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Seaway Section: Chair's report - April 2008

As many of you are aware, first vice-chair and program chair, Dawn Jones, of SUNY Brockport, announced at the Fall meeting that she was stepping down from her positions in the Seaway section for health reasons. We wish her full recovery to good health, and thank her for the work she has done for the section. We are fortunate to have in the section some wonderful people who have willingly stepped into the breach to take over the responsibilities of the program chair until new elections are held at our Spring meeting: John Maceli of Ithaca college has done a superb job of arranging invited speakers, a panel, and a mini-mini course for the meeting at Syracuse; past Chair Gary Towsley has organized the contributed talk program; and Jack Graver, local organizer at Syracuse, has taken on even more responsibilities than usual for the local organizer. Sincere thanks to these three!

I am delighted that Jeff Johannes (SUNY Geneseo) has taken the position of chair for our Seaway Section NExT. He and his enthusiastic new committee have organized a really fine NExT-PFF Friday afternoon workshop at Syracuse. We also have fresh enthusiasm in the student program committee, with Dereck Habermas of SUNY Potsdam as the new chair. The committee has planned some fun activities for the Spring meeting and has interesting ideas for future meetings. Committees like these are the strength of our section - THANKS!

Congratulations to David Brown of Ithaca College who will be presented with a 2008 Alder award at MathFest in Madison. The Alder award is for teaching excellence for faculty who are in their first seven years of post-graduate teaching. With last year's award winner, Darren Narayan of RIT, the Seaway section is doing very well with Alder awards! Congratulations too to Joe Straight who has been awarded a certificate of Meritorious service by the National MAA. As you all know, Joe has done a tremendous amount for the Seaway section.

News from MAA headquarters includes an announcement that the MAA is offering travel grants for undergraduate students to help them attend the national meetings. Information about the grants for MathFest 2008 may be found at [http://www.maa.org/students/undergrad/MathFest08.html]. Students who are presenting either a talk or a poster are eligible to apply, and at most one student from any University, College, or REU will be funded. I was also asked to point out that there is a new deadline of October 1 for nominations for the Alder Award, and to urge members to consider nominating faculty in their departments. Relevant information as well as nomination procedures may be found on the MAA website.

The MAA strategic planning working group on sections has asked for feedback from section officers on several issues. The executive committee will prepare a response to these questions. The questions are listed below. If you have feedback on any of these issues, please send it to me via e-mail ([Mmorrowseaway@aol.com]).

1. 1. What are the 5 things the Association should expect from your section?
   2. What are the 5 things your section expects from the Association?
2. 1. How do you provide for leadership transition and continuity of the Section's knowledge base?
   2. How can the Association help your section make effective leadership transitions?

The Seaway section Fall 08 meeting will be at Sienna College, in Loudonville, near Albany, October 17-18. The local organizer is Kristin Farwell. John Maceli has arranged for MAA national executive committee member Rick Cleary of Bentley College to give one of the invited presentations at this meeting.

As always, thanks to all of those who spend time and energy keeping the Seaway section the vibrant section that it is. THANKS! And new volunteers are always welcome - just drop me an e-mail!

Margaret Morrow

Mathematics Department, SUNY Plattsburgh.

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