EMS Alumni 18 April 2015 Meeting Minutes
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College of EMS Alumni Chapter Board Meeting Minutes
Saturday, 18 April 2015
University of Wisconsin-Platteville Campus, Platteville, WI
By: George Hellert
Present (-in person)
Mark Shubak, Director
Barb Boldt, Director
Brad Samz
Greg Jewel
Don Eichmann, Treasurer
Tom Wisniowski, President
Present (-via teleconference)
Greg Bies, Past President
George Hellert, Secretary
Keena Spencer-Dobson, First Vice President
Jessica Ficke - ME (non-voting attendee)
Kelly Marshall, Foundation (non-voting attendee)
Adam Kaiser, Director
Absent:
Jeff Hoerning, Co-Executive Secretary & Faculty Liaison
Julie McDonald, Incoming Co-Executive Secretary & Faculty Liaison
Kim Schmelz, Director of Alumni Services
Jim Almquist, VECTOR Co-Advisor
Hayley Norpel, Student Liaison
From the Articles of Association and Constitution
The objectives and purpose of the Chapter shall be:
 To cultivate friendships and foster mutual aid among its members.
 To advance the interests and standards of the engineering, mathematics and science departments
of the College of Engineering, Mathematics and Science of the University of Wisconsin
Platteville.
 To promote a mutually beneficial relationship between the University and its engineering,
mathematics and science alumni.
 To receive, invest and use gifts, contributions, devices, and bequests of money and / or real and
personal property for the benefit of the engineering, mathematics and science departments of the
College of Engineering, Mathematics and Science of the University of Wisconsin Platteville.
1) Call to order: President – Tom Wisniowski. President Tom W called meeting to order at 3:08 pm
2) Introductions & Welcome: President – Tom Wisniowski: All who attended.
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3) Agenda approval: President – Tom Wisniowski: Barb motioned to approve the agenda with a
minor correction to note that Don Eichmann will provide an update on the Constitution and By-Laws
subcommittee update. George seconded. Motion carried.
4) Secretary’s Report: George Hellert
a) Approval of minutes
i) Ben made a motion to accept the minutes. Keena second. The motion carried.
b) Secretary’s Report (see also attachment)
i) See Secretary’s Report
(1) Meetings have taken place and the web pages have been substantially updated and
upgraded with consensus on content.
(2) Picture of Jessica as faculty Liaison is needed for the web page.
(3) The budget has yet to be posted.
(4) A description of a number of committees has been posted with their responsibilities but
the membership committee is currently blank.
(5) Suggestion – rather than attempt to list all members of the various committees who
change from time to time we should list one point of contact for each committee.
(6) Several past meeting minutes links are not live. Suggestion – post links for meeting
minutes for the past (one) year and archive the rest.
ii) Board members are asked to please review the website and advise of any needed updates,
suggestions, corrections, etc.
(1) Barb suggested that the faculty emeriti that used to be posted or linked from our web site
should be also made available on the new web site. That will assist with determining
eligibility and may help stimulate memories that could lead to nominations.
(2) New web site is good.
5) Treasurer’s Report: Don Eichmann
a) Several changes are planned to improve the process/budget management.
i) The report has been simplified including the consolidation of several line items.
ii) Homecoming costs have been increased based on last year’s largest historical banquet ($)
impact. We have not increased the cost of the meal for several years and hope that continues.
b) See EMS Treasurer Report, EMS Budget
i) Checking balance is $12,345
ii) Currently $1,788 unfavorable though there remains a substantial reserve.
iii) Supporting membership funding is up at $5,600.
iv) Goals for 2015/2016
(1) Proposing a budget which has a negative cash flow at ~ $1K. This will help justify future requests
(2)
(3)
(4)
to the parent chapter for the EMS portion of the interest returned from the Lifetime Membership
trust.
Take our reserve fund down to ~ $7K for next year by not requesting additional funding from the
Parent Chapter (see above). Note that the Parent Chapter will entertain one-time allocation
requests should something unexpected come up during the year requiring special/significant
funding.
Target ~$2K as our rolling checking account balance.
Motion (Barb), seconded (Mark), approved to not formally request funding from the Parent
Chapter (interest from EMS Lifetime Membership Trust Fund interest) this year with the
understanding that if something special/significant would come up a one-time special allocation
request could be made to the Parent Chapter with the expectation that such a request would be
honored.
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6) Geode: Tom (Kim absent) Consensus - The transition to monthly has been working well for us.
The publication is current, vibrant, professional, impressive and serves a much wider audience than
in the past. Works out well from an EMS Alumni Chapter budgeting perspective as well. Many
thanks to Tammy’s leadership.
7) Committee Reports: Barb Boldt
a) Honors & Awards Committee
i) See Honors & Awards Committee Report.
ii) Three pre-nominations have been received and there are a total of 5 names on the list.
iii) No faculty emeriti nominees at this time.
iv) May 1st is the deadline for nomination forms followed by distribution of the forms and
scoring criteria to the committee members.
v) Tom, Greg, George, Barb, and Keena are the committee members who will be evaluating the
candidates. Tammy’s spot on the committee remains to be filled. Other Board changes need
to be addressed as they affect the Honors and Awards Committee including the
chairmanship.
(1) Greg Jewel expressed an interest in serving on the Honors and Awards Committee.
vi) The marketing plan established in the recent past is working fairly well with the potential
exception of the faculty emeriti.
(1) The honors and awards theory is to recognize those alumni and faculty emeriti that are
deserving.
(2) That said there is no requirement that an award needs to be given out every year.
(3) Barb suggested that faculty emeriti be posted on the new web site. That may assist with
determining eligibility and may help stimulate nominations. Greg has an archive of the
old web site files and will look into recovering and updating the faculty emeriti listing.
vii) Don suggested that all standing committees put together some type of “cheat-sheet”
(timeline/criteria/instruction information) intended to help guide new committee members as
to duties of committees and their members.
b) Supporting Members: Mark Shubak
i) See Supporting Member & Membership Report.
ii) Membership fees total $5,400.
iii) K L Engineering has just been added to the list of supporting members bringing the total to
$5,800.
(1) Most supporting firms are in the Civil Engineering Department.
(2) The Board needs to determine how to expand to other disciplines.
iv) Dues are currently going directly into the checking account. Discussion - should dues go
instead to a Foundation account which has side benefits (e.g., tax letters acknowledging
donor donations must be done individually now whereas the Foundation has an automatic
system). Retrieval of funds from a foundation account would require a formal request but
would otherwise be quite flexible and disbursements are commonly done on a weekly basis.
(1) We would need to ensure that supporting members would be made well aware that
any/all supporting member gift(s) would be specifically restricted to EMS vs a general
foundation expense. Checks should be made out the UWP Foundation and annotated for
the college of EMS Alumni.
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(2) Dues may be set up to recognize supporting memberships for the next fiscal year vs the
current year simplifying the accounting and budgeting process.
(3) Timing and transition detail/coordination was discussed including invoicing. If we opt to
change… we need to communicate this to current supporting members.
(4) Motion (Don), second (Mark), approved that the Supporting Member program be
transitioned to the Foundation and the dues be collected for the following year vs. the
current year provided that current and future supporting members are made well aware
that their supporting members’ dues are restricted to EMS alumni use.
(a) Discussion (George) – Kim has only requested that Board discuss the possibility…
Suggest that a motion is premature until we see an example of the intended
communication to our current and future Supporting Members.
(b) Motion retracted. We will advise Kim that the Board is generally in favor of the
concept and hope to have additional detail (e.g. communications) from Kim at the
next Board meeting and then vote the idea up or down as the case may be.
v) Per Kim, the Supporting Member brochure lists several benefits that have not been fulfilled.
E.g., providing supporting members the opportunity to have a picture/logo or other
information publicized, listed in career booklet, access to bulletin boards, networking
opportunities, etc.
(1) Discussion - decide to either remove them from the brochure or implement the benefits
fully.
(2) Few if any supporting members have requested implementation of any of these benefits.
(3) Consensus – Mark, Don and Greg will collaborate with Kim including a request to Kim
for input/suggestions on this and take it up again at the next (June) meeting. May be time
to update/restructure the brochure differentiating benefits that are automatic from those
that are optional at the request of the supporting member as well as communicating the
change to checks going to the Foundation yet restricted to EMS alumni activities.
8) Constitution and Bylaws: (Don) See also “EMSalum_Chapter_Constitution_03262015 report”
Don, George, Greg, Brad, and Keena comprise the committee tasked with reviewing and updating
the EMS Alumni Chapter’s Constitution and Bylaws. Two working sessions have taken place to
date. Associated information has been distributed to the Board in hope of expediting discussion.
Most of the work thus far focuses on the Constitution. See the information previously submitted to
the Board.
a) The initial intention was to model the Constitution and Bylaws after the Parent Chapter’s
“Articles of Association” and Bylaws as much as is possible in both content and format.
b) Dissolution of the EMS Alumni Chapter needs also to be addressed even though the committee
hopes that dissolution never occurs.
c) Comments:
i) Past President and the Dean are considered members of the EMS Alumni Chapter but do not
have voting privileges.
ii) The draft indicates that changes can be made by vote of 2/3rds of the members present.
Some clarification is needed to avoid the possibility of a very small meeting (e.g., 2 or 3
persons present) effecting changes to the Constitution and Bylaws. What constitutes a
quorum for a meeting has yet to be determined/addressed in either the Constitution or
Bylaws.
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iii) A quorum should be required for any voted action. Language to this effect needs to be
developed: “Any transaction for which a vote is required shall necessitate a quorum as
established by the Bylaws.”
iv) The Bylaws are likely to be more difficult to modify/develop than the Constitution.
v) Moved (Barb), Seconded (George) with friendly amendment to accept the draft Constitution
as a draft subject to formal approval at the annual meeting. Amendment accepted. Motion
carried.
9) Foundation Report: (Kelly Marshall) See also Foundation Report.
a) EMS Expo: The EMS Engineering Expo was held on Thursday, April 9th. One thousand three
hundred and seventy four students ranging from grade 5 to 12 were able to participate in 49
different hands-on activities.
b) EMS Advisory Board Meeting: The EMS Advisory Board met on Friday, April 10 on campus.
Approximately 90 individuals attended this day long meeting.
c) Women In STEM Banquet: On Monday, April 20th, we will be holding the Women In STEM
Banquet. To date we have 19 confirmed individual and corporate sponsors for this event,
totaling $11,475.
d) SWE Conference: We won the bid to host the SWE Conference! The conference dates are
February 26-28, 2016. We expect approximately 700 professional and collegiate SWE members
to attend. We need to raise a little over an additional $50,000 to cover expenses. We sincerely
thank the EMS Alumni Board for your generous support of $5,000.
e) Collaboration Meetings: A group of individuals made up of EMS faculty, EMS Student
Services, the Career Center and the Foundation Office have been meeting to discuss ways to
develop relationships with our business partners.
f) Travel: Dr. Mesut Muslu and I (Kelly Marshall) have continued to make visits to alumni, friends
and business partners, to provide updates on the College of EMS, as well as, to gain feedback
and insight on what is happening and needed in industry today.
10) Alumni Office Report: (Tom Wisniowski presented as Kim Schmelz was Absent)
a) See Alumni Report for complete detail.
b) Regular membership dues total $31,678 and $35,307 for lifetime membership dues.
c) The “A Night in Monte Carlo” event is going to be held tonight in Madison.
d) Spring commencement at UWP has gotten so large that it now is spread over 4 separate
ceremonies, one on Friday night and 3 on Saturday.
New Business:
11) Student Liaison:
a) A couple of draft descriptions of the Student Liaison’s duties and responsibilities
(expectations/job description) were developed by the Secretary and distributed to Board
members in the distant and more recent past with no action from the Board. The current Student
Liaison requested a formal description of duties and responsibilities. The possible designation of
more than one student liaison has been discussed at recent Board meetings. Hayley is believed
to hold that role until May. While two potential candidates for the Student Liaison position
attended the October 2014 meeting, neither has officially been offered let alone accepted the
role.
b) The position has been paid $300 per year of service in the recent past.
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c) Duties have expanded in the recent past to include maintaining the web site in addition to
drafting the meeting minutes. Greg believes that an hour a month should be sufficient to
maintain the web site.
d) Consensus – identify one person as the primary Student Liaison and pay in three partial
payments (after each Board meeting) throughout the year based on performance. Keep the base
at $300 with a discretionary $100 performance bonus at the end of the year. Motion (Don) that
we accept the Student Liaison position as one individual to be paid with a payment/stipend of
$300 issued in three equal portions plus up to a $100 performance bonus issued at the end of the
year of service as outlined in the Bylaws. Seconded (Mark). Discussion… compensation of the
Student Liaison is to come from the Board’s operating budget with payments subject to
performance in accord with the Job description to be included directly or by reference to/within
the Bylaws. Motion approved.
e) George will collaborate with Kim and (per Greg) the faculty liaisons to identify the best
candidate to fill the Student Liaison role. The Secretary shall have the final authority in
awarding the position. The student so identified will be awarded the title Student Liaison and
become subject to the job description when it is implemented via the Bylaws. Prior to
implementation via the Bylaws, the Student Liaison is subject to the duties and responsibilities
most recently drafted by the Secretary and distributed to the Board.
Faculty Liaison: There are two current faculty Liaisons. The Board has recently discussed the
potential need for three.
12) Common Place to Store Files: Greg and Tom agreed to set up a common storage location for EMS
alumni Chapter files.
13) Next Meeting: Web access will be needed to provide access to budget detail.
14) Adjournment: Don made a motion to adjourn the meeting. Barb second. Motion carried.