Present:Lee Anna Clark, Barbara Cornblatt, Nancy Docherty, Robert Dworkin, Diane Gooding, Michael Green, Ray Knight, Susan Mineka, Keith Nuechterlein, Michael Raulin, Steve Silverstein, Tom Widiger, Michael Young
Absent: Robert Bilder, Deborah Levy, Elaine Walker
The meeting was called to order by Barbara Cornblatt.
I. The Board expressed appreciation to Richard Davidson, Local Host, and Michael Green, Program Chair, for an excellent meeting.
II. Plans for future Annual Meetings: The 2002 Annual Meeting will be held in San Francisco, hosted by Ann Kring. Based on previous discussion, it was decided that conference sites should be selected three or four years ahead. Tentative plans for subsequent meeting sites were presented and approved. They are as follows: 2003 in Toronto, hosted by Richard Steffy; 2004 in Miami, hosted by Sheri Johnson; 2005 in St. Louis, hosted by Deanna Barch.
III. Development Committee: Barbara Cornblatt reported on the task force that met to discuss the issue of external sponsorship of future meetings. She proposed that a Development Committee be formed, on a trial basis for the next two or three years, to seek potential sources of ongoing financial support for the Society. This committee would consider issues around this kind of funding, explore avenues for funding, and report to the Board at the next meeting (2002). The proposal was approved unanimously. The committee will be co-chaired by Barbara Cornblatt and Michael Green. Questions raised by the Board for consideration by the committee included (A) the amount of funding to be sought (25K or 50K per year?), (B) the extent to which the Society might or might not be willing to advertise for their sponsors, (C) procedures for ensuring fairness to potential sponsors, (D) ways of using such funds that would be helpful to the Society without making its functioning irrevocably dependent on outside sponsorship, and (E) procedures for soliciting support.
IV. Website Development: Barbara Cornblatt reported that the committee to discuss website development was scheduled to meet later that day. Pursuant to the Boardís discussion of the matter at the Thursday meeting, she proposed that the committee be authorized to contract out the implementation of the website improvement and maintenance, and that up to $10,000 be dedicated to the website improvement, with additional funds for maintenance and periodic updating. This proposal was approved unanimously. The committee will report to the Board on their meeting by e-mail. Members of the Website Development Committee are Lee Anna Clark, Michael Green, Ray Knight, Michael Obuchowski, and Michael Raulin. Secretary Nancy Docherty and Treasurer Michael Young also will participate as needed. Some suggestions were made for new items that might be included on the website: (A) Lists of the responsibilities of each of the officers and the board members of the Society; (B) A history of the Society, including such things as pictures of Zubin Award winners and Presidents, and names of Smadar Levin Award winners. It was proposed and approved unanimously that Milton Strauss be asked to serve as Society historian, to develop historical material for addition to the website and also to organize the Society's paper archives. He was invited into the meeting, where he agreed to take on these tasks. At his request Ray Knight agreed to help.
V. Newsletter: Diane Gooding, the new Newsletter Editor, talked about plans for this year. Some consideration was given to having three issues per year rather than two. It was decided to have two for this year and then to revisit the question at next yearís meeting. The idea was raised that maybe the newsletter could be e-mailed to members rather than mailed. However, the Editor and some Board members thought people would be more likely to read it if it came by regular mail, so the decision was made to continue mailing it. Items suggested for this year's newsletters included: the Presidentís columns; dates and locations of future meetings; a list of new members; short articles or thought pieces by members; lists of recent or in press publications; follow-up information from the meeting, e.g., references for central articles by the key speakers, and/or additional information on grant mechanisms and human subjects issues, which were the topics at the discussion lunches.
VI. SRP 2002: Steve Silverstein was welcomed as next year's Program Chair. The Board discussed two changes in this yearís program that might be relevant to planning for next year. (A) Smadar Levin Award procedures: A new set of procedures was tried this year. Proposals were read and judged before the meeting, and the winner then presented her study as a talk at the meeting. Although the talk was very well received, the Board decided to go back to the old procedures, whereby the judges examine candidatesí posters in the Thursday evening poster session, question them about their projects, and then confer before selecting the winner. Members thought the member-student interaction that this procedure promoted was important. An additional suggestion was made that students submitting regular poster presentations for next year might be invited to list three members who they would like to have visit the poster. (B) Discussion lunches: Board members were very positive about the discussion lunches that were added to the program this year, and thought it would be a good idea to have something similar in future years.
VII. The meeting was adjourned.