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SE Biology, Vol. 61, No. 1, January, 2014 
a small committee, five or fewer members that also serves to guide the student in 
her/his thesis research. The student passes the “Comprehensive Exam” when 
the proposal is altered with suggestions from the committee and adjusted toward 
the status of “likely to be funded”. 
Over the past several years, several graduate students at USC have 
attended, participated in, and enjoyed the annual meeting of our Association. All 
but one no longer attends because the highly specialized professors in my 
department continuously advise them not to join ASB. They encourage graduate 
students to attend small meetings in their specialty discipline, e. g, molecular 
biology, microbiology, etc. and they are advised that meetings of this type are 
much less expensive and far more professionally rewarding. 
Participation in our Association by colleges and universities throughout the 
Southeast is in general rather low and especially minimal in the larger state and 
private universities. The Executive Committee must take steps to make the 
Association more attractive, and my suggestions for this outcome will markedly 
change or reverse current approaches. Consider the following recommendations. 
1. The Meetings Coordinator should find the best venue, in terms of cost to ASB, 
near the Featured Institution, so that he can appeal to that institution to engage 
actively in the meeting and to provide us with space for some of our activities 
(e.g., the Thursday social and/ or the Friday Banquet; perhaps a room for one 
symposium). Selection of a featured institution that has a Convention Center on 
or near campus would stand as the best option. The two members on the Annual 
Meeting Arrangements Committee (AMAC) who represent the featured institution 
along with the Meetings Coordinator should engage appropriate administrators of 
the institution with an appeal for the institution’s active participation in the 
meeting. These three members of the AMAC should be able to enlist some 
(much or little) assistance from the institution that would reduce the costs that 
burden ASB. For example, when ASB met at the University of South Carolina in 
1986, the administration provided space for the Friday banquet free of charge. 
The Provost’s office provided buses to carry those attending to the Thursday 
evening social event (again, free of charge). We must find ways to get those 
attending onto the host campus for a portion (large or small) of the meeting and 
to revive the idea that the host institution derives a prominent benefit for hosting 
ASB. The Chamber of Commerce in the host’s community must be contacted 
early and educated as to the economic impact of our meeting. Our presence 
should be widely publicized. 
This suggestion would reverse the trend that the meeting venue does not need to 
be near the featured institution as first done in 1974 when Georgia Southern 
hosted the meeting in Savannah rather than in Statesboro. The institution should 
be in “field trip” distance for at least a visit by folks on the way home on Saturday. 
2. Elements of the annual meeting should be changed toward making the 
meeting less expensive. Perhaps, for example the Thursday Social could be 
changed to a gathering for beverages, hors d'oeuvres, and conversation, sans 
live music. Because attendance to the Annual Meeting has been more than 
satisfactory in recent years, the danger of the rising costs may be considered 
minimal. However, with the current financial challenges faced by colleges and 
universities, institutional support for faculty and students to attend expensive 
