Minutes

 

for the University of Massachusetts at Amherst Student Chapter of the Institute for Operations Research and the Management Sciences (INFORMS) meeting on September 9 2004 in Room 112 of the School of Management Building at 3:00 p.m. E.S.T.

 

Members Present:

 

President:         Tina Wakolbinger

Vice President: Shenghan Xu

Secretary:         Anh Nguyen, Leo Doherty

Treasurer:         Marius Costeniuc

Other Members: Xuan Huang, Zugang Liu, Sophie Morch, Qiang Qiang, Ekundayo Shittu, Patrick Simon, Diogo Souza-Monteiro, Fuminori Toyasaki, Kai Wu.

 

Members Absent:

Marta Benavente, Lisandra Garay-Vega, Dmytro Matsypura, Ralitza Patrashkova.

 

New Business:

 

  1. Tina introduced INFORMS as well as the student chapter and its general purposes to potential members.

 

  1. We then had nominations and elections for the officer positions. The election results were as follows:

 

Leo Zugang was assigned the position of webmaster. He already started working on the webpage of the student chapter. Students interested in helping him, should contact him at zugang@acad.umass.edu.

 

* There are two active Secretaries because Leo is an undergraduate senior who graduates in December 2004, and at the time, he was the only one to volunteer for the position. However, Anh will be taking over upon Leo’s departure and would like to learn the responsible and duties of the position. Anh will have all the privileges of an official officer.

 

  1. All present members unanimously approved the amendments of the bylaws that were sent out by Tina Wakolbinger to all members one week before the meeting. The new amendments were sent to INFORMS where the INFORMS Chapters/Fora Committee and the INFORMS Subdivisions Council will decide about their approval.
     
  1. Speaker series:

The start of the new speaker series organized by the UMASS Amherst INFORMS Student Chapter was announced. During the Fall semester 2004, 7 professors from different departments in UMASS will present their research. More information about the speaker series can be found at http://supernet.som.umass.edu/informs/speakernew.html

 

After each talk up to 3 members of the student chapter can join in a lunch with the presenter and our faculty advisor Professor Nagurney who substantially contributed to this speaker series as well as the startup of the student chapter. The Department of Finance and Operations Management of the School of Management sponsors these lunches. The chapter is very thankful for the support provided by Professor Nagurney, the Isenberg School of Management, the Department of Finance and Operations Management and the John F. Smith Memorial Fund.

 

The following students have already signed in to participate in the lunches:

  

 

Members interested in participating in one of the lunches at the faculty club should indicate this to Leo or Anh at umassinforms@som.umass.edu. Whoever asks first will be assigned first.

 

5.      Activities: The group formed into smaller groups and brainstormed ideas of group activities. Some of the suggested activities were: going out to visit organizations, watching films about OR, inviting executives to come and give a talk about their work. Also noted was that the web page should provide a short information about each member and that in the following meetings some food and drinks should be provided. 

 

6.      Tina adjourned the meeting at 4:25p.m.

 

Next Meeting:

 

The next meeting was scheduled for Friday, October 8 at 5 pm. The meeting will be held in room 112 in SOM again and is expected to last for one hour. Ekundayo Shittu will give a short presentation and then general topics of interest, especially further activities, will be discussed.