The AMS is holding its Annual General Meeting (AGM) on Oct. 22 at 6 p.m.
The AGM provides a direct way for all students at UBC Vancouver to engage with their student government — and even influence how it operates in the following months or even years to come.
The AGM, as stated in the name, is a once-a-year meeting open to all members of the AMS. It’s a requirement under the AMS’ Bylaws, and it serves as a key opportunity for transparency, accountability and student participation.
At the meeting, AMS executives and board members will present updates on their work, share the society’s audited financial statements and respond to questions from students. There are also opportunities for students to vote on important motions, including proposed changes to AMS bylaws.
The full agenda for this year’s meeting is available on the AMS website.
When quorum is met — meaning at least one per cent of the student body, or around 600 students, attend — students can vote to pass motions or change the AMS’s Bylaws, the union's most stable governing documents. Some of the bylaw amendments that could be voted on include:
- Allowing AMS Council to discipline, suspend and remove members of council (which includes both elected councillors and AMS executives) who are “found to be in violation of the Society’s Bylaws, Code, or internal policies;”
- Formally enshrining the AMS’s resource groups into the bylaws;
- Creating procedures to deem a seat on council vacant and the ability to appoint temporary replacements for vacant members.
There is also a proposed motion to support the SkyTrain extension to UBC, an ongoing advocacy goal from the VP external.
Students can register ahead of time through the AMS website, where they’ll receive the Zoom link
If it’s your first time attending or you’re unsure how it all works, don’t worry — the AMS will start the meeting with a brief overview of the format and process.
“We understand … that the average student isn’t going to know how this works,” said AMS President Riley Huntley in an interview with The Ubyssey. “We’ll be having some housekeeping time there at the beginning to fill them in.”
The AGM has historically struggled to meet quorum, only three AGMs in the past 40 years having reached quorum.
This year, Huntley emphasized a renewed focus on both accessibility and engagement to help boost attendance.
“We’re trying to reverse that trend by improving awareness and really trying to make participation easy,” he said, noting that the AMS is hosting the AGM in a hybrid format and scheduling it outside of class hours. Huntley also shared that the AMS has increased promotional efforts, including posters around the Nest and early broadcast emails sent to all students.
To further encourage turnout, the AMS is offering $5,000 worth of prizes, which include things like tuition credit, club funding and a school-year supply of Blue Chip cookies.
Huntley said his team has been “working around the clock” to ensure this year’s AGM is more accessible and meaningful, and that prioritizes both transparency and student trust.
According to an Oct. 20 email statement from Huntley, 1,710 students have registered to attend the AGM.
“I see [the AGM] as an opportunity to continue to build trust between students and the union … for us to have greater engagement with our student body and for them to have a greater understanding of the work that’s going on and where their fees are going towards,” said Huntley.
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