**Agenda of the CCR-FYI Steering Committee Meeting**

**December 20^th^, 2007 Thursday 11:00AM - 12:00PM**

-   Bethesda: conference room in building 31, room 3A11

-   Frederick: Building 549, Conference Room A

    -   dial-in \# 301-451-6108 phone: 301-846-1659)

**Legend: In black:** as in the Agenda, this paragraphs were read by
Jordan.

**In blue:** Meeting minutes.

**1) Call to order.**

Attendance:

[Frederick(North Campus)]{.underline}: Poonam Tewary; Veronica Hall; Tim
Chan; Paul Schaughency; Jill ford; Selinda Orr; Michal Legiewicz;
Michaela Wendeler; Kristen Jacobsen; Karen Wylie; Arti Santhanam; Qiou
Wei; Jordan Irvin: Julie Torruellas García; Gonzalo de la Rosa.

[Bethesda (South Campus)]{.underline}: Swati Choksi; Brid Ryan;
Christian Capitini; Thomas Paul; Michael Rosu-Myles; Krista Zanetti; Ewy
Mathe; Margaret; Mary Vethelius; Jonathan Wiest; Jonathan Jacobs.

And 2 new members:

**Ewy Mathe (pronounced *Evee Matee*). Email:
[[mathee@mail.nih.gov]{.underline}](mailto:mathee@mail.nih.gov) ; Ph:
301-496-5853; Brid Ryan (pronounced *Breet*) ;Email:
[[ryanb@mail.nih.gov]{.underline}](mailto:ryanb@mail.nih.gov) ;Ph:
301-496-5886**

[ATCC (Middle Campus]{.underline}): nobody

[Excused:]{.underline} Jennifer Shen; Maria Manzzoni; Ram Savan (half
excused; another half-excused will count as unexcused?).

Again, technical problems delayed the meeting. Until 11.20 pm, it was
not possible to start the meeting.

**2) Approval of November minutes.**

No comments made. In the agenda, it was written:

> Since we are on a compressed schedule since our last meeting, minutes
> are not currently available, but will be posted on the web shortly,
> please review and contact Gonzalo or Michael with any issues.
>
> But the minutes were available since 12/7/2007 (as several members
> noticed, by sending Gonzalo corrections).

**3) FelCom Report (Jennifer Shen):**

As Jennifer Shen is not present, Jordan asked the SC to read the
comments in the agenda and give her feedback about those issues.

**4) Amending the SC bylaws (Jordan):**

After reviewing the bylaws (Margaret) to know who was allowed to vote...

-   Proposal to amend the bylaws to establish co-vice chairs for both
    Frederick and Bethesda. Discussions email is about 60/40 in favor of
    having a vice chair in each location.

> Resolved with: -Frederick: 11 votes out of 12 for YES (Jill still has
> no right to vote).

-   Bethesda: 6 votes YES and 2 Abstetions (note: J.Jacobs was not
    present yet).

> As a clear majority (unless someone corrects this point), this change
> will be implemented in the next member election.

-   Replacement secretary in Bethesda since Michael Rosu-Myles will be
    leaving in January. As this has never happened, we should update the
    bylaws to allow a temporary replacement. Again, I'll ask for
    volunteers; if there are none, an appointee will be named.

> Postponed: Krista will be the "non-official" vice-chair until March
> (elections). But, of the two proposed members in Bethesda, only
> Christian qualifies. (Note: this may need a correction; this is what I
> have in my notes. But I don't know whether Christian is taking over,
> or he will wait until March. The latter would allow Orla (the other
> candidate) to be a vice too.)

-   Amending the bylaws to consolidate the alumni, social and community
    life subcommittees into one. I'm going to propose keeping the name
    of community life for this committee, but suggestions are also
    welcome. Additionally, I'm asking for a few members in Bethesda to
    join this committee, including a chair.

Veronica proposed to have the chairs of those committees along with
Jordan and herself discussing about this issue before voting. J.Jacobs
agreed. Margaret considers that also it is required to know the function
and description of the new sub-com. before amending; the description of
the three "old" subcoms is in the by laws: read them and try to find a
new function for the new one. Krista and Ewy (is this correct?)
volunteered to gather together with Veronica &Jordan and the chairs of
the old subcoms (or what is left of them).

-   Maarten Leerkes is currently listed as our NPA representative, and
    I'm waiting to hear if he is willing to continue with this role. The
    NPA annual meeting is in Boston April 25-27, 2008. Jonathan's office
    has funds for travel to this meeting.

> Again, Maarten is not coming to the meetings, nor responds to Jordan
> e-mails, though it is said that he is still interested. Christian
> asked what is NPA and why it would be interesting or important to have
> some of us going to their meetings (Because we never hear from them)?
> Arti answered (Note: as it was impossible for me to grab all the
> information, have a look at:
> <http://www.nationalpostdoc.org/site/c.eoJMIWOBIrH/b.1388175/k.7F3A/About_The_NPA.htm>)
>
> Krista said that she will try to have Jodie and Jennifer to attach NPA
> reports inour meetings.

-   Thomas: Jodie Fleming is FELCOM NPA rep. Thomas might be able to
    convince her to join the SC and act as our rep if Maarten is not
    interested.

**5) Scientific Subcommittee:**

2008 Intramural Scientific Investigators Retreat, Bethesda, Tuesday,
January 8th.

Jordan needs a poster to be presented at the retreat; although
registration is closed, it is possible to go there due to the fact that
Julia Pons is also covering this retreat. He needs data/material to make
the poster and members of the Sci. subc. helping him. He was told that
he will have the information given to Arti to make the Newsletter.

**6) 6.1.Frederick Postdoc Seminar Series (Jordan):**

> (Run by Dr. Stewart Austin and his secretary Madeline Knobel). Howard
> Young and Matt Young have transferred Audio/visual help and
> introductions of this series over to the SC. We will be doing the
> introductions, passing out evaluations, and possibly scheduling (in
> the future). This provides us an opportunity to make announcements to
> the postdoc/postbac community.
>
> Funds that were previously used for pizza and sodas have dried up.
> Stewart Austin believes that we should halt the series until we can
> find a mechanism to fund it; I disagree. I would like to talk to the
> Frederick members briefly at the end of the SC meeting about this and
> if they feel like we should pursue having the series continue without
> food.
>
> Although the general idea was that without food it wouldn't be
> possible, it was said that now those funds are back (Jonathan did?).

**6.2 Bethesda Postdoc Seminar Series: Scientific subcommittee.**

> Jonathan Wiest has funds set aside for pizza and a room reserved for
> postdoc seminars. A bi-monthly schedule with two presenters for the
> entire spring semester would require \~22 presenters. Looking for
> volunteers to assist the scientific subcommittee in approaching PIs
> to 1) suggest postdocs that would be available to present 2) enhance
> attendance. Additionally, SC members in different buildings in
> Bethesda will be asked in the spring to post fliers in their buildings
> to advertise the postdoc seminar series
>
> I have not gotten any volunteers to run this seminar series. I feel
> this is a great opportunity for the SC to achieve a very tangible
> goal. It will require a small amount of work, and will only be a few
> times a year (like in January and then August). It will require active
> involvement from the members in Bethesda. Therefore, I think it is the
> duty of all members in Bethesda to work toward this goal.

Jonathan Wiest clarified that this seminar was focused in helping the
fellows to develop their career, improving presentation skills. As many
answered in the annual survey that they were interested in "a postdoc
seminar series", and not many people are going to this event, the survey
may require to be rephrased to : - "interested in assist" and/or
"interested in going to the seminar to present data".

So far, no volunteers in Bethesda to run/organize this seminar (getting
PIs involved to motivate postdocs, moderate, etc...)

**7) Online business**

-   Jonathan Jacobs will be leaving the SC after the retreat, and would
    like to transfer duties of managing the listserv to another member.

    -   Computer savvy [volunteers]{.mark}?

> None? (I have nothing here)

-   Veronica/Maja/Jordan have been working to add the colloquium to the
    Spotlight feature on ncifcrf.gov web site

    -   Worked with Susan Fox and Jillian Deshazer. At the request of
        the administration, Andy's beach picture of Atlantic City has
        been replaced with the outstanding postdoc talk from last year's
        retreat.

(From now on, most of the minutes were just a quick read of the agenda,
as we ran out of time for the meeting)

**8) Workshop updates (Jonathan Jacobs and others):**

final decision on the structure/format of each individual workshop

1-paragraph biography of each speaker that is relevant to the workshop.

Contact information for each of the speakers in your workshop

Register for the conference and plan on attending.

Jonathan will try to send a template to use to contact the speakers.

Jordan reminded us to encourage PIs to come to the retreat...er..
Colloquium. Krista recommended to send personal invitations to the PIs.

**9) Outstanding Postdoc search (Arti and Swati)**

> Dr. Matthew Hall\--The selection committee found your research work in
> the area of drug discovery using high throughput screens and
> identifying second generation synthetic analogs as potential cancer
> treatments to be of exceptional quality.
>
> Your presentation will be the first plenary session at 4.30 pm on
> Monday March 3rd, 2008 at the CCR-FYI Colloquium.

**[10) December Colloquium Update (Tim):]{.underline}** Tim had to leave
the building before this issue was brought.

The countdown has begun -- only 74 days away (as of 12/20/07)

One of our first major tasks this month has been accomplished-abstract
submission. The deadline was Dec. 14. Various email announcements were
sent out by Julia (Palladian Partners) and Tim through the listserves.
Current count of abstracts submitted **179** (including 6 cores; as of
12/17/07). The next step is abstract judging which will commence on Dec
20. Volunteers for abstract judging (both SC members/staff scientists
and NCI postdocs) have been informed of their categories they will be
judging. Head judges, whose role is to tabulate the scores/ranks from
the other judges in the category, have also been assigned for each
category. The results of abstract judging must be returned to the head
judge no later than Fri. Jan 4/08, in which scores are tabulated and the
results will be submitted to Tim/Jonathan Wiest/Julia Poms. Out of the
top 10 for each category, the top 5 abstracts will be sent letters
inviting them for oral presentations and the remaining ones will be
judged as posters. Thanks to everyone who has volunteered thus far for
judging. More judges will be needed during the retreat for poster and
oral presentations, please see Tim.

Keynote speakers and workshops have been finalized. Still waiting to
determine which deputy director will be participating in the OD Open
forum session. Also, Bob Wiltrout will be at the Colloquium from the
afternoon on March 4 until the end. We have asked him to do the closing
and hand out travel awards.

Organizers of the workshop are beginning to contact their panelists to
"hammer out" the format and style of the workshop. The agenda is
currently being updated to reflect some changes and addition of session
moderators.

Career fair is still gaining momentum. Thus far, confirmed organizations
include:

> Invitrogen
>
> Discovery Logic
>
> Dendreon Corporation
>
> NCI - Patrick Miller
>
> NCI-OSPA - Julie Bronder

There are several who have verbally agreed (embassies and
organizations), but we will continue to keep in contact to get them to
send in their paper work.

Selinda is working on obtaining trinkets. We are limited to \~\$2.50 per
trinket and some of the options at this moment for that price range
include:

Laser pointer

Keyring Torch (flashlight in American!!)

Stressball

An email was also distributed out to the SC recently asking for input
into the meals. The two-page menu provided is a guide for the type of
food we can obtain but we can also customize the menu to include more
vegetarian options, etc. [Please send Selinda your input.]{.mark}

One subject matter brought up -- to attract more PIs to attend, we might
consider doing personal invitations to them. Is this something we want
to do and which PIs do we personally invite?

A reminder to SC members, abstract submission and registration are two
different sections on the website. Remember to do both. The abstract
submission page will remain open until the end of the year. Also, if you
have not selected to submit an abstract, but will be attending, then
register now before the January 25, 2008 deadline. More announcements
will also be made through the listserves to remind individuals to
register.

**11) Future Business:**

By-laws committee meeting to update the above issues in the bylaws

January social get-together???

Options include coffee or happy hours in Bethesda. Frederick is always
willing to host these, but would Bethesda members attend?

Ice staking outing?

Skiing at one of the nearby resorts?

ATC conference room is reserved for 1/31/07 joint meeting