Marine Gandy and Joris Vercammen Elected as NEDA Representatives to Drupal Working Group
Marine Gandy and Joris Vercammen have been elected as the official representatives of the Network of European Drupal Associations (NEDA) to the Drupal Federation Working Group, a major step toward forming a unified European Drupal Federation. The Working Group, initiated by the Drupal Association in collaboration with NEDA, will develop the governance model for this new continental body, designed to support legal, financial, and structural coordination between national and regional associations.
The election opened two seats on the Working Group specifically for NEDA representatives. Candidates were drawn from across Europe, with eligibility open to individuals active in national or regional Drupal associations.
The election saw five strong candidates from across Europe step forward, each representing their national or regional Drupal communities. Marine Gandy represented France, while Joris Vercammen stood for Belgium. Montaña Franco ran from Spain, Will Huggins from the United Kingdom, and Nico Grienauer from Austria.
With high engagement and a narrow vote margin, the election demonstrated the community’s deep investment in the future of European collaboration. In acknowledgement of the strength of all five candidates, NEDA has invited Montaña, Will, and Nico to stay actively involved as advisers in the ongoing process.
Marine Gandy, a PHP developer based in France, has been a driving force in her local and international Drupal communities. She first connected with the community at DrupalCamp Paris 2019 and quickly became deeply involved. In 2020, she joined the board of Drupal France as secretary, later becoming president, and is currently serving a final term as vice-president to ensure a smooth leadership transition.
She organised meetups during the pandemic, launched the DrupalCon Lille Warm Up Tour across French-speaking countries, and co-organised the 2024 DrupalCamp Rennes, with more events on the horizon, including a 2025 BarCamp and France's first Splash Awards in 2026. She also sits on the DrupalCon Europe board, currently chairing the Community Support Committee.
Marine has been part of NEDA since its earliest meetings at DrupalCon Prague, Lille, and Barcelona. In her candidate statement (source), she wrote:
“I want to make sure that this new structure is community-driven and that the decisions are not made with a top-down system… With the DA on board, it’s becoming more of a full-fledged European Drupal Association. It’s great, and we want to see it happen, but I’m also concerned about the governance model and making sure that our vision is preserved.”
She emphasised the importance of building on the collaborative foundation already established, referencing shared initiatives like the Drupal.nl codebase and joint booths at DrupalCon events.
Joris Vercammen, known online as borisson_, is a senior Drupal developer based in Belgium with over 17 years of professional experience in web development. A longtime contributor to the Drupal project, Joris has worked on core and key modules like Search API and Facets, and frequently presents at events across Europe. He also serves on the board of Drupal Belgium and was the lead organiser of the Drupal Developer Days in Leuven.
In his candidate statement (source), Joris emphasised the importance of maintaining community autonomy even as regional structures grow:
“There’s recently been a lot of collaboration for the last couple of years, making the community in Europe a lot stronger. For me it is very important to keep freedom in the choices we make as local associations as well as a group… I would like to join the Working Group with the intention to keep us as a group able to keep doing cool things.”
His focus is on ensuring that any governance model supports local initiative and avoids unnecessary centralisation.
Next Steps: The Working Group and Drupaljam
The Drupal Federation Working Group will begin meeting in June 2025, bringing together NEDA, the Drupal Association, and eventually other continental representatives to collaboratively design the structure of a future European Drupal Federation. This group will explore legal recognition, shared infrastructure, funding models, and ways to better coordinate efforts across Europe while honouring local autonomy.
This new direction will also be at the heart of the NEDA session at Drupaljam, to be held on Wednesday, 21 May 2025. The session will feature the newly elected representatives, Marine and Joris, speaking about their ambitions and priorities. Imre Gmelig Meijling, board member of the Drupal Association, will share the DA’s motivations and vision for the Federation initiative. Esmeralda Tijhoff shall lead a structured discussion based on feedback gathered at DrupalDevDays Leuven, helping refine NEDA’s priorities going forward.
The session invites community leaders, camp organisers, and open-source advocates to participate in shaping what comes next, with plenty of time for questions and open discussion.
The message is clear: this will be built collectively, not behind closed doors.
Sources:
- Candidate statements and election details were published on the official NEDA Drupal.org project page: https://www.drupal.org/project/neda/issues/3522330
- Further highlights and announcements were shared by NEDA via LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/posts/network-of-european-drupal-associations_neda-drupal-neda-ugcPost-7329863537109987328-WILo
- Special thanks to Esmeralda Tijhoff for sharing this important process.
Kazima AbbasKazima Abbas is a sub-editor at The Drop Times
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