Central Virginia Section Report
Despite lagging membership numbers, the Central Virginia Section has been
doing well. Our Secretary/Treasurer resigning last fall has put added
pressure on our officers; however, we were able to get all of our paperwork
into corporate on time for the rebate bonus.
The members and officers of our section now have mailing lists. Our
membership mailing list is reg03-central-va@majordomo.ieee.org and our
officer mailing list is reg03-central-va-exec@majordomo.ieee.org. As of
28 February 1998, our section had 538 members (a 22 member decrease from
the previous year). 263 people are currently subscribed to our section
mailing list. Since we have started announcing our meetings via the mailing
list we have had increase in our average attendance from around 15-20 to
around 30-35 members. Many of our members have responded that the e-mail
notices are much better because they give them much more advance notice
of meetings than our newsletter.
Meetings
Our meeting topics over the last year have included:
* Tour of Comdial Telecommunications (April)
* "How Schools Shortchange Girls" - Peggy Roberson (June)
* 1st Annual GOLD Picnic (June)
* Tour of Target Distribution Center (October)
* Tour of Sprint Switching Center (November)
* GOLD Networking Meeting (November)
* "Current Trends in Semiconductor Manufacturing" - Dr. John Aylor (January)
* Engineers Week Banquet - Motorola's Plans for Virginia (February)
* "The Impacts of Electrical Utility Deregulation" - Virginia Power (March)
On May 2nd our section is sponsoring a road trip to the Radio Telescope in
Greenbank, WV. We are providing transportation from Charlottesville and
Waynesboro to the Radio Telescope. We are also providing box picnic lunches.
We currently have reservations for more than 40 people.
GOLD Program
Our annual GOLD picnic has been moved from June to September this year in
attempt to get more students and new hires that have moved into the area to
attend. We held over the past year 3 GOLD Social meetings, a GOLD picnic,
and a networking seminar. We are planning to continue offering more GOLD
programs in the future. Plans for the GOLD picnic will start soon after
the Greenbank, WV tour. We have named Joe Berman our GOLD chair.
Membership
Our main membership activity is the GOLD program. Joe Berman is also our
Membership chair. Other major membership activities include the Senior
Member Upgrade Program and Student Membership drives with our Student
Branch.
Educational Activities
Kiran Vemuri, our Educational Activities Chair, has been gathering
information on an FE/PE study group. We are hoping to put together the
study program by the end of this year. We also held, in coordination with
the Virginia Council, a Region 3 training seminar. Many of our other
educational activities overlap the GOLD program, including the Networking
Seminar.
PACE
Our PACE program has been periodically active. Osama Hassan, our PACE
chair, fell ill for a few months and was unable to work on the program.
Sam Harris, however, continues to work with local schools to offer the
Faraday Lecture program. Sam also spent an "Engineers Day" with 2 physics
classes at local high schools.
Officers
Despite the increased interest in our meetings, we are continuing to
have difficulties getting members to volunteer for officer positions. It
is very likely that our current officers will serve another year with
Joe Berman (who has been filling in as interim Secretary/Treasurer) taking
over the Secretary/Treasurer position.
--
+--------------------------------+---------------------------+
| Sean A. R. Haynes |Phone: (804) 823-1602 |
| PO Box 7064 |Fax: (804) 823-1603 |
| Charlottesville, VA 22906-7064 |Work: (804) 973-3311 x323 |
+--------------------------------+---------------------------+
| Chair, IEEE Central Virginia Section |
| GOLD Chair, Virginia Council |
| Email: s.a.haynes@ieee.org |
| Web Page: https://www.ewh.ieee.org/r3/central_virginia/ |
+------------------------------------------------------------+