Minutes: UCGIS Council Meeting
Tuesday, February 11, 2003
Capitol Hill Club, Washington DC
1) Call to Order. The meeting was called to order by Art Getis, UCGIS President, at 1:00 p.m.
2) Membership Committee. Lockheed-Martin has applied for Corporate membership. The Membership Committee is in favor of the application, but suggests that a member portfolio be provided on the web in a timely fashion. Mark moved to accept Lockheed-Martin. Craig seconded. Council members voted by ballot to accept Lockheed-Martin as a new Corporate affiliate member.
3) Minutes. Minutes of the Council Meeting of June 29, 2002 in Athens, GA are posted on the UCGIS web site. Miller moved to accept the minutes. D. Wright seconded. Motion passed.
4) Executive Report. Getis summarized some of the major activities of the past year. These activities included: good progress from the Model Curricula Task Force, chaired by Marble; actions of Policy and Legislation Committee members helped get universities listed on the Homeland Security bill; participation with other associations in commenting on federal budget issues for NSF; participation in international conferences (AGILE, Mexico/US, Japan); production of a new UCGIS brochure developed for outreach and publicity; new grants received from ESRI, HUD, Intergraph, and a proposal with CSISS; participation in joint Statistical meetings in New York; co-sponsoring of GIScience 2002 in Boulder; co-sponsoring of the new Vespucci Institute in Italy; awarding of the UCGIS Educator and Research awards to Goodchild and Golledge in 2002.
5) Financial Report. Jampoler (standing in for Richardson) presented the Profit and Loss Statement. The organization is in sound financial shape, with approximately a year’s worth of operating expenses in reserve.
6) Committee Reports.
Policy and Legislation Committee. Craig reported on a new four-step policy formation process approved by the Board. The process includes issue identification, Policy and Legislation Committee actions, Board actions and final actions (e.g., Congressional Breakfast, Presidential letters, listservEs, grassroots enlistment, web statements, organizational collaboration, coalition for NSF funding, etc.). The process is described in more detail on the UCGIS web site. The Committee also organized the Congressional Briefing of February 12, 2003.
Research Committee. Wilson reported on the successful Summer Assembly in Athens, GA, that focused on research agenda setting. At today’s meeting the committee formed a new sub-committee to develop a more formalized process dealing with the authorship of briefs, formalization of briefs, Council vote on briefs, etc. The committee also discussed the review process for the student abstracts for the summer assembly. The National Security Agency has requested that UCGIS collaborate on a visualization workshop, and the research committee will move forward on this initiative with a discussion in Washington on February 12, 2003.
Education Committee. Wiggins reported on activities of the Education Committee. These activities include: posting of the latest “Strawman” (Craig suggested that this title be changed to “Straw” draft) from the Model Curricula Task Force on the UCGIS web site; the completion of a successful Virtual Seminar conducted by Chuck Ehlschlaeger of Hunter College this fall semester (with 64 active participants from 6 institutions); the completion of a special Education Issue of the URISA Journal in 2002 (edited by Kemp and Wiggins); an announcement that Dawn Wright and David DiBiase are soliciting submissions for a special issue on Distance Learning for the Journal of Geography and Higher Education; the review committee for the Educator Award for 2003 is in place and nominations have a deadline of March 21, 2003; and David Mark will follow up on the discussion of contacting the National Resource Council committee on Ph.D. program rankings to see if it is appropriate for GIScience to be included as an emerging discipline.
Membership Committee. Mark reported that UCGIS now has sixty-six full members (62 academic institutions, 4 professional societies), 10 affiliate members (6 corporate affiliates, 2 international affiliates, 2 government affiliates). This leaves us with 12 states to go for full U.S. representation. Eleven institutions have memberships that expire in February 2003, and these institutions need to update their portfolios. ACSM also expired in June 2002. This Committee needs a new Chair.
Communication Committee. Bian reported on four activities: The listserv has been stabilized and appropriate messages may be sent to all@ucgis.org; the new web site design is 90 percent ready; the comprehensive database is being updated, and on-line update functions will be integrated into the new web site; and a draft of a new on-line brochure is under review. Jampoler reminded delegates to respond to her request for member/delegate updates for the database.
Research Project Committee. A follow-on grant from HUD is the only current activity.
7) Election of Officers. An election of officers was held by secret ballot. Shashi Shekhar (University of Minnesota) was elected for the 1-year Board term. Sean Ahearn (Hunter College), Zorica Nedovic-Budic (University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign) were elected for the 2-year terms. Lynn Usery (University of Georgia) was elected as President-Elect.
8) Recognition of outgoing officers. Merry thanked outgoing Board members Miller and McMaster and (now) Past-President Getis for their contributions to UCGIS.
9) Incoming President’s Statement. Merry looks forward to an active year, including 3 active research activities and the Summer Assembly in Asilomar.
10) Summer Assembly 2003. Jampoler, Wilson and Wiggins reported on plans for the 2003 Summer Assembly at the Asilomar Conference Center near Monterey, CA. The assembly dates are June 16-20, and the meeting agenda is posted on the UCGIS web site. The meeting is organized with a “retreat” style, and the agenda includes committee meetings, plenary sessions, workshops, student paper presentations, a student poster session, a GIS bowl, plenary and break-out sessions for the Model Curricula Task Force, and plenary and break-out sessions for the revisions of the 8 original Education Initiatives.
11) Other Business. Mark raised the issue of changing the By-Laws for election of officers from the Winter Meeting to the Summer Assembly meeting. This action will be discussed at the Board meeting.
12) Adjournment. Getis moved to adjourn the Council meeting. Larson seconded. Meeting adjourned at 3:07 p.m.