December 06, 2011 4:00PM
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4:52PM
CAETS
International Council of Academies of Engineering and Technological Sciences, Inc.
CAETS Executive Committee Meeting/Telecom,
December 6, 2011
SATW offices, Zurich
4:00 PM Zurich/9:00 AM Mexico City
Summary Minutes
Draft December 29, 2011
Participation: Jose Antonio Ceballos, President (phone); Rene Dändliker, President-elect; William C. Salmon, Secretary, Treasurer; Klaus Bock, Past President (phone).
Guest: Hans Hänni , Senior Consultant, SATW.
1. The President asked the President-elect to lead the discussion. The draft agenda distributed earlier was approved.
2. The Summary Minutes of ExCom Meeting of June 27, 2011 was approved. There were no amendments proposed for the Minutes of the Board Meeting of June 27, 2011, nor for the Minutes of the Council Meeting of July 1, 2011.
3. Administrative Issues
a. The Secretary reported that dues have not been received from one member academy, despite several e-mail reminders. (Later in December funds were received.) Two member academies have paid their 2012 dues early.
b. The President appointed the members of the 2012 – 2013 CAETS Audit Committee: Bob Pullen, SAAE; C. D. (Dan) Mote, Jr., NAE; Lance Davis, NAE.
4. The Secretary reported on his discussions with Janos Ginsztler, HAE (CAETS 2012 President-elect), in Budapest on December 2, 2011, concerning the program for the symposium to be held during the 2013 CAETS meetings. The topic, “Engineering Education: Cooperation and/or Competition, was approved by the Board of Directors in early 2011. The Secretary reviewed the highlight”s of the July 1, 2011 Council discussion of this topic, including two reports mentioned: “A New Culture of Learning,” by Brown and Thomas; and “Rethinking Engineering Education – The CDIO Approach” by Ed Crowley and 3 additional authors. For suggestions on the 2013 symposium program the Past President suggested contacting his successor as President of ATV, Martin Philip Bendsøe, who is well involved in engineering education in Denmark.
5. The President-elect briefly described current plans for the 2012 CAETS meetings. The meetings will be held in the Swissotel Zurich, located in Oerlikon, which is located on the train line about half-way from the Zurich airport to downtown Zurich. A Welcome reception will be held on Wednesday evening, August 29, the Symposium on Thursday, the Council meeting on Friday, and an interesting tour has been arranged for Saturday, September 1. The details for hotel reservation, meeting registration, and related fees will be posted on the SATW web site in mid-January 2012.
The Symposium program has been reorganized to have no parallel sessions. The latest version of the program will be sent to ExCom members in a few days and to all member academies by mid-January inviting experts to be nominated for the open parts of the program.
The President mentioned that AI will send a delegation of 4 people to the 2012 meetings. Also, he will present at the Council meeting a brief paper on data from member academies on the independence of academies from their government.
6. On the matter of improving the usefulness of the council meetings to member academies, the Secretary reported that the experiment of asking second-year Board members to lead a discussion is not meeting expectations. As an alternative, it may be more useful to develop one topic, of interest to most member academies, perhaps include an outside resource, and spend about two hours with brief papers prepared ahead of time. Examples of such a topic could be nuclear power, climate change, and developing engineering capacity in Africa. The ExCom members supported the Secretary further developing this alternative.
7. Next meeting of the ExCom is proposed to be on April 23, 24, 25 or 27, 2012 in Zurich with telephone connection, again beginning at 4:00 PM CET/9:00 AM Mexico City time. The following meeting of the ExCom will be on Wednesday morning, August 29 at the Swissotel.
8. The Past President thanked the President for the very nice Convocation in Mexico City in June. All thanked The Past President for his contributions to CAETS and the work on the ExCom.
9. The meeting was adjourned at 4:50 PM