For those of you unable to attend the meeting in Long Beach, here is a summary of the SIG-11 Business Meeting. Approximately 35 of the 188 SIG-11 members were in attendance.
Members were encouraged to fill out a SIG-11 Membership Resource Form to complete or update their information. This is available along with lots of other cool stuff on the SIG-11 home page (http://www.resna.org/sigs/sig11/index.htm). If you are a SIG-11 member and haven’t yet filled out a form or need to update your information, please contact Dave Jaffe at 650/892-4464. There is also an email distribution list where SIG members receive occasional postings with relevant assistive technology information and SIG updates. If you are not yet on the list, again contact Dave.
Patty Benzing presented a SIG-11 mission statement to help us better understand and describe what we are trying to do. Any comments would be welcome.
Mission Statement: To facilitate education and information sharing between RESNA members and other professional organizations who have an interest in computer applications to benefit people with disabilities.
The following two proposals were presented, discussed, and passed by a vote of the members present.
The vice-chair will serve one year and then automatically assume the position of chair for the following year. The terms of chair and vice-chair will each be one year in length. A new vice-chair will be elected every year.
The election process will include a call for nominations for vice-chair each spring. The names of all nominated candidates will be placed on a ballot that will be sent to all members by email when possible. For members without email, a ballot will be sent by US mail or faxed. All ballots will be returned to Dave Jaffe, who will tally them and provide the chair and vice-chair with the results.
Elections: Additional nominations for chair were requested. No additional nominations were provided. Glen Ashlock, the only nominee, was elected by default.
Additional nominations for vice-chair were requested. Karen Milchus nominated John Goldthwaite and this was seconded by Denis Anson. Roger L. Rachow had been nominated prior to the conference. A vote was held and John was elected and will serve as vice-chair this year and become chair at next year’s conference. Thanks go to Roger for running and he can be assured that his continued input and assistance will be welcomed.
The Developers Forum received commitments to participate from 12 companies. Potential changes for the next year were discussed. Due to competition from other conference events, concerns of reduced attendance were expressed. Possible suggestions for changes included a lunch or breakfast meeting instead of the time period at the end of the day. It was agreed that if attendance was down these ideas would be addressed. (Attendance was very good and initial feedback was positive. So no changes to the time will be planned for next year.) Changing the session’s name to one that better reflects the goal of providing developers an opportunity to discuss new products and ideas with the people who will be using them was proposed. Potential names include Developer’s Showcase, Developer’s Open House, Talkback to Developers, and Developer’s Forum: Some Descriptive Text Here. A small group to discuss name and format changes for next year will be formed soon. Volunteers should contact me at the address below.
Members were reminded that we need ideas for new courses, concurrent sessions, and papers for next year’s conference. If you have ideas for any of these, please let me know. The SIG can help to find members to review proposals and papers prior to submission, we can try and find people to help you teach a course or run a session, or provide any other assistance as needed. That is the point of the SIG – you are not alone! If you have ideas for presentations that you would like to see by people outside the SIG or RESNA, let me know. We have some money available that could be used to help make this happen so that we can get some new ideas.
As always, opportunities to get involved with the SIG and RESNA still exist! These include (but are not limited to): reviewing papers and course proposals, presenting papers, proposing courses or concurrent sessions, submitting articles for the newsletter, making suggestions for all of the above, and generally helping to share info and make the SIG more useful to everyone. Thanks to all the people who signed up for these activities. Contact Glen at the address below if you didn’t sign up but are able to help.
Many thanks go out to Patty Benzing for doing such a great job leading the SIG for the last two years.
Glen Ashlock
Ann Arbor Center for Independent Living
Assistive Technology Center
2568 Packard Rd.
Ann Arbor, MI 48104
734-971-0277
gha@aacil.org