# Becoming a Jupyter Foundations and Standards Council member

## Jupyter Foundations and Standards Council responsibilities

Active members actively carry out the responsibilities listed in the [Membership Guide Page](membership_guidelines).

## Active and inactive membership

There are two types of Jupyter Foundations and Standards Council members,
**active** and **inactive**.

Active members:

* Must be nominated by a current member.
* Can be elected as the Software Steering Council representative for Jupyter Foundations and Standards.
* Get a vote in a voting situation.
* Count towards quorum in a voting situation.
* Are expected to participate in a majority of votes.
* Can nominate new members.
* Should actively participate, either synchronously or asynchronously, in meetings.

Inactive members:

* Were previously an active member.
* Do not vote.
* Are not counted towards voting quorum.
* Can "reactivate" at any time by expressing their change in status publicly.

Council members can freely pass between active and inactive at any time. They
*should* publicly state their status change in a pull request that updates the
`council.yml` file with their status change.

This means an inactive member can "reactivate" themselves at any time by
publicly stating their change in status. This does not require a nomination from
another team member.

For example, a member who is going out on a long leave/vacation (>2 weeks) can
temporarily change their status to inactive during their absence and immediately
reactivate upon return. This isn't required, but this can relieve them from
having to watch this repository for any formal votes that happen during their
absence.

## Nominating a new member

For someone to become a Jupyter Foundations and Standards Council member,
they should already be a consistent, positive, productive member of the
community. Newcomers are encouraged to become members after they've shown a
sustained interest in engaging with the community. Moreover, council members
should be interested in **continuing their engagement** over a long-ish period
of time (at least one year), generally putting in more time and effort than
non-members. This doesn't have to mean contributing code - it can be assisting
others in forums/issues, reviewing pull requests, participating in team
meetings, etc.

Any new members must be nominated and championed by an active
Jupyter Foundations and Standards Council member. This process takes the following
steps:

1. The champion should first discuss internally with the
   Jupyter Foundations and Standards Council to ensure that there's general consensus
   before officially starting the process.
2. If there is obvious consensus within the Jupyter Foundations and Standards Council,
   then move to the next step. If not, then an internal vote can be taken to
   protect the privacy of the potential member.
3. A member of the Jupyter Foundations and Standards Council contacts the potential new
   member and asks if they are interested. Don't forget to run them by the
   {ref}`membership_guidelines` page to make sure they understand what they're
   signing up for.

## Membership Maintenance

Every six months, one currently active member should open an issue in the
team-compass repo asking all currently active team members to reply if they
still consider themselves active. If not (or no response is given by a team
member), it will be assumed that they have gone inactive. This will help keep
the active member list up-to-date.

Remember, an inactive member can return at any time by simply changing their
status on the team-compass page.