Posted by Vice Admiral Sarah Hemenway (President) in Proposal: FCOMM Revision (Open to 9/22/20)

Posted by Fleet Captain Adam W. (EGO) in Proposal: FCOMM Revision (Open to 9/22/20)

(snip)

While I’m satisfied with the proposal as is, Sharon’s suggestion has me thinking. What if we made it explicitly clear that it doesn’t matter if a standard ship closely follows canon or not?

My thought is that we’d leave in the objective requirements of standard ships like rank structure, posting limits, and the current STF year. What we would make clear is that the subjective requirements would not be what defines the difference between a standard ship and an alt-RPG. We’d avoid situations like the Viking where for four years the FComm is fine with it as a standard ship and than a new FComm comes in with a different subjective interpretation. So I think that would solve the issue Sharon is expressing concerns about.

And we could require standard ships to have FComm permission to accept new members in cases where someone isn’t specifically requesting their ship. This would mean a standard ship with a horror or comedy theme couldn’t just accept new members without someone checking on if that makes sense.

During the election Sarah had suggested the possibility of more of our alt-RPG ships being considered standard ships instead. If that’s something the club wants, this would be a way to achieve that.

Adam W.

I already wrote a bunch of this in a reply to Katy’s thread, but I think there is a fundamental difference between new member experience and expectation on, say, the Viking or the Constellation than there is on, say, the Olinski. I’m not quite sure why we would even have Standard Ships vs. Alt-RPGs at that point, though…

A new member shouldn’t be unexpectedly be thrown onto a ship like the Viking or Connie. That’s why I added the FComm approval bit.

The distinction would still apply to differences that are objective, not subjective. And would give the alt ships a chance to define their leadership structure, or point in the timeline, or their posting limits, etc.

My biggest concern is that we are already facing a very limited number of ships being available for new members. This could quickly make the PDept’s job even harder.

Sarah

Then add a disclaimer or explanation that the proposed FComm’s ability to deny a ship would only be for when the ship has a theme not suitable for new members. Or just not suitable for new members period. But one thing we shouldn’t do is place new members on a ship that is not suitable for new members in order to make the Personnel Department feel like it can meet its own policy more easily.

As I’ve been saying, I’m happy with the proposal as you had it. But I thought I’d try throwing out this approach as well. My hope is to end up with what we think we should be doing to match the wording in the bylaw better than those currently match. There’s more than one path to end up there.

Adam W.