2010 NSBP Annual Conference 

Dear Members and Supporters of NSBP,

First, I would like to wish you all a happy and prosperous new year.

I am writing to inform you that the NSBP/NSHP Annual Meeting which was scheduled for February 11-13, 2010 will now be held as an NSBP Meeting on Saturday only, February 13^th from 8:00 am to 6:30pm at the Omni Shoreham Hotel in Washington DC. 

Please plan to attend.   You can register for the meeting and secure lodging by going to

http://www.nsbp.org/conference

The reason for the short fall of funding for the conference is best summarized by noting the following scenario and sequences of events:

As you may know, the NSBP Annual Meeting had primary funding from the National Science Foundation, with additional, albeit, smaller funding from other federal agencies.  The original grant was for 5 years, which started in 2004 and went through 2008.  NSBP needs to sign a contract with the conference hotel more than 1 year prior to holding the meeting and provide substantial down payments to secure the venue.  Additional substantial payments must also be made to contract with the conference services that assists NSBP in securing travel for the student attendees.   To make these payments, typically, some Board members have to extended loans to the society, since the NSF grant works on a reimbursement basis only, i.e., there are no cash advances.   For the 2004 meeting, NSBP received its first round of funding shortly after the meeting, which allowed us to pay the encumbered debt to Board members, conference venue, and other conference related activities. This process worked effectively from 2004-2008. 

In June, NSBP was informed that our submitted proposal from 2008 would be funded, however, the funding could only be used for the next conference year of 2010.  

This unfortunate circumstance prevented NSBP from covering the encumbrance we accrued from the 2009 conference. 

In October, NSF met with board members of NSBP and NSHP and NSF voiced their concern regarding the financial status of the 2009 conference. It was at this meeting that NSF withdrew their positive recommendation for an award. To try to mitigate the severity of the situation, NSF suggested that SURA serve as the contract awardee, and assist NSBP and NSHP in managing the conference, with the NSBP/NSHP program committee continuing to handle all programmatic aspects of the meeting .

During the next two months, a new proposal had to be written, along with a new budget, and negotiations with the conference venue, conference services, and, most importantly SURA, who, if they decided that they would manage the meeting, would be assuming the financial risk of the conference.   

Going forward the NSBP leadership is working on various aspects of the organization that will reach out to its membership, as well as new revenue sources to not only meet our past expenses but also to diversify the financial resources for our future conferences and other programs.   We are also working with our long-time supporters and partners, such as Brookhaven National Lab, to make sure that we have the kind of conference in 2011 that we had in 2004-2009. These are key topics and points for discussion that we will address during our business meeting.

This news, for many, is very saddening, since this meeting was the primary event that allowed Black and Hispanic physicists and engineers to come together and present their research findings, share their academic experiences with each other and seek out mentoring advice from professionals. This conference was seen by all as a keystone in the support and broadening of diversity in the sciences. It is our hope that your attendance will speak loudly to the support of this mission. 

I hope to see you there.

Sincerely,

Peter Delfyett

Mapquest

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