[555] in APO News
9/22/93 ExecComm Minutes
daemon@ATHENA.MIT.EDU (Harry Tsai)
Mon Sep 27 21:05:46 1993
To: apo-minutes@mit.edu
Date: Mon, 27 Sep 93 21:05:07 EDT
From: Harry Tsai <hftsai@mit.edu>
Minutes of ExecComm (September 22, 1993)
Administrative notes:
Start: 7:06pm; End: 8:32pm. Present: Kevin Dahm, Harry Tsai, Ellen
Kranzer, Elizabeth Yow, Gilbert Leung, Ping Huang, Kate Curtis, Ezra Erb,
Yale Zussman, Bridget Spitznagel, Joe Kuchta, Alan Meisler
Officers' reports:
SVP's report:
Ping: We had an open project at Camp Resolute last Saturday; we did lots of
random tasks.
Upcoming stuff---Saturday we have a project. And for everyone's
information, we now have projects set for the rest of the term. The
project this Saturday is at the Easton Children's Museum. Chapter Weekend
is coming up. I wanted Camp Mayhew, the one for delinquent youths, but
they don't have anything we could do until after spring finals.
We've now had seven projects, and I've had to personally PC four of them.
This is a problem. ExecComm should discuss it.
MVP's report:
Bridget: Only two people came to the open meeting, so there are lots of
cookies left.
Five people have said they Definitely Want to Pledge. (Two of them are the
two from the last open meeting.) I will do a phone calling (RSN) to ask
the other people who've been to projects whether they want to pledge; I'll
also ask the people who've been to open meetings (and I will encourage the
latter to come to the project Saturday.) If you know a prospective better
than I do, you're welcome to ask him/her (just let me know what the answer
is, so I don't hunt people down redundantly.)
Pledge ceremonies will occur Monday and Tuesday at 7 p.m. in Building 1.
Setup will occur before 7... In addition, I would like to be sure
that people (brothers) involved in the ceremony (a) know that they
are involved and (b) have a grip on what they're supposed to do.
I am hoping to get the pledge manual updated and graphicly-arted by October
1 so I can have a pledge meeting and pass them out then.
Last I checked, there were five wannabe Big Brothers. We have five wannabe
pledges and will likely get more... so... I will probably need more
BB's. Hint. It would be nice to have enough by the first pledge meeting
so things can get sorted out there.
Who's in charge of pledge article meal (it's on October 3rd)?
Ezra: You're in charge.
Bridget: Okay. Well, I think that's it. Someone tell me whether there's
something else I should be doing that I've forgotten about...
AVP's report:
I'm almost done with the requisition authorization form. I just need the
ASC's signature. (But first, we need to elect a new ASC, so I'll have to
wait until Wednesday.)
Fellowship Chair's report:
Ezra: Steak Fry is October 6. Dave Cho is PC'ing it. If you see any of
the alumni, ask them to come. Dave is working on an invitation for the
AXAA newsletter.
Please encourage other brothers to think about PC'ing study breaks this
term.
Kevin: Oops! I skipped the treasurer.
Treasurer's report:
Service Meals
I move to increase the prices we charge brothers for service meals from $1,
$2, and $3 to $2, $3, and $4 for breakfast, lunch, and dinner respectively.
We have been losing a slight amount of money. Besides, the old prices have
been there for a long time already. A $0.50 increase would be sufficient
to take up the loss but a $1 increase is *a lot* easier for the treasurer
(me!!) ... The following table of our recent projects that included meals
should give a rough idea of how much we have been losing.
Date Expense Revenue
Projects:
Sojourner House Project Sept '93 43.84 34.00
Afterfinals May '93 83.52 68.00
Chapter Weekend II April '93 102.24 100.00
Pledge Article Meal April '93 39.48 39.00
Afterfinals Jan '93 211.90 121.00
===============================================================
Total 480.98 362.00
Coke
I finally threatened the salesperson at Coke that if he doesn't call me
back, I'd find Pepsi. For the first time since June, he called back!!! He
said that leasing a machine from Coke would cost us $28 per month. From
past records, we approximately consume 1400 cans of coke per semester.
That's about 230 cans per month. We need to mark up $0.15 per can of coke.
I think this is a little too high. The Coke Chair (if we have one) should
consider some other options like asking Pepsi for a better deal, or just
repair our old krudgy machine.
Active Brothers and Dues
We have about 24 brothers who want to be actives this term. The dues are
$8.50 : $4 for national and $4.50 for Apoc.
APOcEd's report:
Kevin [for Amy]: I postponed the APOc again. It will
absolutely-positively-definitely-without-a-doubt be out at the next Chapter
Meeting (I think). Submit anything (articles, photos, doodles, whatever)
by some reasonable time Monday evening. Yeah. That's all.
ASC's report:
Kevin: The office lock is getting tricky. I'm talking to Joe about it.
Kate: Now that the new terminal is working, we should do something with the
old one. (Other than leaving on the coffee table.)
Joe: We might also want to think about bolting down the new one.
PubDir's report:
Kevin [for Amy]: I changed the IC board. My humblest apologies to Bridget
for having to remove the bottom portion of her lovely blue-and-yellow
artwork, due to my big goof in measuring.
Kate: We're completely out of drop poster receipts.
Historian's report:
Harry [for Ann]: I still need to do the scrapbook, so if there are any more
pictures, get them to me (mailbox) or leave them at the New House front
desk. Hope everyone's doing OK.
Chairman of the Advisory Committee, report of:
Joe: We need advisors. Professor Mann is retiring. I've talked to David
Michael; his attitude is just ``let me know if you need anything...'' He
doesn't come to our meetings. Anyway, the main requirement for an advisor
is to attend at least one chapter meeting a month.
Ping: I went to the news office, and _Tech_Talk_ said they might put in an
ad for us.
President's report:
I sent an article to the APOc about junior office elections. Dima said he
might run for Historian if someone helps him and shows him what to do.
Karen Greig is also interested, but neither one is confirmed yet. Bert is
also out looking for candidates. I haven't talked to him yet.
Coke chair---Dima was interested at one point, but since he's now
interested in Historian, I don't know...
New Business:
Kevin: Is the raising of meal prices to $2-$3-$4 going to an undue
burden on anyone?
Alan: Is it right for us to be making a profit?
Ping: We've been making a loss for a while. It all evens out over time.
[various others]: It probably won't even make up for what we've already
lost. Besides, if we only raise it 50 cents, then the next raise will just
come sooner. I think we should go all the way.
Kevin [in other news...]: This is Elizabeth Yow. We'll make her our new
Sectional Rep at the next Chapter Meeting.
Standing Policies
Kevin: I think we should separate the 3-year expiration clause and make it
a permanent policy. Really, what would we do if it ever expired? I also
think the tax exemption policy should become permanent.
And is 10 cents/mile still a good price for transport reimbursement?
Yale: How many people actually use it?
Kate: Alan uses it to pay his debts. That's about it...
Yale: In general, it doesn't get used too much. But it is handy if you're
shuttling 100 miles back and forth.
Ping: We'll leave it.
PC's
Ping: I can't get PC's. I still don't have one for UMOC. It's been a real
hassle finding them this term.
Yale: It's been getting more difficult over the past few years.
Ellen: What have you been doing?
Ping: I've been calling people, asking them when I see them; I wrote an
APOc article; I made an announcement at chapter meeting. I've even set a
deadline. This Saturday's project would have been cancelled if no one had
volunteered by tonight.
Kate: Actually, Lori did that at I-Banquet: set a cancellation deadline for
*all* projects.
Ping: Amy finally volunteered for this Saturday. I think that was really a
case of coercion, though.
Kate: Many people don't realize how easy it is to PC a Saturday project.
Ping: Yes, I've had to explain to many people exactly what's involved.
Ellen: And lots of people also think that Someone Else will do it.
Yale: Have you considered drawing lots? I mean, it would be completely
non-binding, but people might get the idea...
Ellen: People need to to be reminded that a leadership position is in the
expectations.
Kevin: Remember, if they say ``no'' to a specific thing, you should still
ask them about other ones.
Ellen: Give them the impression that ``You *will* be doing something,''
rather than ``Help! I'm desperate for someone now!''
Bridget: You might want to ask people who have sub-PC'ed major projects if
they want to PC them now. They already know what's involved.
Ping: Henning has volunteered to do UMOC treasury again.
Ellen: You should talk to him about training a successor. That's the kind
of thing we *really* need.
Yale: Traditionally, these projects have been run by sophomores.
Regionals
Joe: We should keep in mind that we need two delegates to Regionals.
Ellen: It's in Schenectady, not Albany, as originally planned. (There was
a problem with the original hotel.) There will be a Chapter Presidents'
Workshop right before the conference. Regionals runs from December 28--30.
CPW begins on the 27th.
There will be lots of workshops, fellowship events, etc. There will also
be a business meeting. Traditionally, there's not really any business. I
think that will continue to be true this year.
File Access
Yale: There was a request from another chapter for information about UMOC.
I was going to send it to them, but it's about half a megabyte of it. I
think we should just refer them to the files. The issue is---do we want to
tell other chapters where all our stuff is? Then they'll have complete
access to everything.
Ping: What do we have to hide? It's all currently world-readable, anyway.
Ellen: We may not want to have the database readable.
Kate: Yeah, I withheld my phone number from the MIT directory because I'm
TA'ing 1.00.
Ellen: There are also people who go around getting lists off the network,
even though they're not supposed to...
Yale: Okay, so the consensus is that we make certain things private, then
tell the other chapter.
Ping: Yes, we'll go through all the directories and fix them.
FellowshipComm
Ezra: CPPC is at the end of October? (Kevin: Yeah.) I'm thinking of
having a FellowshipComm before that. I want to discuss interaction between
the actives and alumni at Steak Fry. I'll set the date and time later.
Yale: Call your counterpart in the Alumni Association and discuss it. See
where that takes you.
Announcements
Kevin: Okay, I'm going to wrap up now for those who have to leave. After
Announcements and Points for the Good of the Order, I want to discuss CPPC
with everyone else for however long.
Ezra: Steak Fry is October 6 at 6pm in the New House Country Kitchen.
Bring your own knife. Bring money for the auction, too. In the meantime,
donate things for the auction. Dave Cho would also appreciate it if you
could help him.
Ping: Let me know if you're going on Saturday's project.
PFTGOTO
Kate: Thanks to people who have been giving out Book Exchange checks.
Bridget: The IC board looks great :-) Thanks to people who've been helping
the membership program. Remind brothers you see that Next Week is The
Return of the Junior Officer Elections! (Kate: Especially if they're not
already officers...) Last week's episode was pretty scary and next week
had better not be a rerun.
Halftime: 8:05pm
[Ping and Gilbert leave]
CPPC Discussion
Kevin: So far, I've been thinking that we might have CPPC on the boat trip
back from the George's Island project. Anyway, people seem to have been
underimpressed by recent CPPC's. At WPI, our president had a good
idea---he sent out a survey two weeks beforehand to see what the
brotherhood really cared about. So what sort of information do you, as
officers, want to know?
Ezra: I think we should talk about things to be done *this* term.
Recommendations tend to be put away and forgotten. Also, we've tried
surveys before. They haven't worked too well.
Yale: It depends on the survey. Some of ours haven't been terribly
encouraging.
Joe: It's worth a try.
Alan: Suggestion: bring extra copies to CPPC so people can fill them out if
they've forgotten.
Kevin: Right. I also plan to do both electronic and paper mailings.
Ellen: Typical response rate around here is pretty abysmal.
Kate: So what do we get for taking the survey? :)
Kevin: Well, there's $150 in the Discretionary Fund...
Ezra: A boat trip might not be the best place to have CPPC. It's
distracting, and we might disturb a lot of other people.
Ellen: If you want something different, you could try having it at a
chapter weekend.
Yale: We might consider spending a night on George's Island. There's this
place in the fort. I arranged a project there once, I could try it again.
Once the tourists are gone, we'll have the island to ourselves. And no one
can leave. :)
Kate: That's a little much to do in addition to chapter weekends.
Ezra: How about having it at a current chapter weekend?
Kevin: Would a chapter weekend evening be good for attendance?
Kate: CPPC isn't well attended anyway. We can increase attendance by
arranging transport for just that evening. It would also keep people from
leaving in the middle of CPPC.
Alan: We should let Ping know, so he can choose a closer camp.
Ezra: It's also good to associate CPPC with service.
Kevin: Okay. Now, how do we handle pledges? Should they come to CPPC?
Alan: I never felt out of place there.
Ellen: We should give them the chance anyway. It's good way to expose them
to the chapter.
Ezra: They also remember more about recruitment than we do.
Kevin: All right. So we should move CPPC to October 9? Looks good. I'll
need to speed up my planning, though. Should we think about inviting
advisors?
Ellen: None have ever shown up.
Kevin: I've talked to Bonny Kellerman. She was interested in getting back
in touch with the chapter. She feels that, for the most part, the advisors
have been abandoned.
Yale: It might be good to have a ritual rededication. Once a person gets
their service pin, they longer have any direction. They need a refocusing,
a reaffirmation...
Elizabeth: I wrote one of those once. I could go dig it up.
Ellen: Push that as another good point of CPPC.
Ezra: We never get in-depth. I think we should focus on a few issues.
Yale: We should think about ``What happens after a person gets a service
pin? What happens after that first summer away?''
Kevin: Sum up... On the weekend of October 9, we'll have CPPC at
chapter weekend. If I do the survey, it'll have to happen in the next few
days. What topics should be on it?
Yale: I can assist you in preparing a questionnaire.
Kevin: If any of you have gleams of inspiration, send them to me---things
like, ``I want to know about this.'' ``I want to see this at CPPC.''
E-mail is the easiest way to get in touch with me, but you can also leave a
message on the board, or phone me, or whatever...
