1) Student Chapters - a radically new spin

Inspired by our visit last November to the campus of the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign (main U-IL campus) to attend the SEDS SpaceVision Conference, we have been considering how to tap into this pool of existing chapters (currently 28 in North America) of a friendly space-focused organization - Students for the Exploration and Development of Space.

Our new idea is to offer these existing chapters something akin to "Institutional Membership" in the Moon Society. At the February 16th Board Meeting, the Moon Society board voted unanimously to "amend the Moon Society's bylaws to institute a new class of membership called a "student organization membership." This class of membership would apply to existing student chapters of other national/international organizations such as SEDS - (Students for the Exploration and Development of Space) or FIRST Robotics.  These organizations can become student organizational members of the Moon Society. All rules related to the obligations, duties and privileges of this class of membership are to be determined by the Management Committee."

At the March 2nd Management Committee meeting we approved the following rules.

The Candidate Student Chapter of another organization would be the "Member" in our database, not one or more of its leaders. Whether annual dues are involved or not, is to be decided. The registration rate will be $25, which can be adjusted for chapters just starting up.

The registered Contact Person will have access to a Moon Society username and password, which would be shared to be shared with individual members, with the suggested provision that the password be  changed at the beginning of each new academic year, so that former members of  the student group would no longer have access to MMM, and be encouraged to join  the Society as individual
adult/student members.

By tapping an existing pool of space-focused campus organizations, our message will reach far more students.

2) Chapter Projects and Outreach Materials - Financial assistance

The Management Committee gave strong approval to the idea of helping finance worthy chapter projects as well as public outreach needs

Outreach needs: a banner, a podium sign, a common business card design - we will begin working on these

Chapter Projects: A chapter that has an idea for a project that will
    • Involve students or
    • Support public outreach in general,
is encouraged to write up a proposal, describing the project, its physical components and design if any, its purpose, and use.
    • Components and materials that have a price tag should be identified.
    • The Chapters Projects Coordinator will present these to the Management Committee for appraisal. Projects with smaller price tags and those that are designed to be easily reproduced by other chapters, will receive first attention.

The existing "Project Guidelines" should be consulted

If you would like the Management Committee to consider a new initiative or idea, contact president@moonsociety.org

On the agenda, in addition to setting the rules for student organizations, will be a discussion of a proposal to use some of our recent $7,700 Bequest funds to support Chapter activities and projects. We need to reserve funding for those projects that are most promising, especially those from which other chapters can benefit. To date, we have earmarked some of these funds as prize money for contests and engineering competitions.

[The Board must decide all matters that involve modification of the Bylaws and all matters that are specifically referred to the Board in the Bylaws. All other matters can be decided by the Management Committee which includes all Board Directors and all Officers]

The call for nominations has already gone out in the March issue of Moon Miners' Manifesto

It is time to begin the annual Moon Society Elections Ritual once again. Each year, we vote for 2 of our 4 officers, and in odd # years, such as this one, we vote for 3 of our 5 directors, voting for the other 2 in even # years. Respond to president@moonsociety.org 

Three (3) Moon Society offices are up for election or re-election are Vice-President (inc. Jason Tuttle) and Treasurer (inc. Dana Carson.) Their terms will end in 2013. The office of Secretary has been vacant for some time, and nominations are most welcome. Election would be to the balance of a 2-year term ending in 2012, when a nominee could run for reelection.

Moon Society Directors positions open for election or re-election are the seats currently held by R. Scotty Gammenthaler, David Dunlop and Bryce Johnson. We have also been operating without a Chairman of the Board for sometime, Any director may volunteer. The Board is scheduled to convene once a quarter, (the 3rd Wednesday of the second month of every quarter (Feb, May, Aug, Nov) but may be convened at any time

Eligibility: Anyone who has been a member of the Society for a full year as of August 1, 2011 is eligible to run for a board seat or officer position. This year all members with a membership number of 1600 or lower are eligible for election.

Recommendations:

(1) Anyone unable to attend our meetings on a regular basis should not run for office.
The Management Committee (officers and directors meeting together) meets the 1st and 3rd Wednesday evenings monthly, 9-11 pm Eastern, 8-10 pm Central, 7-9 pm Mountain, 6-8 pm Pacific. Times will be earlier in Hawaii and Alaska, Times in the Eastern Hemisphere will be on the following Thursday: wee morning hours in Europe, morning in India, and early afternoon in Australia. Our meetings are held in a private and dedicated chat room, in the ASI-MOO environment.

(2) Anyone who has not previously served in a Moon Society leadership capacity and who wishes to run, is encouraged to join us in our meetings now, so that you will be up to speed by election day.
To gain access to the Management Committee meetings, please send an email to president@moonsociety.org so that access (restricted) can be granted.

Even if all current incumbents choose to run for re-election, at least 1 new person is needed! As we have no incumbent in the Secretary position, we need at least one new candidate! Of course, anyone is welcome to run against any incumbent. In total there are 6 positions open. And if we have some contests this year, that will liven things up!

To all members not running: You are not restricted from giving input on matters of any kind that pertain to Society goals and directions, projects and programs, the website or newsletter. Do feel free at any time to send an email to president@moonscoiety.org sharing with us your concerns, opinions, and suggestions. We enjoy hearing from you, and are encouraged by your taking interest in this way. Many thanks!

Nominations are due April 15th along with a candidate statement (250 words maximum) stating what you bring to the office in question, background, etc.  

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SEDS - Students for the Exploration and Development of Space

Next year's SEDS SpaceVision Conference will be held in November, 2011 at the University of Colorado Boulder campus. The Moon Society plans to stay involved.

FIRST Robotics

Another group of existing student organizations that may be interconnected to the Moon Society in this fashion are the High School Level FIRST Robotics teams. [FIRST = For Inspiration and Recognition of Science & Technology] Peter Kokh and Directors Dave Dunlop and Bryce Johnson met with a local Rockford Robotics team leader on January 1st. This meeting was very productive

The National Space Society:

We are collaborating with NSS on several fronts:

• The NSS-Kalam Space Solar Power Initiative
• Engineering Competitions, Design and Art Contests, etc.
• Sharing MMM with several NSS Chapters
• Helping find speakers for the annual International Space Development Conference
• Encouraging more "joint" NSS/Moon Society Chapters: Milwaukee, Portland, and Houston have pioneered this collaboration, and a new joint chapter is in the works for Indianapolis, IN, and Moon Society St. Louis may follow suite.