This month, we got to hold our public board meeting, well, in public. Mostly all together in Barcelona, we met in the middle of DrupalCon to share some updates with the board and community. As always, if you want to catch up on all the details, you can find everything you need to know about the meeting online, including minutes, materials, and a video recording. If you're just here for a summary view, read on!

Drupal 8 Accelerate is fully funded

Early in 2015 we set out to do something that we have never done before: raise $250,000 to get the next release of Drupal out the door. I am thrilled to share that we met that goal at DrupalCon Barcelona, with the last donation coming in from Exove just before Dries took the stage for his keynote. Drupal 8 Accelerate allowed the Drupal core maintainers to identify issues that needed immediate attention and pay contributors to make their time available. Additionally, community members were able to propose sprints and other initiatives to help crush D8 release blockers. We've made over 50 grants around the globe through the program, resolving hundreds of issues. We want to thank everyone in the community who donated and helped spread the word about the campaign, including our anchor donors, Acquia, Appnovation, Palantir.net, Phase2, Wunderkraut, PreviousNext, and Drupalize.me.

Drupal 8 release candidate communications plan

We all heard some very exciting news during the Barcelona #Driesnote. Unless we come across any major unexpected hiccups, we'll have a Drupal 8 release candidate ("RC") on October 7. At the Association, we're gearing up to work with the community to shout the RC news, and then the full release news, from the rooftops. We shared the plan at the public board meeting, and are asking the community for help in two specific areas. First, we need your help educating people about Drupal 8 features and how they can be used. We also need your help sharing how Drupal 8 will meet the needs of specific audiences. We'll be updating the Drupal 8 landing page over the next few weeks and want to fill it with all of your great work. Here's the kind of content we're looking for:

Here's how you can share in the D8 release fun:

• Planning on hosting a release party? Share the details and we'll help spread the word about your event.
• Are you already building sites with Drupal 8? Share a link in social media and tag it #madewithdrupal8. You can also add it to the list on groups.drupal.org.
• If you have demos, white papers, blog posts, or some other materials that talk about the virtues of D8, share it on social media and tag it #drupal8rc.

2016 at-large board elections

Every year the Drupal commmunity nominates and elects one individual to serve a 2-year term on the Association board of directors. If you're interested in what the board does and why you might want to consider running, you can check out this blog post and presentation from last year. We'll be holding the next elections in the first three months of 2016, so we took some time in Barcelona to talk about the process. You can review the presentation from the meeting, and here are the key dates for the next election:

• Nominations (February 1-19, 2016)
• Meet the candidates (February 22 - March 4, 2016)
  • February 23 session at 7am Pacific
  • February 24 session at noon Pacific
  • February 25 session at 4pm Pacific
• Voting (March 7-18)
• Ratification and communication (March 25)

Cake for Angie

We also took a moment to thank long-time board member Angie Byron (webchick) for her service on the board. Angie's term ends in November, and she is stepping down from her board role to focus on making the Drupal 8 release as big as possible. One a personal note, I am so grateful for the opportunity to work with Angie so closely for so long. Her ability to be honest and kind at the same time is something that I have tried to learn from every time I interact with her. Thank you Angie for everything I have been able to learn from you.