YPP - Meeting

In Attendance:

* DESY: Gudrid Moortgat-Pick (left at 8:25 am PDT), Sabine Lammers
* Fermilab: Bonnie Flemming
* Florida State University: Todd Adams
* University Washington: Joe Formaggio
* CESR: Mark Palmer (left at approx 9:30 am PDT)
* SLAC: Chris Potter, Wolfgang Walkowiak, Amanda Weinstein
* CERN: Veronique Boisvert
* Ohio State University: George Flemming

Meeting Minutes: recorded by Wolfgang Walkowiak

The Meeting:

• Announcement:
  • Jocelyn Monroe has been elected new YPP treasurer. Congratulations!

• Chapter Reports:
  
  • DESY
    • First meeting of YPP chapter at DESY:
      • About 30 persons attending the meeting
      • Top issue picked:
        New German law on junior professorships limits time employees at universities can spent on time-limited positions to 12 years total (lifetime). This effectively makes a considerable number of young academics in temporary pre-tenure positions vulnerable to unemployment without any regard to their qualifications. (see e.g. http://www.bmbf.de/en/index.php3 for official info from the German government). The DESY chapter will investigate the implications for young people in our field, especially in Germany.
      • Mrs. Edelgard Bulmahn, German Federal Minister of Education and Research will be visiting Hamburg on July 17th, 2002 --> YPP chapter at DESY will organize to attend the event as a group
      • Next YPP chpater meeting in 3 weeks where questions for minister will be prepared. (Sabine will be facilitating this meeting.)
      • They will bring in a lawyer to better understand the details of the new law on junior professorships.
  • SLAC
    • Peskin lecture series on Physics at an e+e- Linear Collider held in May, up to 70 attendees (transparencies and some photos on YPP@SLAC webpage http://www-project.slac.stanford.edu/ypp/ )
  • FNAL
    • Meeting: What will the Fermilab group do?
      • Exhibit on Fermilab at Science museum at Chicago
      • YPP grant which is stalled was discussed
      • Muon lifetime kits which to go to school; Chapter may get support from Fermilab
      • Global YPP: presence at APS meeting next spring considered.
  • CERN
    • Chapter at CERN: talked to people so far -> need is there
    • worry about size --> grad, postdocs, CERN fellows, limited contract staff --> idea: split the chapter into groups related to types of experiments and similar categories, if it grows too large.
    • A first meeting will hopefully be held within the next couple weeks.

• Report from meeting with DPF Exec Committee:
  
  • Stan Wojcicki had invited YPP to DPF Exec Committee
  • John Krane, Joe Formaggio and Sam Zeller went
  • John gave Snowmass report
  • Joe gave report what happened thereafter.
  • The presentations were well received.
  • Minutes including links to the above talks can be found at: http://ypp.hep.net/ypp_meeting0502_dpf.html
  • They offered: How can we help you?
  • Important topic: grant (*)
    --> DPF Exec will try to nudge the NSF to help our grant proposal (letter of encouragement)
    --> We decided to ask DPF Exec Committee to write this letter of encouragement.

  • Topic: Globalization of YPP:
    We have no representation in Asia.
    --> pointed to Steve Olsen for contacts to Asian collaborators
    --> talk to Clark McGrew (Stony Brook)
    --> find Asian colleagues who are going back
    

  • Meeting at APS'03 (April 2003 in Philadelphia) suggested:
    • Bonnie and George are interested in organizing.
    • First get money for YPP people to April APS meeting.
    • Have one day/one afternoon forum with e.g. a panel discussion.
    • Report of results of panel in plenary session foreseen.
    • Sally Dawson was excited about the idea.
    • Other interested people should contact Bonnie and George to get involved.
    • Joe is exited about it and will get involved.

  • APS FGSA (Grad student devision in APS)
    
    • Florencia has been in contact with Karsten Heeger (UW/LBL).

  • APS wants representation of YPP on Committees on
    • Government Outreach and
    • Outreach and Education
      (The invitation was extended to YPP by a separate email after the meeting with the DPF Exec Committee by Stan Wojcicki.) --> We may send one representative to each committee.

• Grant Status (*):
  (Todd): grant is under peer review (can take up to 6 months, we are 4 months into it)
  (George, non-official): NSF is under stress with respect to funding, cuts will be propagated to grants currently under review --> no money for YPP grant?
  --> It was asked to circulate an email statement on the current grant status.

• Ambassador Ammendment :
  
  • Some discussion based on the YPP at SLAC core groups proposal. ( http://www.slac.stanford.edu/~walkowia/ypp/bylaws/)
  • Some notes from the discussion:
    • The ambassodors shall have a resonable degree of freedom to act in unforeseen situations; they shall however be responsible to consider existing YPP policies and have to report back to the Exec Committee and/or Representative Body.
    • Todd wants the ambassadors to be appointed and to be responsible to the Exec Committee. ("The American model").
    • There is the issue of what the foreign entity wants from the YPP person:
      - representation of one young person's opinion in the field or
      - representation of YPP
      --> If the ambassador speaks or votes on behalf of YPP, we need to keep the ambassador accountable for their choices.
    • There was the general feeling that: - We want a mechanism for interim nomination and appointment of ambassadors via the Exec Committee.
      - We want some lee-way for the ambassador to act according to the situation, consulting the Exec Committee beforehand if possible.
      - At meetings of foreign entity the ambassador will vote according to YPP policy on the subject or to their best judgement.
      - We want transparency w.r.t. to the appointment of ambassadors, their actions and what happens in the foreign entity.
      [E.g. ambassadors report back to Exec Committee and Rep Body.]
      
  • Next steps: SLAC will send out a query for concrete changes to the ammendment text to ypp_org including a deadline. The SLAC core group will then try to unify the different proposals and edit a final draft. The Representative Body will vote then vote on the ammendment.

• Nominations for Ambassadors:
  
  • Government issues committee of DPF
    --> Chris Potter as potential candidate.
  • Public Outreach committee of DPF
    --> no nominations so far.
  • Send out email to general YPP list to solicit nominations (2-3 weeks).

• Executive Committee members
  
  • Currently, Exec Comm consists of two members:
    • Joe and Jocelyn
    • Secretary position is still open
    • Additional members (between 3 and 6): We want to fill 3 additional positions.
    • Nominations for exec committee: Wolfgang, George, Veronique (?) or Gudrid (?)
      [We would like representation from Europe.]
    • Process will continue via email.

• Role of the University Chapters in the Global YPP
  
  • What is their role?
  • Strengthen university chapters --> How?
  • The challenge to start university chapters is greater than at labs.
  • Give them action oriented support --> outreach kits etc.
  • YPP meetings / get-togethers at conferences and meetings in the field may help individual members from universities to connect with each other and YPP.

  For the minutes,

  Wolfgang Walkowiak