A working group is being formed to create a guide for online districts. The purpose of this group is to address the existing gap in guidance for online districts. A preliminary outline for this guide is here. We encourage your feedback and participation in this collaborative effort.

The kickoff meeting is scheduled for Thursday, March 6 at  7 PM (ET) / 6 PM (CT) / 5 PM (MT) / 4 PM (PT). You can join via Zoom using the ID: 818 0170 5778 and the passcode: 2021. 

If you're interested in participating in this writing project as an author, editor, or reviewer, we would love to have you join us! Should you have any inquiries, please contact Jeff B. at a44p69delegate@gmail.com.

Background

Online AA meetings have been around since the advent of the Internet in the mid 90's.  However, until the 71st. Conference in 2021, there was no approved way for an online group to register with The General Service Office (GSO) and join a District.  At that Conference, an Advisory Action was passed that allowed online groups to join a District and, by default, a group registering with GSO was assigned to the District and Area of their primary contact.  This would allow the voice of an online group to be heard as they elected a GSR and joined a District. There was no requirement that an online group accept this default and online groups were free to join whatever District and Area they chose.

With the pandemic raging and many in-person group locations unavailable, new online groups formed rapidly.  This coincided with advances in video meeting technologies like Zoom and Google Meet. These online groups lacked a physical location and many of them were concerned that they were being asked to join an in-person District in a physical Area even though their members might be from all over the US and Canada and even from foreign countries. This led to several Areas in the US and Canada exploring the creation of an online District.

By late 2020 and into 2021, several Areas like Area 72 Western Washington and Area 48 NENY, in the US/Canada General Service structure began discussing the possibility of creating an online District and by the end of 2021; these two Areas had created online Districts.  In the subsequent years, 4 other Areas (Area 12 Delaware, Area 14 North Florida, Area 45 Southern NJ and Area 58 Oregon) created online Districts.  The online District in Area 45 struggled and has since been disbanded but the others remain.

To date, there has been very little guidance for these online Districts from GSO or the General Service Board. The latest edition of the Service Manual now mentions online Districts as a new type of District, in addition to in-person and linguistic districts, referring to them as "virtual" Districts (see page 13). However, there is no additional information about this type of District or guidance for those wishing to create an online District in their Area.

That is the purpose of this writing project. We aim to create a Guide for Online Districts. This guide is intended to assist trusted servant AA members within these Districts and serve as a platform for sharing their experience, strength and hope. 

This guide will also assist those AA members in Areas that do not currently have an online District with the ways that an online District can be created and some of the obstacles that they will face.