Meeting of the Branch Committee

Minutes for 2004-04-14

Time:	13:00--14:00
Venue:	CUBIN Board Room.

View the agenda for this meeting

Present

John Papandriopoulos (JP), Boon Ng (BN), Jolyon White (JW), Thaya Thanabalasingham (TT), Jennifer Che (JC), Malka Halgamuge (MH), Angiras, Dominik Heim (arrived late).

Apologies

Andrew Liu (AL).

Previous Minutes

Accepted subject to correction of AP19.8, and Section 3.3 (no acknowledgement has been received as to whether the judges will take account of the site's dynamic content). Motion put by JP, passed unanimously.

Completed Action Points

Item Number	Description	Responsible Person	Date Completed
12.6	Make poster to advertise membership forms and ways to return them	TT	2004-04-14
19.2	JP to make a proposal for a request for funding for R10 student congress, to be put to a vote at the next meeting.	JP	2004-04-14
19.5	BN/AL to attend friday meeting and prepare slides for presentation by Monday (Making Connections).	AL,BN	2004-03-29
19.8	AL to talk to TT about Endeavour project and send an email to JP to	AL	2004-04-14
19.9	DH to organise and chair brainstorming meeting in the next 2	DH	2004-04-14

Open Items

Item Number	Description	Responsible Person	Due Date
14.5	Investigate other sources of funding (e.g. UMPA).	AL	2003-11-25
16.1	Revise and redraft by-laws relating to election process.	JW	2004-02-01
16.5	Contact departmental mentoring scheme coordinator.	JW	2004-01-30
18.6	AL to liaise with Section to reconcile amounts held with section and arrange to have all branch funds transferred to branch account:	AL	2004-04-14
18.14	JW investigate more effective ways to deliver meeting minutes in web-presentable form:	JW	2004-03-02
19.1	JW to submit 2004 Annual Plan by Friday, 2004-03-26.	JW	2004-03-26
19.3	AL to determine the deadlines for UMPA Student Initiative Funding rounds for the rest of the year.	AL	2004-04-14
19.4	JP to find out if BoM will allow endorsing cheques.	JP	2004-03-26
19.6	AL to prepare an analysis to quantify the loss which would have occurred had the recent BBQ been free to members.	AL	2004-03-31
19.7	JP to make contact with other branches to start interbranch seminar series project.	JP	2004-04-14
20.1	Draft proposal for IEEE Vic Section for presence at Endeavour	AL,TT	2004-05-05
20.2	Complete BBQ planning.	JC	2004-04-07
20.3	Coordinate to prepare draft faculty funding proposal.	AL	2004-04-07
20.4	Determine feasibility of branch ski trip.	TT	2004-05-05
20.5	Prepare branch website visitor statistics report.	JP	2004-05-05
20.6	Organise site visits with Kerry Hinton, RMIT student branch.	BN	2004-05-05

Proceedings

Present and apologies

See above
Outstanding action points and acceptance of previous minutes.
- AP12.6 Done: TT to send email to list.
- AP14.5 Open.
- AP16.1 Ongoing.
- AP16.5 Ongoing.
- AP18.6 Ongoing. JP: Peter Wills (Vic Sec Treasurer) was to go over details last weekend, but AL was meant to liaise with him to make sure all amounts were accounted for. No indication from AL as to whether this has been done.
- AP18.14 Ongoing. JW to make appointment with JP to discuss.
- AP19.1 Ongoing. Annual Plan: submitted but not confirmed by Barbara Koenig. JW to email her to confirm.
- AP19.2 Closed. No proposal needed as IEEEVic has agreed to cover airfare and taxes.
- AP19.3 Ongoing.
- AP19.4 Ongoing.
- AP19.5 Closed. A summary was emailed to the committee.
- AP19.6 Ongoing.
- AP19.7 Ongoing. RMIT is willing to be involved but is currently in an election cycle so progress must wait for it to finish.
- AP19.8 Done. In the past IEEE Vic has supported Endeavour and prizes given to some projects. There is willingness for this to continue but a proposal must be made. AP20.1 AL and TT to draft a proposal. Manning a desk at the Endeavour exhibition is a good idea.
- AP19.9 Done. Brainstorming session to be held on the evening after the MATLAB workshop.
Chair's Report
1. IEEE Reporting: 2004 Annual Plan.
  
  Annual plan has been submitted. Confirmation from Barbara Koenig required to ensure payments are made to the branch for rebates (JW).
2. R10 Student Congress Funding.
  
  IEEE Vic Section has agreed to increase funding to $1200 (+ GST/taxes) to cover airfares. JP to fund the difference.
Financial Report

Since the treasurer was not present there was no financial report.
Branch Activities/Events
1. MATLAB Workshop Update
  
  BN gave an overview of current preparations:
  - Booking has been made but there has been no acknowledgement yet (tobe followed up).
  - Survey has not been drafted (to be done next Monday).
  - Malik/Soban have agreed to send a draft of the materials they arepreparing by this afternoon (2004-04-14).
  - There is currently no planned meeting. Malik and Soban should plana meeting for next week.
2. Mid-Semester BBQ
  
  Jennifer Che gave an overview:
  - Planning has commenced.
  - TT and DH will recruit people to help.
  - A budget needs to be prepared in coordination with AL (Treasurer).
  AP20.2: JC to organise BBQ meeting for next week.
3. T-Shirt competition
  
  From now until winter break Syed will work out a plan for the competition. The proposed T-Shirt designs should have a pocket-location logo on the front (i.e. small) and a full-sized design on the back. Designs will be accepted in MS PowerPoint format. Costs are to be determined by this Friday 2004-04-16. From 2004-04-16 until 2004-04-30 the website and (electronic) application form should be in place. A detailed timeline overview was given by JP.
4. Case study competition
  
  Dominik Heim gave an overview of the European-based case study competition he was involved in at his home university, with multiple rounds leading to a Europe-wide final, and a prize of an internship with the sponsor (Roland Berger).
  
  The idea is to start with a small pilot competition this year with 2-4 teams. Participants should be engineering and commerce engineering students, 3rd year and up. A panel of judges is needed. E.g. Moshe Zukerman, someone from Economics & Commerce Faculty.
  
  Case studies themselves should not be difficult to find or construct.
  
  This is a good candidate for faculty sponsorship.
  
  AP20.3: AL to coordinate a draft fo the faculty funding proposal.
5. Mentoring
  
  There has been no progress on this project.
6. Ski trip planning
  
  It is questionable whether the university ski lodge is still available to be booked at this stage. Interest is also uncertain.
  
  AP20.4: TT to do a feasibility study by next meeting
  
  AP20.5: JP to check branch website visitor statistics and report at next meeting.
7. Site visits
  
  RMIT is organising a site visit to TRL. It might be possible to combine efforts.
  
  AP20.6: BN to talk to Kerry Hinton about site visits and coordinate with RMIT contact.
Next meeting:

The next Branch committee meeting will take place on Wednesday 5 May 2004.

Meeting closed at 14:10.