2006 Section Advisory Committee Report
December 2005 Meeting:
The first SAC meeting took place in early December 2005
as a dinner meeting prior to the annual meeting to select the candidate
slate for the council- and president –elect offices. Traditionally, the
primary function of the December meeting is to select time-slots for the
sectional distinguished lecturers to be held at the subsequent Experimental
Biology Meeting, e.g., in San Francisco. Also, residual items for the
upcoming EB meeting and updates from the Strategic Retreat were covered.
One of the shortcomings of the annual December meeting
is that, most of the time, there are considerable Section Chairs not in
attendance since many of these individuals are nominated as candidates for
the APS Council. As such, most of the “pinch hitters” are not well informed
of what is actually going on within their respective sectional activities.
Outcomes of the December Meeting
The council should evaluate the utility of having such
a meeting at that time of year in the current format as little headway is
accomplished beyond selection of the distinguished lectureship time-frames
at the EB meeting.
April SAC Meeting
The SAC meeting was held prior to the 2006 EB/Council
meeting and it was very interactive and productive with a full agenda being
covered. Only one SAC member (Respiratory) was not in attendance. The
following items comprised the agenda: 1) discussion of relevant issue with
the Chairs of other APS committees (Communications, Public Affairs, Animal
Care and Experimentation, and Membership); 2) Section Reports; 3) Sectional
Awards (processes and mechanisms to recognize honor-award winners); 4) APS
Strategic Plan: Implementation Strategies Impacting the SAC; 5) New and
Dropped Member Communications; and 6) Other Business.
Outcomes of the April Meeting
SAC Chairs gained considerable insight from the
interaction with Chairs of other APS Committees. It was agreed that such
interactions should be held routinely, because the deliberations will
bolster Sectional activities on several fronts, especially in membership
retention and recruitment of new members, and in the utilization of the
public affairs office as a valuable resource.
The SAC unanimously passed a proposal to have the final
Sectional Reports received by May 15 each year. This time-frame will enable
each section to include a variety of actions that occur during their
steering committee deliberations, which normally take place after the SAC
meeting is held at the EB meeting. This action was presented to and accepted
by the Council at the Spring Meeting held at EB.
The SAC strongly endorsed the APS strategic plan
implementation process and its use of task forces to address key issues in
The Plan. The SAC expressed enthusiasm for playing a role in The Plan
implementation process, especially in the categories of Direction 1,
Strategy 2 and in Direction 2, Strategy 1&2. Specifically the members were
interested in focusing on enhancing regional chapters and alternative venues
for APS sponsored meetings. Further, the SAC was enthusiastic in supporting
enhancement of the international membership base and becoming more
aggressive in the recruitment and retention of membership within the
sections, especially at the level of student membership.
The SAC agreed in principle to: a) participate in the
“Living Scholars Program” by having each section provide a list of
candidates suitable for the program as presently conceived for
implementation (It seems appropriate for the Council to provide a set of
guidelines for implementing the program if it is to become viable); and b)
support the concept of a grass-roots section(s)-driven type of regional
meeting format, which will be submitted for review by the Task Force to be
assembled on chapters and regional meetings, which will be a key task-force
for implementing the Strategic Plan.
Synopsis of Relevant Items/Issues Redacted From the
Sectional Reports
All sections submitted final reports with the exception
of the Respiration Section.
With the exception of the GI& Liver, NCAR, and Teaching
Sections all the other sections reported financial stability in meeting its
primary goals of operation.
All sections reported a robust student award program
operating at the pre-doctoral, postdoctoral and beginning investigator
level.
All sections have active social interactions at the EB
meeting ranging from formal banquets to business meeting reception socials.
These venues are generally used to recognize the award winners. The CV
section raised $20,000.00 to fund its banquet.
CV Section has utilized novel approach of seeking
active discussions with SRAs of NIH study sections impacting its membership.
This is an item that more sections should be looking into given the nature
of the funding situation at NIH.
Some sections are utilizing the Sectional Distinguished
Lectures for generating Review Articles for its primary APS Journal. This is
an un-tapped area for keeping the various disciplines up to date and better
utilizing the various journal entities.
Many sections report strong participation of its
memberships now serving on APS committees. CVS reports 60 members being
involved.
Most sections report active interaction with one or
more other sections in forming programmatic interactions.
It appears that all sections are publishing two
newsletters a year in communicating with its membership. Some are more
informative than others.
All sections report active participation of its Trainee
and Industry appointments on the steering committees.
All sections are making concerted efforts to energize
their steering committees by either appointing more members or seeking
involvement of younger, recognized awardees for involvement.
Most sections acknowledged satisfaction with the
quality of recent meeting in terms of program content and the quality of the
subject matter, including the number and quality of the abstract award
applications.
Most sections expressed an interest in enhancing the
visibility of new investigators and graduate students within the EB program
format. This is an area that needs to be better flushed out.
In general, the sections are very much satisfied with
resources and assistance being provided by the APS.
Areas Needing Fine Tuning
Tweaking of the Web Server for Sectional use to
communicate with their constituency and for submitting award applications
on-line.
The Hand Book For Sections and the SOPs need to be up
dated and this should be an action item delivered to the sections to get
them in synch with the new strategic plan and its implementation.
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