American Society for Engineering Education

MEMORANDUM

 

Date:               November 16, 2004

 

To:                   ASEE IL/IN Executive Board

 

From:               Mark C. Johnson

                        Secretary, ASEE IL/IN Section

                        Phone: 765 494-0636

                        email: mcjohnso@purdue.edu

 

Re:                   October 8, 2004 IL/IN Executive Board Meeting Minutes

 

On October 8, 2004 from approximately 1:00-6:00pm, the IL/IN executive board met at Northern Illinois University, DeKalb, IL.

 

In attendance were:

 

Hosni Abu-Mulaweh, Indiana University / Purdue University, Fort Wayne, IN

Winfred Anakwa, Bradley University, Peoria, IL

Abul Azad, Northern Illinois University - Dekalb, IL, 2005 Conference Co-Chair

Radha Bal, Northern Illinois University - Dekalb, IL, 2005 Conference Co-Chair

Debbie Brue, Northern Illinois University - Dekalb, IL, Director of External Programs

David Devine, Indiana University / Purdue University, Fort Wayne, IN

Heidi Diefes-Dux, Purdue UniversityWest Lafayette, IN, Section Ex-Chair

Robert Hoffinger, Purdue University - New Albany, IN, Section Campus Rep.

            Mark C. Johnson, Purdue UniversityWest Lafayette, IN, Secretary/Webmaster

            Michael Kozak, Purdue University - Richmond, IN, Section Chair

            Carmine Polito, Valparaiso Universtiy - Valparaiso, IN, Treasurer

            Gary Steffen, Indiana University / Purdue University, Fort Wayne, IN

            Doug Tougaw, Valparaiso University - Valparaiso, IN

            Sandra Yost, University of Detroit Mercy, Detroit, MI, Zone II Chair

 

The following notes have been re-grouped somewhat to match the order of topics in the agenda. Original, unedited notes are available from Mark Johnson. Notes for the first 30 minutes were taken by Doug Tougaw in Mark Johnson’s absence. Items requiring action have been underlined.

 

1. Secretary's report - MCJ

 

Still need to censor portions past minutes before posting on web site - to remove items that must be kept confidential - so far, discussions regarding selection of award recipients are the only matters considered confidential.

 

2. Treasurer's report - CP

 

            Based on June 30 figures

            BASS Account: $12,009.33 and growing

            Operating Account: $59.96. $550 added at end of September

 

            Nearly all conference expenses can come out of BASS.

 

3. Section bylaws update - HDD, DT

 

National constitution only recognizes by-laws, but IL/IN has both constitution and by-laws. HDD moved, DT seconded combining section by-laws and constitution to comply with national constitution. Ammended by-laws must be approved by exec. committee, then mailed to membership 30 days before general meeting at 2005 section conference.

 

Term of chair - MK - 2 years as chair elect, 2 years as chair, 2 years as ex-chair may be too many for some candidates. HDD & DT are now or have been in this situation, don’t see as problem.

 

HDD - a nominating committee preferable to current “scrounging” of officers

 

SY - give leeway in writing by-laws with regard to major appointed positions. Other appointed positions can be discretion of chair.

 

HDD

            intend to remove a lot of committees from bylaws

            must to have awards chair

            could have bylaws ready for vote early next semester

            HDD & DT willing to do this

 

Mike - Motion to merge documents (const & bylaws), Doug 2nd, unanimous

 

4. Newsletter update

 

No report as newsletter chair, Robert Bloompott could not attend.

 

5. Webmaster report

 

MK - suggesting having 2nd webmaster as backup

GS - willing to help with this

RB, AA - have set up 2005 conference site. Conference site and section site need to link to each other (action for MCJ, RB, and AA)

 

6. Officers 2005/2006

 

            HDD - need to identify new chair elect.  Bob Hofinger is chair elect for this year

           

            Carmine is current & ongoing treasurer. 

           

Will treasurer be 2 yr or 3 yr? CP - recommend decoupling term from 2 year terms proposed for other offices.

 

            HDD - recommends 2 year treasurer because transition is a lot of trouble

 

After some discussion, it was concluded that a 3 year treasurer’s term could be in order.

 

Past chair (HDD)- can function as awards chair if necessary and would handle nominations of new officers

 

            Awards chair - Dennis Kroll, Bradly Univ. (had planned to be here, couldn’t)

 

            Program chair 2005 - AA, RB

           

            Newsletter - Bob Bloompott

 

Mark Johnson - webmaster & secretary - willing to continue. No other volunteers.

 

Mark/Mike/Heidi - discussion -  could split the secretary & webmaster positions in the future. There is no particular reason why they need to be combined.

 

            HDD - have to have a slate of officers at section mtg.

 

            HDD, DT will be nominating committee, look for chair elect & maybe secretary

 

7. Lessons learned from spring 2004 section meeting

 

HDD - Have to get receipts and confirmations to registrants immediately. Better signage for rooms.

 

WA - Proceedings were not well put together.

 

DT - think 2 universities hosting not as successful as hoped - single point of contact or 2 points of contact but at same institution preferable for communication purposes.

 

CP - paper reviews should be spread out among different institutions

 

HDD - recommend to AA & RB that they do a call for reviewers - can put on list serve

 

RB - do reviewers have to be in region? RH, others - not in particular. DT - don’t think it will be a problem to find adequate reviewers within region.

 

MK - how many reviewers is enough? - expecting 50 papers. RH - at least 2-3 reviewers per paper -> 50 reviewers. DT - 2 reviewers sufficient, could use authors as pool for reviewers

 

RH - can use session moderator as deciding vote on papers where there is a tie vote between 2 reviewers

 

8. Zone Chair comments - SY

 

Has succeeded J.P. Mohsen - invites concerns, input

 

Need to know who the outstanding teaching award winner was for 2004 & best paper. Best teacher - Douglas Stamps from Univ. of Evansville

 

Have to select best zone paper from best sec papers. Don’t have to do this for best teacher - all are recognized at national conference. Letters from students helpful for best teacher. Awards chair needs to collect info to support nomination. Need copy of best paper.

 

HDD - align our criteria (best teach) with national? SY - bring up at Jan. board meeting, but won’t change in time for Jan. nomination submission.

 

Mike - re criteria - last year, just pulled criteria from national web site

 

Each section puts forth its best teacher. HDD - using national criteria simplifies things when passing on to national.

 

National going to be taking a look at division by-laws - many are off track. Review of section by-laws will probably come after that.

 

Will report to national that all 3 sections in zone have internally reviewed by-laws recently.

 

Best zone papers are included in national conference the following year. (not the same year)

 

DT was co-author on best paper (Eric Johnson, primary author)

 

RB - has a concern for Sandy - relatively high cost of national conference - hard to get funds. SY - ASEE goal is to break even on conference, so doubt that there is much room to cut & tries to go to less expensive cities. For some people, ASEE national comes out of own pocket.

 

Note: conference account is a completely separate operation from national organization.

 

Does everybody know about national outstanding teaching medal (maybe $ award in future). Most sections have put in $2k each to fund this. Each section’s outstanding engineering educator will compete. Make sure candidate has all materials to be able to compete.

 

SY - all set for IL/IN with respect to this year’s outstanding teacher

 

HDD & several others, don’t like new national website - has trouble finding CAPS, member directories - SY will take concerns back to national

 

MCJ - noticed that IL/IN chair listed incorrectly

 

Action item - chair (MK) will ensure that right officers are listed on national web site.

 

 


9. Spring 2005 section meeting items, especially the budget:

 

DB - provided initial draft of budget (attached), revised budget (attached) based on discussions noted below. Line numbers refer to lines in initial draft.

 

RB - presented web site for next section conference. Favorable comments from several.

 

RH - couple of years ago, prepared a paper on “how to prepare a paper”. Last year, tried to use FIE format, but a lot of complains - 2 columns was problem.

 

MK - found sample paper from DT (originally RH) very helpful as sample paper to cut and paste into.

 

AA & RB - have updated author instructions.

 

RB - why not just provide CD of papers & hard copy only of abstracts. NIU prepared to do this.

 

MK - one of the issues - not having hard copy of paper to look at during the talk.

 

Discussion - providing printer for papers. RB - think that having printer poses too many problems. DT likes idea - SY et al - could take PC + printer out of budget.

 

SY - suggest just inform author that attendees will only have CD, author welcome to bring hardcopies to session.

 

Discussed limited access to papers on web site? Gary, others?  Could password the web site.

 

MK - Why limit access to papers?  HDD - think it would be a good selling point to have papers freely accessible on web site. (implied action item for AA, RB, MCJ)

 

MK - is web site storage an issue? MCJ - not so far, no where close to filling current 500M allocation from readyhosting.com.

 

DB from NIU - presented budget for conference. Distributed initial spreadsheet (attached) to attendees

 

DB is director of external programs for NIU. University outreach services does registration - costs $5/person.

 

Question of who pays for mailings - HDD - we (IL/IN) do. National just supplies mailing labels.

 

MK - action item - contact Dwight Wardell at national to get mail labels & electronic listing. Heidi, can also post all materials via list serve. One hardcopy mailing is good.

 

SY - actually, national will supply up to 4 sets of mailing labels.

 

DT - only Chair & one other can send to national mailing list & can’t look at that list - national is careful about this.

 

MK - can we get electronic listing from national? DT - no. HDD - think that has changed - was able to get electronic list last year.

 

DB - prefer electronic list - NIU can print direct to envelopes rather than peeling labels.

 

AA - as conf progrma chair - can make request to national - Dwight Wardell - for mailing list.

 

DB - Explained what Sunk costs, Fixed costs, and Variable costs refer to on spreadsheet. Sunk refers to costs not affected by the number of people who attend. Fixed refer to costs associated with pre-determined attendees who won’t be paying conference registration. Variable refers to per-person costs assocated with paying attendees.

 

DB estimate - NIU $4400 in hole relative to $100 per person. DT - 2 years ago, conf at Valpo only cost about $5k.

 

Figured out that a lot of costs will reduce - can strike line 29, 30, 46(?) , 31 much smaller (not full dinner) - mainly because non-paying attendee costs not nearly as much as estimated. (subsequent notes clarify this)

 

HDD - recommend social event Friday evening. Board meeting Friday evening.

 

DT- 2 years ago - Fri night ice cream social

 

Decision on Friday/Buffet dinner?

 

HDD - last year had about 35 people for dinner & speaker.

 

DT - 3-4 years ago, Oer-Deuvres Fri evening were nice

 

RB - need to identify Friday speaker

 

HDD - don’t see central IN people getting to DeKalb very early on Fri. 7pm a reasonable time.

 

DB - Saturday lunch - HDD, DT - lunch is major hot meal for section meeting

 

Conclusion regarding Saturday lunch/dinner - nice lunch, but quick food in evening

 

DB - will provide detailed revised budget spreadsheet - DONE, copy attached

 

Saturday dinner - col 6 $150 fixed (MK) - line 35 -

 

DB - all fixed costs going by way side - this was accounting for people who receive complimenatary meals. Can be struck for several line items

 

How many students will we feed/ - need to include in fixed.

 

DB - pizza ok for Sat evening? Consensus - yes.

 

Parking passes? DB $4/person from NIU on Friday.

 

HDD - if people only arrive Fri 7:00 - no parking fees? DB - Yes.

 

Daytime Friday permits only an issue for exec comm who are here Fri afternoon.

 

Exec board meeting will be around 4pm Fri.

 

line 45 - DB - printed materials for participants? Abstracts only $60.

 

line 46 - DB - Nice folders for people to take home? SY - do we have possible industrial sponsor for this?. Abul/Radha will look into.

 

DT - note - hardcopy proceedings only cost $10. $6.50 per CD isn’t much savings. Could try to get sponsors. DT - $6.50 seems high. May do cheaper ourselves.  After much discussion, may not get much cheaper.

 

line 51 DB - Proj display boards for student posters. Qty 35 is probably high. HDD - will be lucky to get 20 & some students bring own displays.

 

line 55 - DB - student help from technology

 

line 56 - DB - CEET Administrative fee - can drop this if “we help out & get things in early”

 

line 61 - DB - NIU outreach services reg fee - handling registration & receipt mailing $5/person - online & telephone registrars

 

line 63 - DB - credit card fee (just in case)

 

line 62 - DB - non-paying people certs? Continuing education certificates? - Several responses - No Need. However, IL will require this for “Professional Engineers” - not for Professors. Can put order form into folder & requester can order it. Non-paying people are students won’t need.

 

line 64 - DB - diploma covers for speakers?  After discussion -  No. delete. but give dinner to keynote.

 

line 65 - DB deleting cups and “huskie” for speakers (after some discussion)

 

line 66 DB - deleted

 

MK - may be cheaper to give CEU’s to everybody instead of keeping track of

 

DT to DB - keep in mind section will pay the bills, i.e., NIU won’t be stuck for additional things that are discovered.

 

MK - can meals be in this bldg? RB has room in mind, but it only handles 80 people.

 

MK - Motion to accept revised budget. 2nd DT. No discussion. Unanimous approval.

 

(discussed during meal after meeting)

 

RB - conference fee will be $100 - ok by exec committee. $20 penalty for late reg. Last year’s $80 was a fluke - food costs were extremely low at ICC.

 

10. Announcement/call for papers

 

AA/RB distributed CFP (paper and student poster), online http://www.ceet.niu.edu/ASEE_ILIN/

 

RB - plan to call all deans/dept chairs? - DT - that is still a lot of people.

 

SY - suggest doing campus reps

 

HDD - any institutional member of ASEE would get mailings.

 

MK - can AA send a separate email to deans & dept heads?

 

A -> Mike -you need to sign the letter

 

HDD - now, online, can do full address search on all members (showed us)

 

DT - for Valpo conf - letter to Deans & Dept heads did make a difference

 

RB/AA - will send letter to deans & dept heads.

 

HDD - could use electronic signature on paper (Mike gave sheet with signature to Abul for this)

 

Group reviewed/edited Dean’s letter, Call for Abstracts. re topic list - “include but not limited to”. “innovative curricula” repeated. Put “work-in-progress” in topic list & remove from letter. Call for Student Poster Abstract. Other minor edits.

 

HDD - have never pursued making students have faculty member registered, although this requirement was stated.

 

RB - add “from Faculty Advisors” to Call for posters? Heidi - others - recommend not, it is common for students to submit abstract.

 

RH - current wording could mislead people into thinking that there are 5 prize categories. Discussed other wordings.

 

DT suggested a wording that solves problem re students entering in 5 categories thinking that there are 5 awards. DT - eliminate bullet list & just write one sentence that says that student submissions are welcome from… will be accepted from any academic level, UG research and multidisciplinary projects are welcome.

 

DT has changes to 1st page, MK - changes to 2nd page, MK has most poster call changes, DT has words re student categories (above)

 

HDD - can use same letter for general members as for Deans - delete “Deans & heads” addressees and address to all members.

 

11. Parking arrangements - Discussed in item #9

 


12. Schedule of events

 

Schedule - distributed preliminary program schedule from AA/RB. (Summary of revised schedule listed below)

 

RB -> not planning interactive sessions. Wasn’t much response last year.

 

Registration - SY - 1 hr before reception? RB - start registration at 6, reception at 7-8 4pm is board meeting

 

DT - 8 pm - ? welcome and keynote

 

RB - mentioned a keynote speaker - Tom McDunn - former president of Ingersoll Milling, now director for an advanced manufacturing research center - Eiger lab. Haven’t spoken to him yet, but plan to.

 

RB - another possible name in mind - Quarterman Lee from Kansas - a famous consultant on lean manufacturing. Would probably cost us $1200 to bring him.

 

SY - ASEE president Sherra Kerns has mentioned that sections can get someone from ASEE headquarters to come to speak

 

HDD - last year, J.P. got the ASEE president here

 

SY will make contact for either Fri night or Sat morning to get president or other officer here.

 

RH - keynote in morning? lunch? HDD - can be flexible on this. DT - likes morning keynotes at national conference. That’s how we did it at Valpo. SY - morning keynote avoids meal noise. HDD - probably should leave flexible with respect to schedule of the speaker.

 

SY will contact president & give option of either time.

 

MK - any other speaker suggestions. DT - have Carmine speak regarding engineers without borders. Carmine - would be glad to. Carmine gave overview of project that he led -  set up windmills & irrigation in Kenya. Valpo 1st school outside of Colorado to have project, but is now booming at many campuses.

 

DT/CP - could even have 3 speakers - Fri PM, Sat AM, Sat lunch (e.g., McDunn, ASEE pres, Carmine) If not ASEE pres, perhaps another national officer.

 

HDD - suggest 7:00 reception, 7:30 welcome & keynote (people probably won’t come a full hour ahead of keynote)

 

RB - negotiated a $59 rate at best local hotel (Baymont Inn). Only disadvantage is that better hotel isn’t close to good place for social. Recommend Johnny’s Char-House for Social. Note: Baymont Inn will be named as official conference site. People will need to metion ASEE meeting to get conference rate.

 

MK - suggest 9-? social time

 

8-8:10 opening remarks

 

8:10-9:00 keynote

 

CP - does lunch & section meeting need to be 2 hours 15 minutes? If in same bldg, don’t need to be so long. Could create more time for speaker.

 

DT wrote on white board & made changes as discussed

 

8-8:15 welcome

8:15 keynote speaker

9:15 refreshment break

9:30-10:30 tech session 1 Doug - prefer 1hr over 2 hr tech sessions - easier to sync times of papers

10:30   refreshment break

10:45 Tech session 2

11:45 break

12:00-1:30 lunch & speaker

1:30-1:45 break

1:30 student posters

2:00 tech session 3

3:00 refreshment break

3:15-4:15 tech session 4

4:15-4:30 break

4:30-5:00 closing ceremony

5:00-5:30 pizza & farewell

 

13. Board meeting time and place - 4pm Friday as discussed earlier.

 

14. Featured speaker/Meal - discussed in items 9 and 12

 

15. Paper reviewers - discussed at end of item 7

 

16. Presentation rooms - Tour of facility

 

Entire conference will take place in the Engineering Building

 

Room 101 - nice tiered lecture hall capacity 120 - for keynotes

 

Continental breakfast in atrium 1st floor, but may be too crowded

 

Rm 141 could be used for breakfast

 

DT - suggest - register in lobby instead & use “non-smart” room on 2nd floor for breakfast.

 

went to another large “smart” classroom, capacity approx. 70 on 2nd floor - pizza/closing session in here. Note: proposed breakfast room only slightly smaller.

 

lunch in commons area outside library, capacity approx. 80

 

CP - how about putting food line in nearby room to allow more room for dining

 

RB - there is a classroom and a smaller commons area nearby for foodline & students

 

HDD - hope to pull in over 100 - RB will check on bigger rooms for lunch

 

DT - perhaps still better to keep it in same building because we will have control over the rooms

 

HDD - if keynote speaker has slides we will have to bring in equipment (AA/RB)

 

17. Student poster session - discussed in items 9 and 11

 

18. Awards

 

Re teacher award - can renominate people who didn’t win last time. Existing recommendation packet useful.

 

CP - how about Feb 1 nomination deadline with March 1 reviewer deadline. DT - previously waited till conference to announce, decide on winner. Generally, just hint to person that they should be at the conference.

 

CP - is a month long enough to notify winner? MK - last year there wasn’t even that much lead time.

 

MK - there is a time lag for packages to go to national & come back to us. Perhaps we could hold them till next national deadline.

 

SY - note - some people will still send applications to national because that is what is posted on natl web site. MK - took several weeks to get the app packages back from natl.

 

DT - suggest internal deadline 1mo after natl deadline & 2 weeks review due Mar 1.

 

HDD - confused re what happens when people submit teacher award (or any award) to national by Jan 15. Is national assuming that they are going for current year national award? SY - no.

 

CP - suggest booking room for as yet unnamed winner - give name later.

 

On whiteboard - deadline list (DT)

 

Jan 15 natl deadline

 

Feb 1 application deadline to awards chair

 

Mar 1 decision complete - inform winner

 

Apr 1 conference

 

HDD - suggest use forms on line, but tell people to send directly to section awards chair. Send an email to members, don’t reference national page, provide forms & instructions. Just in case someone went

 

MCJ - ACTION - post teacher award info on web site - get from Heidi.

 

(discussion of award amounts took place during meal after meeting)

 

MK - only loose end - didn’t discuss amount of awards.  Was $100 before.

 

CP - propose $200 for outstanding teacher, $50 for best paper

 

DT - best paper award doesn’t need large award - certificate & honor is best thing. re teacher - would be more meaningful to contribute something that benefits their research/teaching & larger amount. Mike - concern - some schools may take overhead out of it. Sandy - could ask user how they will use the money. Carmine - can ask check to be cut directly to organization. Doug - retract suggestion - give to the individual unless person wants it to be made to someone else.

 

19. Attendee receipts - discussed in item 7.

 

20. Additional business (not on original agenda) - use of $12,000 BASS account funds & what executive committee expenses can be reimbursed

 

MK - section has excess in BASS acct $12k - what should we be doing with it.

 

Discussion -

 

            Pay for section chair to go to national

 

            CP - pay teacher winner’s travel to national + $500 award.

 

            Another idea, flat $1k winner has option to use for trip

 

            HDD - prefer smaller fixed amount + pay travel to national if they go

 

SY - what about inviting area teachers to conference - perhaps on Friday

 

HDD - pehaps have teachers come just Sat afternoon (after lunch) for student posters and tech sessions (especialy if tech session could be geared to that audience).

 

RH - mentioned trying to get a class to conf - MK - probably couldn’t get a class here on a Sat.

 

DT - another proposal - $500 towards travel of best teacher to national conference

 

Final consensus regarding section conference award amounts (except posters)

 

$100 poster

$100 best paper

$500 oustanding teacher + 500 for travel to either best paper and/or teacher if needs to go to national

 

CP - last year for poster winners - gave out $50 gift certificates to Barnes and Noble. HD - get $25 gift cards - makes large team winners easier to manage (since each student team members gets gift certificate)

 

HDD, Doug - one year some time ago, gave cash, was not a good idea

 

RB - propose give section chair $500 towards travel to national

 

MK - to both chair and chair-elect? Bob - more important for chair elect to prepare him to be chair. CP - Does 2 year chair elect get sent twice. No - whoever is going to be chair next year is sent.

 

Also discussed earlier travel reimbursement for exec committee members coming to meeting. Perhaps also pay for hotel.  CP - send receipts to treasurer.

 

DT - who would be eligible for travel reimbursement?  HDD - past chair is considered exec committee member. MK - all who “attend”? RH - can’t leave it that open. DT - only pay expenses for exec board comm meeting, not necessarly section conference. MK, CP - don’t see why that is different.  Mike … “board and invited members” for reimbursement.

 

Unit directors - HD - represent following fields of interest - instruction, research, etc. There is a description of this in by-laws. Note: ASEE national policy statement - while leadership considered voluntary, although some defrayal of expenses is allowable if employer doesn’t do it. Reimbursement for national conference not provided. CP will contact national to ask about this.

 

Extended discussion during meal of what can be reimbursed. Also discussed who is responsible for what risk regarding conference expenses. SY - national can loan $1k seed money for conference to cover initial expenses before reg fees come in, has to be repaid. If NIU needs to overspend by more than $1k, overage must be approved by exec board.

 

HDD - pay base registration for award winner at national.

 

DT

at fall meeting all expenses of exec members - send receipts

at spring conference meeting is not reimbursed - only out of concern for outgo

national - chair to be will get base registration, no travel reimbursement

if either best paper or teacher advances to national, we pay base reg.

current IRS appr mileage rate 37c