In Attendance:
Charlie Carter
John DeWolf
Phil Gresh
Dave Hart
Emmett Moore
Janeen Paradise
Gina Razum
Jill Siegel
John Wenaas
Mary Beth Zlock
Raj

Not in Attendance:
Colin Costello
Marty Egna
Sally Hornick
Peter Schallmoser
Pete Tulley
Robyn Young

1. Call to Order
1. Meeting called to order by Charlie Carter at 9:10 am.
2. Minutes of September 9, 2000 meeting at ITW Hi-Cone
1. The minutes from the September 9 meeting were not reviewed, as they have not been distributed to board members or posted on the web site
3. Old Business
1. By-laws review
1. Phil Gresh has been assigned the task of heading up a sub-committee to review the by-laws and perhaps add to and or modify them. Date: Spring 2001.
2. Getting more people active in the chapter committees
1. Each committee chair should send a paragraph describing their committee for the purpose of getting more people to help out on their committee. E.g. "Why should someone get involved on your committee? What are the opportunities?" See Action Item list for specific tasks.
3. Budget
1. Charlie Carter presented a draft of a budget that each committee will complete on a yearly basis.
2. See Action Item List for specific tasks
4. Committee Reports
1. Alumni Admissions – reported by Jill Siegel
1. Fall fairs are completed and were successful
2. The spring offer reception will be held March 4, 2001 at the Schaumburg Hyatt near Woodfield Mall on Golf Rd.
3. Questions for Marty Egna from Jill: 1) Do we have one list of current Penn State students 2) Is anything happening for the charter bus to Penn State?
2. AAAO – reported by Emmett Moore
1. We’re struggling both nationally and locally. Part of the reason is because Emmett has been out of town a lot.
2. There is a serious problem at Penn State directed at minority students
1. There has been hate mail, death threats, a swastika was painted on a door.
2. The Alumni Council is concerned and is supporting Penn State’s efforts to control this, such as taking out ads in the paper, sending e-mails to students.
3. The Alumni Council’s Diversity sub-committee is meeting on a regular basis and will come up with recommendations for the Alumni Council’s spring meeting.
4. Some ideas being discussed by the Alumni Council:
1. Develop and implement a diversity awareness course that all students must take and pass
2. Improve diversity awareness information that is presented to prospective students.
5. There needs to be a three-pronged approach: 1) Students 2) Faculty 3) Staff. In sum, the diversity climate at Penn State is not good right now.
6. Some ideas suggested by Janeen Paradise: Get Joe Paterno and/or Jerry Dunn involved because students will listen to them.
3. In terms of transitioning his role, Emmett has in mind a Penn State student that is graduating in the spring, coming back to Chicago, and is very interested in getting involved.
4. On behalf of our chapter, Emmett accepted an award from Diane Ryan, Executive Director of the Penn State Alumni Association. The award was a 2000 Chapter Achievement Award presented to the Greater Chicago Chapter for outstanding Community Service Program: Big Ten SCORE (Success Comes Out of Reading Experiences). The award also came with a check for $500.
5. Emmett presented a check for $1500 from Allstate for the 2000 Freshman Sendoff/Garden Party to John Wenaas.
3. Career Networking – reported by Charlie Carter on behalf of Pete Tulley
1. Pete drafted a comprehensive proposal for the Career Networking committee, which was distributed at the September 9, 2000 meeting. Hard copies of subsequent correspondence were provided in the meeting packet from Charlie Carter.
1. There are some great ideas. We need to make sure that we get the proper approvals from the University.
4. Community Service – no report
5. Communications – no report
1. Raj’s e-mail address has changed to: g.rajesh@rexambca.com
6. Membership - reported by Janeen Paradise
1. 154 members - As of December 1, 2000
2. 336 members - Rolling membership
3. Kathy Johnson volunteered her house for the Garden Party
7. Parent-Student Interaction – presented by Charlie Carter on behalf of Marty Egna
1. Student directory – working on it. Hope to have completed and delivered via e-mail before the first of the year. The directory will be in a format that students can read with any web browser on any type of computer (Mac or PC).
2. Marty needs input from the chairpersons of the Scholarship and Career Networking committees to know what information about their services they would like included in the directory. Also, if any other committee would like a description of their services to current students included in the directory, let Marty know. Please e-mail Marty at egnam@cch.com.
3. Chartering transportation for students on school breaks for school year 2001/2002
1. Not much has changed since last meeting’s report because the focus is on getting the student directory completed
2. Marty has contacted several PSAA chapters in New England that have banded together to offer charted transportation to the students from their chapter areas.
8. Scholarship - reported by Mary Beth Zlock
1. New contact person at the University is Jill Ivicic
2. $998 has been contributed to the 2001 scholarship program from the membership.
3. $2467 is available for the 2001 scholarship program from the endowment.
4. For the Year 2000 Scholarships, we gave a total of $3,000 in scholarships.
5. John moves that we designate $3500 to be earmarked for the 2001 scholarships and that $1615 to the endowment
6. Charlie moves that we designate $4000 to be earmarked for the 2001 scholarships, with the breakdown as follows: 1) Scholarship Committee has $3000 to work with 2) AAAO Committee has $500 to work with to give to a minority student 3) Allstate (from their $1500 donation) has $500 to award to an area intern. Charlie designates that $1115 goes to the endowment. Whatever is unawarded out of the $4000 will go to the endowment. All scholarships will be based on the same criteria. A motion was made to allocate the funds as stated above. The motion was passed unanimously.
7. Scholarship decisions are made in February with letters going out to students by the end of February.
9. Social Programming – reported by Charlie Carter on behalf of Robyn Young
1. Robyn is looking into having a Social Committee meeting the second week of January
2. Robyn is looking for new members to get involved on the Social Committee.
3. We discussed the size of the boat for the Air and Water Show, as per Robyn’s request. The general feeling was to go with the smaller boat.
4. The Big 10 Tournament Challenge is coming up in early March, around the time of the Big 10 Basketball Tournament. Robyn is looking for volunteers to help get donations, man the Pen State table, etc.
10. Sports Programming – reported by Dave Hart
1. The football trip to Indiana was successful. There was a $454 profit.
2. There were some problems with the bus. It was a different company than last year.
3. There was some discussion of Adam Taliaferro and an impromptu decision was made to take up a collection for him. $435 was collected. Dave asked if our chapter would like to match the donation.
4. Dave Hart made a motion to contribute $435 to the Adam Taliaferro fund. Take the $385 of the $454 profit from the Indiana trip to make a total contribution to the endowment of $1500. The remaining $69 will go to our treasury.
5. Planned for 2001 football season is a bus trip to Illinois and tickets to Northwestern.
5. Treasurer’s Report – reported by John Wenaas
1. Treasury is at $22,687
2. Dave Hart suggested that John itemized the revenues as he does the expenses
6. New Business
1. Jill Siegel had an idea that a good fundraiser would be to have Penn State Chicago chapter merchandise. Jill and Charlie will work on getting this started.
2. Andrew Roth, former Community Service chairperson, sent an e-mail to Charlie regarding an opportunity to prepare tax forms for low income families. See the hard copy in the meeting packet created by Charlie Carter.
3. Charlie Carter suggested Kane County Cougars baseball game as an outing
4. We should consider an event where we have a speaker from the University. Cheryl Stringer would be the contact at the University. We need to determine whom we want. This would be something that Charlie Carter or Gina Razum would coordinate depending on whether it was a fundraising (Charlie) or social (Gina) event.
7. Other Business
1. Charlie Carter proposed that we start meeting on a regular schedule, which will be the third Saturday of every odd month, excluding January (e.g. March, May, July, September, November). Our next board meeting will be Saturday, March 17.
8. Adjournment
1. Meeting adjourned at 12:00 noon.

Action Item List