“Perhaps WASPP should look into Asilomar or Marconi. How about approaching the agencies for $$ and perhaps Steve Briggs at Syngeta (ex. Novartis) to provide support (?)” Note: The WASPB Section Representatives looked into this to try to fund the 2001 meeting and found that companies preferred to support national rather than local meetings. This may be worth trying again.
“Develop an awareness that the section can provide something for its members. ...precisely, regular meetings would help develop a sense of community.” Note: Recall that the genesis of this questionnaire was that having a regional meeting is not feasible financially or logistically...
“Local meetings would also help...if inexpensive.”
“Perhaps we should sponsor scholarships for grad students to attend meetings.” Note: The ASPB Headquarters does this now. It would be redundant to duplicate functions or dip twice into dues (national or regional) to fulfill a general need of the membership.
“...add a rep(resentative) for each university or region...” Note: These have been in place for years. See our web site
“...get a ASPP-WEST server...” Note: Probably best and cheapest to continue to use the ASPB main server that is run out of headquarters. Who would maintain it if they did not?
“...I like Jon Munroe’s ideas.” Note: See ASPB's Web Site
“The existing Web site could be used for information and discussions such as this (the questionnaire), with notices of updates sent by email.” Note: Right! Exactly our plan!
“...to facilitate the widest participation, section meetings should be for long weekends and accessible by a simple automobile trip.”
“I found that the size and relative intimacy (of the Northeastern Section) was very helpful in encouraging my students to connect with other students as well as with senior investigators.”
“I think this (reorganizing into smaller regions) is a bad idea.”
“In my opinion, the west should be broken into at least 4 subregions (Northwest, N. Calif. S. Calif. and Southwest).”
“The Western section is just too big. It is too expensive and difficult to get everyone together.”
“One potential good function of sections is to provide regional meeting formats in which students and postdocs get the opportunity to present heir work to a wider audience than they would in their own departments and schools.”
“...we have an incredible wealth of talent here, and PI’s, postdocs and students could benefit from easier communication among colleagues in terms of learning techniques, developing joint proposals, etc.”
“...there are way too many meetings. ... A better way to get the section to work is as a ‘virtual’ section where information, job, tips, etc are passed online.” Note: This is the function of the ASPB web site. We will be posting things there now.
“I’m not really sure what the objective is in having a regional group. So, maybe the objectives and resources available to member could be made clear, also in a way as to entice new members.” Note: Part of the intent of this questionnaire was to elicit ideas as to what West-ASPB members want... Perhaps we need to define Goals for West-ASPB?
“I’m in favor of splitting WASPP into regions such as WASPP North and WASPP South and rotating meeting locations within those regions.”
“Probably the best option for WASPP is to stay away from general meetings as most of us to the national meetings anyway. I would recommend a focus on thematic workshops or issue oriented meetings on topics unique to the region or someones’ unique interest.”
“I feel there is little communication. I think smaller subgroups might meet one year and the entire section meet on the alternate year. ...important event for students. Less intimidating than ASPP national meetings...”
“...(if WASPB) dues were used to help student expenses to attend meetings...” Note: There are scholarships from ASPB that one can apply for to attend the national meeting. Section dues need to support the section without duplicating the functions of Headquarters.
“Use ...most of dues to support student travel to meetings.”
“... more information about what dues support?”
“Having meetings (would get me to pay section dues). We don’t get other forms of communication.” Note: We are trying to fix that with the Newsletter and the web site!
“Something useful back (would entice me to pay dues).”
“CASH awards, at least two $5,000 lottery type drawings and at least 2 merit based awards with more of decreasing amounts. Money to be used for personal expenditures, no accountability.” Note: With blessings of the Executive Committee pending, the Membership Committee is planning just such a move with it’s membership drive.
