The Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers, Inc.

IEEE Baltimore Section

IEEE ExCom Section Meeting

March 8, 2004

Attendees

X Jeff Friedhoffer – Chair

Brian Sequeira – Vice Chair

X Boris Gramatikov – Secretary

X Roberto Cuellar – Treasurer

X John Dentler – Continuing Education

Christopher Nemarich – Program Director

X Neville Jacobs – Student Activities

Tom Patton – Awards

Joseph Pollitt – Audits & Bylaws

Carole Carey – Professional Activities 1 / ESB Rep

Hoosamuddin Bandukwalla – Professional Activities 2

Vil Arafiles – Membership Development

X Ron Aloysius – Newsletter Editor

Thad Welch – Annapolis subsection

X Dave Boyd – Annapolis subsection

X Eric Henlon – PES Chair

David Sherman – EMB

X Walt Willing – Chair Reliability

X Garth McKenzie – Chair Computer Society

Bill Dixon – Acting Chair AES

X Robert Berkovits – Chair EMC

Wole Akpose – GOLD

Domenic Georgantas – GOLD

X Tina Kohler – WIE

Leonard Bathgate IAS Treasurer & Publications

Mel Hotz – Chairman of the Maryland State of Licensed Professional Engineers

X Jay Gamerman – IEEE Member

X Linda Perry – Regional Activities Board (RAB)
X Jerry Gibbon - R2 Chair, South Area

X Karl Anderson – New member

Jeff Friedhoffer chaired the meeting, which was called to order at 6:30 pm.

Executive Reports

Section Chair (Jeffrey Friedhoffer): Reported on the Region 2 Meeting (Feb 28/29, 2004):

1. We were asked to think of significant Milestones in electrical engineering from the Baltimore area for the IEEE History center.

2. The Sections Congress will be held 14-16 Oct 05 Tampa. What issues do we want them to address? We have to decide who attends, the recommendation is that the chair for 2006 be the representative of the section. We can send additional non-voting members with their expenses paid for by the section. Primary delegate is paid for by the region

3. We need to develop a Section plan on membership development. This was assigned to Vil. Once completed send Bill Walsh a copy of the Membership development plan w.walsh@ieee.org

4. The RAB operations manual, includes by laws that cover sections in chapter 9, these can be used in lieu of our bylaws.

5. The IEEE has a drive to do more Industry relations, the section needs to have an industry relations representative.

6. The section should set up one meeting with a local industry

7. The section should send an estimated request for PACE funding for 2004 to Paviz Famouri ASAP. This has been assigned to Carole and Hoosam.

8. The section should be looking at nominating people for IEEE Awards. The region will be putting a list of available awards on their web site.

9. There is a Student Activities conference April 23-25, 2004 in Cleveland ewh.ieee.org/reg/r2/r2sac/reg2contest2004.html The region covers up to $400 per branch. The student chapters have been contacted and were told to make a request to the section for additional support if needed. The only response was from Baltimore City Community College.

Section Vice-Chair (Brian Sequeira)

None

Secretary (Boris Gramatikov)

Minutes of the February 9, 2004 meeting were posted on Section website
L31 was filed for the above meeting
The Minutes were approved unanimously.

Treasurer (Bob Cuellar)

Bob is paying checks and keeping track of the checkbook. He is successfully taking over.

Old Business and Review of Action Items

1) Programs (Chris Nemarich):

John Dentler reported for Chris Nemarich on the Centennial Celebration of the Baltimore Section IEEE (1904-2004). The Celebration was a success, especially with distinguished speakers: Delegate Kumar P. Barve, Doctor Merrill Skolnik, The Honorable Aris Melissaratos and Doctor Moshe Kam. Jeff Friedhoffer read a Congratulations Letter from Senator Barbara Mikulski, and showed the Centennial Banner which the Section received from IEEE. Special thanks went to Chris Nemarich, as well as to John and Katie Dentler for the great organization. Jerry Gibbon also emphasized the good choice of speakers and place.

2) Jeff announced the arrival of the LCD projector.

3) Jeff: Budgets for all chapters are needed. A deadline of May 1, 2004 was set.

4) Jeff: The Section will have a table at the upcoming IEEE Conference on Intelligent Transportation Systems in October. John Dentler commented that it would be a good opportunity to advertise membership in the IEEE. A demo on the Robot Challenge would be appropriate.

5) Consultants Network – Dave Pfaltzgraff is organizing a Consultants group for networking in the Baltimore region, similar to the NSAC which is active in the DC area. A Baltimore region network could function efficiently for industrial professionals. Back in January Dave was offered financial support for several meetings, in order to find out what interest there is in the Baltimore region. He will set up an affinity group, and is expected to fill the necessary forms and obtain the endorsing signatures.

Reports from IEEE Executives

Jerry Gibbon - R2 Chair, South Area

Jerry introduced the IEEE bimonthly SCANNER Newsletter for the National Capital Area (about 15-16,000 copies). This is a joint publication of the N. Virginia and the Washington Sections. The SCANNER contains valuable information on meetings, courses etc., and contains a calendar of events The layout is being done by the National Capital Area. The Newsletter also appears electronically as eScanner.

Linda Perry – Regional Activities Board (RAB)
Linda spoke on the need of opening a dialogue about closer industry-IEEE cooperation and mutual usefulness. She would like to make presentations to local companies and the IEEE reaching out to industry. She also touched on the issue of engineering jobs going overseas and the need of new ideas, enhanced education and reeducation, new high-tech concepts etc. Jerry Gibbon endorsed these ideas and added, that there is an upcoming conference of the National Science Foundation (NSF) with strong IEEE participation.

Jeff suggested that Linda put together some kind of a proposal so that the Section can further discuss these ideas.

Report Highlights from Directors and Chapter Chairs

Student Activities (Neville Jacobs):

Neville distributed a written report on the status of Student Activities.

Robot Challenge: No new items – just consolidating existing teams and trying to get them through the building phase and ready for the Challenge. Mentors are actively following up on all teams.
Neville and his team have a list of available judges and are currently working through them and identifying who should do what.
Gary Wieboldt will be handling the Pit again this year and will have an assistant. He will also have a digital photographer, and will arrange to publish the photos on the web page each evening.
Robot Challenge events: judging the written reports on March 22, 2004; the main event on Saturday, March 27, 2004, and the track event on Sunday, March 28, 2004.

Newsletter (Ron Aloysius)

· The April issue is in preparation. Will cover the Section’s Centennial Celebration, as well as the upcoming Robot Challenge.

· Ron invited contributions to the Newsletter on issues of common interest

Professional Activities (Carole Carey)

Awards nominations are on the web.

Continuing Education (John Dentler)

Made a note on the Region 2 Meeting (Feb 28/29, 2004):

Continuing Education programs: Engineers need to be rejuvenated, especially in a period of depression in terms of jobs.

This was immediately reiterated by Jerry Gibbon, R-2 Chair, South Area, who said that there is a need for further education and qualification of electrical and electronic engineers.

Chapter Chair Reports

PES (Eric Henlon)

PES is trying to grow by attracting students and volunteers. Also trying to enhance their Senior Membership drive. Working toward changing the routine technical environment through redesigning their meetings and activities. The Power Engineering Society (PES) and the Industrial Engineering Society (IAS) jointly sponsored a number of book scholarships for high school seniors entering college each academic year (Book Scholarship Award). The Engineers’ Week Dinner jointly sponsored by the Section and the PES Chapter provided an opportunity for high-school students considering studying engineering to meet with local IEEE members and discuss engineering careers.

EMC (Robert Berkovits)

EMC have planned their meetings till June
Washington DC’s EMC will have a meeting on March 18, 2004

Annapolis Subsection (David Boyd)

Feb Events:

· Kit Night: Feb 5th: about 80% success rate

· National Cryptological Museum field trip: Feb 23: great tour

March:

· SIGINT Topic: Mar 25

· UAV topic: Apr 8th

Affinity Groups

WIE (Tina Kohler)

Held a petition signing meeting for the Baltimore affinity group, and 8 signatures were sent.

New Business

Membership Development Plan (to be presented by Vil)
Sections Congress 2005
PACE Request 2004 (Carole and Hoosam)
IEEE Student Activities conference to be held in Cleveland, Ohio, April 23-25
Officer elections for chapters & Annapolis
Jeff Friedhoffer: “How often should the ExCom be inviting chapter chairs?” He proposed once in a quarter. Eric Henlon seconded. John Dentler reminded that effective contact to chapters should be maintained. Jeff made a motion to dedicate the September, November, February and April meetings to chapter chairs. Motion was seconded by Dave Boyd, who also suggested that a reminder be added specially for those meetings. All voted in favor and motion was carried.
Chapter Chairs’ Dinner: we need to set a date and start preparation.
Jeff Friedhoffer: “We need to organize a general Section meeting which would be of technical character and would be open to a broader membership”. Linda: “Yes, for example as a tutorial on a hot topic”. Jeff: “Volunteers are needed to organize such a meeting”. Bob Berkovits volunteered. As potential topics were mentioned “Nanotechnology” (Bob) or “Big Blackout” (Eric). This proposal went in as an action item.

The meeting adjourned at 8:12 pm.

Next Meeting: April 19, 2004, 6:00 pm at HEM

Action Items

Number	Action/Disposition
03.4	Compile a history of the section over the past 100 years (Chris Nemarich)./Open
10.3	Present action taken with proposal on History of Electronics in Flight (Carole Carey).
10.10	Provide PR paragraph about robots for Newsletter (John Dentler).
10.11	Confer and coordinate with John Dentler about Region meeting and generate a proposal for the celebration (Chirs Nemarich).
10.14	Arrange for web training (Jeffrey Friedhoffer)
03.1	Jeff Friedhoffer to get together with IAS
03.2	Organize a general Section meeting which would be of technical character and would be open to a broader membership i. e. “Nanotechnology” or “Big Blackout”. (Bob Berkovits)