East Midlands Materials Society
A Local Society affiliated to the Institute of Materials, Minerals and Mining
Minutes of Annual General Meeting held on Wednesday17thApril 2013at LeicesterUniversity
The President Gary Critchlow formally opened the meeting, and thanked all attendees for arriving in advance of the evening’s lecture by George Barnwell. He explained that, as in previous years, the AGM would proceed in a timely manner so as not to take up too much of everyone’s precious time. There were 28 persons present.
1 Apologies
Keith Harrison.
2 Minutes of AGM 2012
The minutes of the 2012 AGM were accepted as a true record of the meeting.
3 Matters arising
There were no matters arising.
4 President’s Report 2012-2013.
This report covers the activities of EMMS from 19 April 2012 to 17 April 2013.The metrics relating to the number of meetings and attendees will be reported by the Secretary. What I would like to do is to reflect upon some personal highlights of the year.
In this period we have held the usual eclectic mix of technical meetings plus a visit to Sherwood Observatory and also our annual social event. Once again the range of topics covered in our meetings has included something-for-everyone; considering materials as hard as diamond to the fluid flow of molten metals. This diversity and the resultant increase in attendee numbers has undoubtedly contributed to the success of EMMS this year culminating with the award of the title of “IOMMM (small) Local Society of the Year” for 2012/13. The social event was enjoyed by all even though I was disastrously bad and lost EMMS the Sue Pantaney trophy to another local society. This is a trophy named in honour of someone who was very well-known to many of us and who will be fondly-remembered. Hopefully we can compete for this again and win it back very soon !
Back to the successes though !
Continuing support for local students through: registration with IoMMM; travel grants, and; support for Younger Members is something that we consider really important. The high quality of our regional younger members is reflected in the excellent performance of our YPLC competitors at Local, National and International level in recent years. We wish Adam Brown from Leicester University every success in the National Finals of this completion this year. This support for younger members along with the aforementioned event organisation and other initiatives do not happen by chance. Initiatives need to be thought through and events organised in terms of: finding speakers; arranging venues; organising catering; arranging publicity and so on…..
This will be my final meeting as President and I would like to thank all those on the EMMS Committee who work tirelessly to make such things happen. All know who you are ! It has been a great honour and pleasure to work alongside everyone on the EMMS Committee for the past four years. Although I am sad to be stepping down from the role as President I know that EMMS will move onwards and upwards to greater things in new hands.
Talking of “onwards and upwards”, this brings me, finally, to the “High Performance Coating” event to be held at the National Space Centre. This upcoming event promises to be very exciting with high quality speakers and at a great venue. I am sure this will be a great success and is evidence that EMMS is in a great place moving forward under new leadership. Thanks again to all for the support extended to me and EMMS in the past four years.
5 Secretary’s Report 2012-2013.
This season’s EMMS programme includes a total of 11 events. The notification of the meetings has been by a poster emailed a week or so before each event on our website Thanks are due to our web-editor, Martin Tuffs, for keeping our website up to date.
Excluding this meeting, the average attendance over the season has been has been 38 (comprising 31 members of the Institute and 7 non-members). This shows our numbers are higher by two from last year, those figures being an average of 34 (comprising 26 members and 8 non-members). It is pleasing to see that our numbers are holding. We have again held a round of the Young Persons Lecture Competition. This was won by Adam Brown of Leicester University, and he has been subsequently judged as winner in the Midlands region. He will be giving his talk at the National lecture competition on 24th April. Let’s hope he goes one better than last year’s regional winner, Simon laws, who came second.
We have been recognised as successful by winning the Institute’s prestigious local society of the year award for 2013. I am very proud of this achievement, and thanks go to the president, the rest of the committee and all our attendees for your support. We are, in terms of numbers and grants, the most successful society in the Midlands, and indeed we now rank sixth overall in the Institute. Our changes to meeting dates and times seem to have been successful, and we propose to continue with the arrangements for next season.
Our conference this year “High Performance Coatings” will take place in about two months’ time, and registrations are well under way. We have secured an exciting venue, the National Space Centre in Leicester, and a world class array of speakers from aerospace, space (naturally!), motorsport and defence. Please register soon as possible.
The Society has been pleased to sponsor 49 students to become members of the Institute this year, including some from Nottingham Trent University and some from Environmental Engineering at the University of Nottingham – the first, so our reach is spreading... We have also part-funded eight students to attend conferences. We are pleased at the success of our scheme, but this has caused us financial concern in the last year. From the beginning of this year we have introduced some new requirements and a cap on our funding, but please, do keep the requests for funding coming in would like to thank the officers and members of the Committee for their help in the running of the Society. Many of them have a “day job”, but always seem to find time to help run the Society. Also I would like to thank our speakers for providing such interesting talks and everyone who has attended the events.
As you have heard, Gary is standing down as President this year, having done his two terms in office (four years in all). So I feel perfectly entitled to embarrass him (in the nicest possible way, of course). Gary has been a fantastic president. He has worked tirelessly for the society. He has: co-organised two conferences; promoted the society at the universities and in local industry; got some excellent speakers; helped win the local society of the year award, and many other things. His commitment has been exceptional: for example, he stepped in to judge the YPLC in February as the nominated judge was stuck in traffic, thus committing himself to go to Birmingham last month; he even nearly burnt his house down when a social visit lasted longer than expected! So, many thanks, Gary. You’re going to be a hard act to follow!
6 Treasurer’s Report 2012-2013.
The treasurer’s report was presented at the meeting. They were complete but had not yet been audited. The report is with the auditor and will be finished in the next few days. Copies were made available. The report was accepted by the meeting.
7 Election of Officers and Committee 2012-2013
The Treasurer and Honorary Secretary agreed to stand again in their current positions. The President, Gary Critchlow, has completed two terms of office (4 years in total) and is standing down, but wished to remain on the committee. Katy Voisey was proposed as the President, and she was duly elected. The Honorary Secretary had thanked Gary in his report, and Gary received a round of applause for his efforts as President. Allother committee members agreed to stand again in their current positions. No other nominations were received. The officers and committee were returned unanimously and are therefore as follows:
President: Katy Voisey
Secretary: Dave Evetts
Treasurer: Simon Hogg
Younger Members Representatives: Ian Edmonds, John Forsdike, Sophie Cozien-Cazuc
Committee: Hong Dong, Steve Andrews, Martin Tuffs (website coordinator), Gary Critchlow, Keith Harrison.
Any persons wishing to join the committee please let us know.
Dave Evetts – Honorary Secretary, East Midlands Materials Society
20thApril 2013