2008 WISENet AGM Minutes
Minutes of the 2008 WISENet AGM held on Wednesday 9th April at 5pm at the Monash Institute of Medical Research, Victoria. The meeting included a teleconference component. As a quorum was not achieved for the constitutional vote the meeting was continued in the ‘virtual’ environment. The virtual meeting closed at 5pm on Wed 23rd April, 2008.
Attendance
D Webster, J Byrne, C Foley, J Tennent, J Arblaster, E Gold, R Lechte, D Goodwille, R White, L Wright.
Voted electronically: S Brown, P Bonham, S Ashmore, P Reisner, A Reisner, S Mao, J Gibson, S Ruuska, L Taverner, R Porter, C Praeger, G Newton, D Tronson, K Lamoureux, J O’Neil, J Crowley, P Cocker, J Weber, S Male, T Lowe, J Westren, R Sutton, I Carrin, K Basford, A Robinson, S Stowe.
Apologies (to the MIRM meeting)
S Stocklmayer, A Sefton, R Porter, R Mason, K Lamoureux, A Robinson, J Thompson,
I Carrin, H Pongracic, J Gibson, J Christie, S Ruuska.
Minutes from the 2007 AGM
Diane Webster moved that the minutes published in WISENET Journal Vol 74 be
accepted as a true and accurate record of the meeting. Seconded by Julie
Arblaster.
Accepted unanimously.
National Co-Convenors Report
The national executive has been in caretaker mode for 2007 due to the birth of
my first son. We have struggled due to vacant positions on the executive.
WISENet would benefit greatly from election of a new National Co-convenor with
enthusiasm for the task. I believe that WISENet remains a relevant organisation.
However, it will fail unless we are able to reinvigorate it. I plan to
investigate the cost of undertaking an electronic survey to canvas the opinion
of all members on how best to revitalise our organisation.
On behalf of WISENet I’d like to extend a public vote of thanks to the following people for their efforts:
Alex Reisner for his ongoing care of the WISENET web-site,
Robyn Porter for undertaking the enormous task of converting all of WISENet’s historical documents into electronic format, and,
Mick Gould, Convention Associates, for making the daily management of WISENet a relatively simple task.
Diane Webster
Acceptance of the report was moved by Diane Webster, seconded by Jenny Byrne, passed unanimously.
FASTS / National Co-convenor Report
FASTS had a particularly active year in 2007-2008, leading up to the election in November, reviewing and commenting on policies of the former and new governments.
Note that details of press releases, links to reports and to government policy announcements, etc. can be found on or via the FASTS website: http://www.fasts.org Some of these had some relevance to women in science, as outlined below:
General science
policy/funding/status issues:
Between 1996/7 and 2004/5 expenditure on science in Government and higher
education institutions increased in real terms by 7%. In the same period
humanities and social sciences increased by 43%, medical research by 57% and
engineering about 25% . In terms of total ‘market share’ science declined
from 48% to 42% and humanities/social sciences increased from 16% to 19%.
Note that Commonwealth agencies including CSIRO have declined in aggregate
from 51% of total Commonwealth investment in R&D in the early 1980s to about
23% now.
However this is not simply a shift of resources from Government agencies to
universities. Undergraduate load in unis has changed over the past decade
with science having a reduced share, so as scientists retire they are often
not replaced. There also appears to be a move to applications over
fundamental research.
Questions: What is the optimum division of resources? What is the
appropriate scientific workforce for the 21st century – does the development
of high level computational tools reduce the need for some programming
analytic skills?
FASTS AGM, November 2007, attended by Rosemary White and
Anna Robinson of WISENet.
Guest speakers included Professor Margaret Sheil – CEO, Australian Research
Council, Professor Glenn Withers – CEO, Universities Australia, Dr Susannah
Eliott - CEO, Australian Science Media Centre. The keynote speaker at the
FASTS dinner was Michael Gallagher, CEO, Group of Eight Universities.
Newly-elected officers: Vice President - Amanda Lynch (Monash), Treasurer –
Graham Taylor (industry), Ordinary member – Peter Adams (UQ), Early Career
scientist – Ben McNeil (UNSW). Professor Ken Baldwin, formerly
President-elect, took up his position as President of FASTS.
Note that at the FASTS AGM in 2008, the positions of President-elect,
Secretary, Policy Chair and Early career scientist will be up for election,
if any WISENet member is interested.
Rosemary White
There was extensive discussion of the FASTS report:
Cathy Foley (also on FASTS board) noted that FASTS input
was very important in bring about changes to the Prime Ministers prize. By
extension/associations WISENet has also helped mediate this change.
Cathy is also following up with FASTS with regard to what
other societies within FASTS are doing for women in science.
Sharon Bell has been commissioned (by FASTS?) to prepare a report on women in science. This report has not yet been tabled.
Acceptance of the report was moved by Rosemary White, seconded by
Diane Webster, passed unanimously.
Treasurer’s Report
2007 Income and Expenditure are in line with previous years. The accounts have been audited by Wendy Burton (Burton Partners Chartered Accountants). Please see the attached documents for specific details. Income for 2006 was lower than expected and this has been offset by the increased income received in 2007, presumably due to the variability in subscription payments. [For your information, income in 2005 was $8,938]. Expenditure was similar to previous years. The main expenses remain production and postage of the journal, and the management fee paid to Convention Associates. At the end of 2007 WISENet had $9,482.29 in the bank [compared to $6,785.27 for 2006, and $7,878.00 for 2005]. It is not necessary to raise subscription rates at this time.
Diane Webster on behalf of Helen Maclean.
Acceptance of the report was moved by Diane Webster, seconded by Lynne Wright, passed unanimously.
Membership Coordinator
As of April 2008, 139 members were listed
in the database, of whom 109 were financial.
These numbers represent declining membership
to the previous 2 years (see below).
By member type there were 103 ordinary members, 17 retired members, 8 students, 1 honorary, 3 complimentary, 1 subscription paying institution and 7 other memberships.
Membership was divided amongst the Link Groups as follows:
Convention Associates were approached to see if direct debit was an option for
payment of subscriptions to assist in membership renewal (ie opt out rather than
opt in). The response was that although it is possible, it is not a preferred
payment method as it is more complicated to administer eg. it gets messy when
credit cards expire.
It was proposed at last year’s meeting to come up with a flyer listing the membership benefits of WISENET. Unfortunately I have yet to follow this up. If anyone has ideas to contribute on producing such a flyer I would be most appreciative in hearing them.
Julie Arblaster
Discussion:
The idea of a flyer of membership
benefits was endorsed.
The need to link with like-minded
organisations was discussed at length. In a practical sense this could
include website links, electronic distribution networks, and/or combined
meetings. Cathy Foley has volunteered to generate a list of organisations
and contacts as a starting point.
It was noted that the Sydney
University women’s network was not really working (Jenny).
Wollongong membership numbers are below 5 (the number required to form a link-group). However, it was noted that this includes an institutional membership. Lynne is working towards improving the number of individual members. One idea could be to make a small number of discounted membership available as ‘door prizes’, for example, two years for the price of one. Lynne will investigate the merits of this idea and seek executive approval prior to proceeding.
Acceptance of the report was moved by Julie Arblaster, seconded by Elspeth Gold, passed unanimously.
Journal Report
The Journal Co-ordinator position remains unfilled since it was vacated by
Olivia in 2006. I would like to thank everyone who has contributed to recent
WISENet Journal issues, in particular the WA group (Susan Barker and Sally Male)
for editing issue 75.
Publication of the WISENet Journal has been falling further behind the scheduled dates for some time. As a result it was decided to publish a small issue in December/Jan in order to get back on track. This issue was used to highlight matters for discussion at the AGM.
A new journal rotation has been prepared to ensure that the three editions for 2008 are full of good reading. Thank you to the following people/groups who are taking responsibility for the 2008 editions.
J77 May Wollongong/Lynne Wright
J78 August ACT/Julie Christie
J79 November NSW/Jennifer Bryne
Diane Webster
Discussion:
There was wide support for continuing to print the journal (as opposed to an electronic only version). It was noted that the print version is useful to have available at meetings and to give to prospective members and journal contributors. It was also noted that other organisations had seen a drop in membership when they switched to e-bulletins.
Acceptance of the report was moved by Diane Webster, seconded by Lynne Wright, passed unanimously.
Link Groups
Reports for the following groups were presented to the meeting:
NSW-Sydney by Jenny Byrne
NSW-Wollongong by Lynne Wright
VIC by Elspeth Gold
Acceptance of the reports was moved by Cathy Foley, seconded by Rosemary White, passed unanimously.
Constitutional Amendment for a Virtual National Executive
Details of the proposal and accompanying changes to the constitution were published in WISENet J76. All discussion of this proposal was positive. The following motion was put to the meeting:
“That the constitution be altered to allow the National Link Team to function as a virtual committee with members sourced from throughout the organisation.”
Acceptance of the motion was moved by Diane Webster, seconded by Cathy Foley, passed unanimously (34 votes in favour, none against).
It was further moved “That approval be given for up to three teleconferences per year (including the AGM) to facilitate management of WISENet by the National Link Team. (expected cost <$900 per year, sustainable within current budgets)”
Acceptance of the motion was moved by Diane Webster, seconded by Rosemary White, passed unanimously (34 votes in favour, none against).
Tasmanian Link-Group
Membership of the Tasmanian Link Group continues to drop. As it is below the threshold for link-group formation and the convenor position remains vacant it was moved that the Tasmanian group be merged with the Victorian Link Group.
Acceptance of the motion was moved by Diane Webster, seconded by Elspeth Gold, passed unanimously.
Election of new committee members
No nominations were forthcoming for the position of National convenor, National convenor ‘elect’, Journal Co-ordinator or vacant link group convenor positions. Volunteers for these positions are still sought.
Robin Porter was nominated by Diane Webster for the position of Treasurer for 2008, seconded by Julie Arblaster, passed unanimously by electronic vote (15 votes in favour (plus 2 late), none against). Congratulations Robyn, and thank you!
Endorsement of the ‘position statement’
A document outlining issues of interest to women in science has been circulated in a number of forms (electronic and in the journal). It has been suggested that this document be ‘matured’ into a position statement. The following motion was put to the meeting:
“That WISENet have a publicly available position statement which is a living document that can be updated with the approval of the National executive.”
Acceptance of the motion was moved by Diane Webster, seconded by Elspeth Gold, passed unanimously.
Further discussion of the current document indicated that more work is required before it can be made public. It was noted that this is too much work for one person. The document will be circulated with a call for individuals to take responsibility for crafting/editing sections of the document.
Initiatives for attracting young women into science
While this is an important issue it was noted that it is also very complicated and many initiatives have failed to ‘hit the mark’ over the years. It was suggested that it might be a good topic for discussion on the list-serv. The whole area needs to be re-assessed.
It was noted that the current executive are not able to undertake action in this area at time. However, support would be given to anyone wishing to champion this issue.
Diana Temple Memorial Lecture
Jennifer Byrne noted that the inaugural Diana Temple memorial lecture was held in 2007 and there is support from the University of Sydney to hold an annual lecture. Ideas for speakers were given, including various ministers, Sharon Bell and Margaret Sheil. The suggested topic for the lecture is “the advancement of the role of women in science”.
Other Business
Rosemary White raised the idea of
a ‘women in science’ conference. It was decided that we should keep it on
the agenda for next year but that at this time it is beyond our people
reserves to get it going. The usefulness of linking in with other groups was
restated in this context. It was also noted that while grass-roots
conferences have an important role they do not necessarily facilitate
institutional change.
Conversion of back-issues of the
WISENet Journal to PDF files. Anna Robinson has requested permission to get
ANU Printers to scan issues 1 to 37 for us. The intention is to upload the
back-issues onto the website, and complete the conversion of our historic
records to electronic format. A quote has not been obtained but it is
expected to cost less than $500. The meeting agreed that this was a good
idea. Permission was given to seek a quote and circulate it to the National
Executive for approval.
An objection was raised to the scheduled time of the AGM. Those at the meeting noted that it is not possible to schedule a time that will suit everyone. The day/time was circulated for feedback and only positive responses were received. Members should feel free to comment on any issue when drafts/ proposals are circulated.