Chris Goodall opend the meeting with a warm thank-you to Don Wiebe for serving as the faculty host for this year’s MATT meeting and presented Don with gifts of appreciation form MATT.There were no minutes from last year’s membership meeting due to an over sight by the secretary Laureen Marinetti who promises to provide minutes for the current meeting. The elections from the 2001 meeting are summarized in the MATT newsletter. Also no official budget for MATT was available at this time due to the fact that the funds and expenses for the current meeting had not been calculated. The balance is approximately $13,000.00. The membership stands at approximately 100 and hopefully the new and fully operations web site will help increase membership.
There are two tentative proposals for the MATT meeting in 2003 and 2004. They are: Michigan State University Student Union in East Lansing, MI for MATT 2003 and The Anderson Conference Center in Lyle, IL for MATT 2004. Proposals were offered by Laureen Marinetti for the Michigan site and Adam Negrusz for the Illinois site. MATT is currently accepting proposals for either 2003 or 2003, however the 2003 proposal would have to be submitted by the end of May in order to ensure that there is enough time to make the arrangements. No proposals were offered from the floor so the 2003 meeting will most likely take place in East Lansing. Information will be available on the MATT web site.
Fred House is working hard to build a database of members� address. If you did not receive your newsletter please check with Fred to make sure your address is correct. Also Fred has extra issues if you would still like one. The new MATT web site was constructed by a University of Wisconsin sophomore for the cost of $750.00 with an annual fee of $149.00. Members are asked for their input as to what information or changes they would like to see on the web site. Visit www.midwesttox.org and let one of the MATT officers know what you think. In the fall we will be asking the membership if they would consider accepting the newsletter via e-mail using a pdf format. This falls newsletter will be mailed as usual. Also we would like to be able to update member information via a web link directly to Fred House�s e-mail.
MATT would also like to propose the idea of offering a corporate sponsorship with two levels. The less expensive sponsorship would offer one free registration to the annual meeting, free advertising in the newsletter and a link from the MATT web site. The more expensive sponsorship would offer both the advertising and the link and also an unlimited number of free registrations for employees and access to the membership list of MATT. If there are any ideas or suggestions regarding the sponsorship please contact one of the MATT officers.
MATT would like to solicit ideas from the membership for an award to be given at the annual meeting. This award would be designed to encourage student participation in the meeting such as best poster for platform presentation. The MATT by-laws require updating. Proposed changes will be made to the officer election procedure and the committee structure. The executive committee would re-write the by laws and present them to the membership for their approval. There was a suggestion to post the by-laws on the web site. Steve Wong will type the by laws and send them to Chris Goodall. Christine Moore and Dan Isenschmid will serve on the nominating committee to select the slate of officers for next year�s elections. The 2002 annual MATT general membership meeting is concluded see you in East Lansing at the 2003 meeting and don�t forget your green and white – GO STATE!!!
Submitted by Laureen Marinetti