Iowa Section of the MAA

Executive Committee Meeting

Saturday, October 23, 2010

Coe College

Present: Murphy Waggoner (Chair), TJ Hitchman (Vice-Chair), Jon White (Vice-Chair Elect & host), Scott Searcy (Treasurer), Al Hibbard (Information Officer), Russ Goodman (Liaison Coordinator & Vice-Chair Elect candidate), Ruth Berger (Competition Coordinator), Rick Gillman (MAA representative), Cal Van Niewaal (host & cook), Bernie Baker (Secretary).

Murphy Waggoner called the meeting to order at 7:25am.

1. Introductions around the table and appreciation to Van Niewaal & White for the excellent breakfast provided to the Executive Committee & guests. Minutes from 2009 were approved earlier by email

2. Vice-Chair elect candidate, Russ Goodman, was welcomed as was MAA representative, Rick Gillman, from Valparaiso University.

3. Hibbard asked for all members of the Executive Committee to review the operational plans for their respective positions and update them as appropriate. That is, fix the dates and elaborate the duties to make sense for the position as you see it, using relative time, such as “2 weeks before the meeting” instead of actual dates, such as Oct 1. Drafts are due in one month to Hibbard who will act as whip.

4. Hibbard noted that the nominating committee for Executive Committee officers has been composed of past chairs. He suggested chairs should not be responsible for this duty, and that making this change would spread the workload and get more people involved. Waggoner will draft an advisory on this change and circulate it to the Executive Committee.

5. Hibbard announced that he wishes to resign as Information Officer so a new one needs to be appointed. This information will be announced at the Business meeting and interested persons recruited.

6. Nominations for the national Outstanding Teaching Award are due to the Section by Feb 1 and to the Association by March 1. A motion to re-nominate Jon White for the next year was made by Baker and seconded by Goodman. The motion passed unanimously (except for White who passed). The selection committee consists of one member of the Executive Committee and two previous winners and this committee should consider the current deadlines and decide whether they should be changed or kept. Different deadlines might increase the number of nominations for this award. After the deadline decision is made, a new call for nomination for the following year should go out.

7. Considerable discussion of the merger exploration took place with Gillman sharing some of the vision and background for the idea. His sense is that it is difficult for sections with such membership and small meeting attendance to generate genuinely interesting and stimulating meetings, which is cyclic and causes meeting attendance and section membership to continue to decrease. The initial discussion meeting will be held in Kansas City on Nov. 6. After discussion it was decided that the Business meeting participants would be asked to approve reimbursement of $100 each for 4 members of the Executive Committee to attend the Kansas City meeting.

8. Berger reported the results of the Iowa Mathematics competition held at Grinnell on Mar 13, with 19 teams from 10 colleges. A team from ISU won so the next competition will be held on Feb 19, 2011, at ISU. It is impossible to find a date that “misses” all spring breaks so the date is moved around, sometimes early and sometimes late in an effort to be fair to all schools.

9. Gillman shared some of his observations about the Iowa Section and made some suggestions for ways to improve our functioning. Among his suggestions were ideas to increase membership, such as having Madeline Palmer, MAA representative send an email to all members urging them to recruit new members among colleagues, or to use liaisons not for member contact, but for outreach to non-members for recruitment purposes, or to enlarge the Executive Committee to include a Membership Coordinator to recruit new members. He also suggested using some of our funds for marketing, and brainstorming ways to get the state universities and community colleges more involved in the Section. Discussion continued informally after Waggoner adjourned the meeting.

Respectfully submitted,

Bernadette M Baker

IA MAA Section Secretary