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2006 Business Meeting Minutes
ASHG Business Meeting
New Orleans, Louisiana
Thursday, October 12, 2006
MINUTES
President Warren opened the meeting and asked for a moment of silence for the
recently deceased members of the Society. They are: Robert Baumiller, Lorraine
Flaherty, Robert Gorlin, Caroline Laundon, Robert Miller, Theodore Puck, Peter
Rowley, Karen Snow Bailey, Kay Tanaka, John Hamerton, Friedrich Vogel.
He then thanked retiring board members: Robert Nussbaum, Ann Bowcock and Pat
Ward and welcomed new directors: Anthony Wynshaw-Boris, Muin Khoury, Miriam
Blitzer and President-elect Aravinda Chakravarti.
SECRETARY'S REPORT – Dr. David Nelson
Dr. Nelson reported that the minutes from
the business meeting in Salt Lake City have been available on the ASHG
website for several months. He asked for a motion to approve those minutes.
A motion was given and seconded. There were no objections.
He thanked the 2006 Nominating Committee members chaired by Huntington
Willard. They are: Robin Bennett, James Evans, Ada Hamosh, Brendan Lee, Neil
Risch, Stephanie Sherman. The committee put forward the following slate of
candidates: Aravinda Chakravarti, Miriam Blitzer, Rick Kittles, Bonnie LeRoy,
Muin Khoury, Harry Orr, and Tony Wynshaw-Boris. He congratulated the
winners: Aravinda Chakravarti, (President-elect), Miriam Blitzer, Muin
Khoury and Tony Wynshaw-Boris (Directors), and thanked all the candidates
for standing for the election.
The election was handled by email ballot. Ballots were distributed to over
3,800 paid trainee and regular members and 948 voted, which is a 25% return
rate, slightly down from last year.
As of September 30, 2006, there are 6,086 paid members, with over 1,000
Trainees and slightly over 1,000 Overseas Affiliates. Membership has
declined 8 percent since last year, which has been a continuing trend. Many
2005 members have not paid their dues for 2006. Since last year, the Board
has instituted multi-year membership so membership can be renewed for two or
three years. There has been a steady influx of new members, 950. Dr. Nelson
stated that the Board is concerned about the decrease and that he and Dr.
Roberta Pagon have been appointed as initial members of a group to
investigate ways to increase membership. He encouraged ideas from the
members for ways to make membership more enticing and asked them to refer
any ideas, or if they wished to volunteer as part of that task force, to
email Dr. Joann Boughman.
Membership peaked in 2003 and has been declining since. Part of the decline
may be related to meeting attendance as many members tend to renew as they
register for the meeting. He was hopeful that when meeting attendance begins
to rise again, membership will follow that trend. Meeting registration for
New Orleans of 3,610 attendees is down from last year, but above what was
projected. He thanked everyone for coming and for supporting the Society’s
decision to stay here. It is expected that attendance in San Diego will rise
to about 5000.
TREASURER'S REPORT – Dr.
Daniel Van Dyke
Dr. Van Dyke thanked everyone for supporting
the Society as well as the city of New Orleans by attending the meeting. He
said that T-shirts are still available and $5.00 (out of $20) will go toward
the Katrina Fund. The Katrina Fund so far has collected $12,009 to support
educational supplies for the New Orleans public schools, and he thanked Dr.
Kenna Shaw for her leadership in the fund drive.
Actual revenue from 2005 is $4,362,030 and expenses were $3,906,059 for a
net of $456,000. The financial news for 2006 is not good primarily because
of what is regarded as the Katrina effect. It is projected that the Society
will lose $89,000 in 2006. For the annual meeting, we expect to lose about
$200,000 because revenue is lower and the expenses higher than in 2004 and
2005. Next year in San Diego the Society has budgeted for revenue of
$1,857,000 and expenses of $1,749,000 with net revenue of $108,000.
The regular membership fee was increased by $20 for 2006 and will not be
increased in 2007. Overseas membership was increased by $25 in 2006 and will
not increase in 2007. Emeritus and Trainee membership fees remain unchanged.
Institutional fees are going up at a regular rate.
Investments are distributed through TIAA-CREF and mutual funds, and the fund
distribution for 2006 is the same as 2005. Current value of investment is
$2,879,000. Earnings for 2005 were $77,663. The change in value compared to
a balanced index fund is shown for 2005 and for the latest 12 month period.
It is slightly less primarily because of investment management fees.
EDITOR'S REPORT – Dr.
Cynthia Morton
Dr. Morton thanked retiring associate
editors (Bronya Keats, Marcy McDonald, John Moran and Bruce Rinala) and
welcomed new associate editors (Jan Friedman, Charis Eng, Rita Cantor, Ellen
Wijsman). She also thanked the membership, especially for their
participation in the Journal by being authors and reviewers, and asked that
they accept opportunities to review papers in the future. Lastly, she
thanked the editorial staff in Boston (Robin Williamson, Katherine DeReys
and Susanne Peterson) for their dedication and commitment to the Journal.
Dr. Morton reported that circulation over the past year has not changed from
2004 to 2005. She reported that the Journal has added a new feature – which
Dr. Arno Motulsky, a previous editor of the Journal, has taken on --
“Perspectives in Human Genetics.” His column will begin sometime early next
year. Also, “Society News” edited by Dr. Joann Boughman has been added along
with some new cover illustrations. She said that they are always looking for
and appreciate ideas from the membership.
The Journal continues to maintain its position among the top 10 genetics
journals. It is number six but is number two in journals that publish
primary research. The impact factor has risen from 12.34 to 12.65. The
submissions this year remain about the same, approximately 1,200 papers,
coming into the office with an acceptance rate of 15 percent. However, it
always goes up by the end of the year. It was 14 percent this time last
year. The time from submission to rejection is about 8 days – and the time
from submission to acceptance is about 65 days. Finally, the time from
receipt at the University of Chicago press to e-publication is 26 days.
EXECUTIVE VICE
PRESIDENT'S UPDATE - Dr. Joann Boughman
Dr. Boughman briefly pointed out the major
issues the Society is working on and encouraged feedback from the members.
She reported that genetic nondiscrimination legislation has not yet passed
the House of Representatives. The bill has passed the Senate twice
unanimously and now is at a point where it has never been before. HR 1227
now has 246 cosponsors in the House. It continues to be locked up;
committees and the Speaker have not yet brought it to the floor. There is a
list of house members generated through the Coalition for Genetic Fairness
who have not yet decided to co-sponsor this legislation. Members were
encouraged to call and talk to their representatives. By doing this it is
likely that representatives will sign on as it is simply a matter of
awareness and interest.
She reported that the Society continues to work hard on the enhancement of
NIH funding. The federal research budget is in dire straights and we will
probably be looking at an omnibus bill and/or extended continuing budget
resolution. The best case scenario at this point would be flat funding or a
very small increase. She said that talk among scientists will not change it,
but that engaging those representatives who have an impact on the budget may
bring about change. She encouraged everyone to call or email their
representatives or invite them to individual laboratories to show them what
important research is going on in an institution that is in their districts.
The NIH Reauthorization Act did pass the House but will probably go nowhere
in this legislative session. It was supported by FASEB and ASHG. Congressman
Barton, who chairs the committee where this legislation is considered, has
moved substantially from his initial point regarding the NIH Reform or
Authorization. Dr. Boughman said that Dr. Zerhouni, a speaker at the
Thursday night symposium, will talk about new NIH initiatives and the common
fund, which is one of the issues addressed in the Reauthorization
legislation.
Dr. Boughman described a series of family history initiatives that the
Society has been involved in. Initially a large grant was given to the
Genetic Alliance from the CDC and HRSA, and in which ASHG is a partner. The
intent of this grant is to encourage families to take their family medical
histories and empower patients and advocates to engage their own primary
care physicians in this effort as well as the genetics community.
She reported that the NHGRI/ASHG policy fellowship program is in its fifth
year. Dr. Derek Scholes, the 2005-06 fellow, is finishing up his tenure on
Capital Hill as a staffer on the Senate HELP committee. The newest policy
fellow, Dr. Edward Ramos, is currently at the NHGRI and will be taking a
position on the Hill in January 2007.
This year, the Society has been awarded a CDC genetics fellowship grant,
which will fund three CDC/ASHG public health fellows. The three new fellows
who will be working at the CDC in Atlanta are: Drs. Julie Robitaille,
Katrina Goddard and Diane Smelser. Dr. Goddard will be spending one year at
the CDC and the others will be spending two years. Dr. Boughman told the
members that these grants were awarded primarily to gain a balanced
perspective by infusing more genetics into the public health arena and the
public health perspective into genetics.
Dr. Boughman ended her report by noting that the Genome-Wide Association
Study policy statement by the NIH will be discussed under “New Business”.
EDUCATION INITIATIVES – Dr.
Kenna Shaw, ASHG Director of Education
Dr. Shaw briefly described DNA day, which is
held every April 25. The Society sent 200 mentors into schools throughout
the country on or around that day, and she encouraged other members to sign
up for the mentor network. Another big initiative was the first ever ASHG
essay contest for high school students. All 1,300 essays from around the
country were received electronically by the ASHG administrative office and
were reviewed by over 100 volunteer judges from the ASHG membership, also
done electronically. Applied Biosystems partnered with the Society to award
all of the winners a cash award as well as $2,000 in scientific equipment to
the winning teacher. Dr. Shaw encouraged members to volunteer as judges for
this event as well. The second annual essay contest will be held in March of
2007.
Dr. Shaw emphasized the importance of resources for the mentors and
described the online Genetics Education Clearinghouse found on the ASHG
Education Website at www.genednet.org. This clearinghouse includes a
database of science standards in genetics adopted by each of the 50 states
for consistent teaching of genetics concepts within each state. It also
includes science standards for all of the Canadian provinces. Many of the
standards are cross referenced to websites that have been vetted to assist
teachers/mentors. If anyone is interested in going into a science class in
his/her city or state, he/she can visit the education website, look up the
standards for that state and review websites that would help teach those
standards at the appropriate grade levels.
Dr. Shaw also informed the members that ASHG was awarded a grant from NSF --
a math and science partnership grant -- for which she is the PI. In total
the grant is worth almost $1.5 million of which ASHG will be receiving just
over $1 million over a three-year period. One part of the grant focuses on
partnerships between local high school teachers and geneticists, who,
working together over a period of a year, will develop activities for
students with the goal of bringing these experiences to others by
participation in a workshop. The other important component of the grant is
to look at the effect this Society-run effort could have on the prominence
of education and outreach in institutions of higher education and the tenure
and promotion process. Workshops will be held in five cities within the US
(2007 in Washington, DC; 2008 in New Jersey and Minnesota; 2009 either in
Birmingham or Atlanta, and in San Francisco). She encouraged STEM faculty
members who will be going through the tenure process within the next 2-5
years to contact her to see if they would be interested in becoming part of
this network. Also, senior faculty members, who are already tenured, would
be invited to participate.
She reported that in addition to the 13th Annual High School Workshop that
took place on the Monday before the meeting, there was also the first annual
Undergraduate Workshop held at the same time. This workshop was for science
professors who teach undergraduate science in and around the New Orleans
area. And, finally, the Venter Institute BioBus, a mobile laboratory, came
to New Orleans and parked in front of the convention center so New Orleans
high schoolers could take advantage of the rotating classes in the
laboratory each day.
AD HOC POSTDOCTORAL COMMITTEE –
Dr. Derek Scholes
Members of this committee are: Derek Scholes,
Chair; Reid Alisch; Katie Rudd; Swaroop Aradhya; Lawrence Merritt; Kenna
Shaw (staff advisor) and Keith Micoli (Postdoctoral Association Advisor).
Dr. Scholes explained that this committee was formed because the ASHG Board
wanted to provide more opportunities for early career geneticists and to
give trainees a stronger voice within the Society. The first charge of the
committee was to organize an event at the annual meeting. The event was held
on Tuesday evening and the theme was on careers and mentoring. It included a
keynote speaker, who talked about the challenges and opportunities for
trainees, a panel, all of whom were on various career paths, and a great
networking event during the last hour. He said that it is hoped it will be
the first of many.
He concluded by talking about future plans to collect some data to better
serve the young trainee members and to develop some career resources that
can be put on the web. He encouraged people to talk with him about other
ideas.
SOCIAL ISSUES COMMITTEE – Dr.
Kathy Hudson
Members of this committee are: Kathy Hudson,
Chair; Wylie Burke; Carolyn Bruzdzinski; Tim Caulfield; Miriam Kuppermann;
Tim Leshan; Mark Nunes; Charmaine Royal; Sharon Terry.
Dr. Hudson reviewed the primary function of the committee which is to
coordinate the Social Issues sessions at the annual meeting. This year there
were four. All were well attended and very valuable for the membership. It
is hoped that in future years they can be spread out over the duration of
the meeting as they competed with one another and were concurrent with the
Education Sessions. The committee is now soliciting proposals for 2007 and
the application process will be on the web.
She stated that the other committee function is to identify and explore
issues of importance to the Society. This year two issues were raised with
the Board. The first was a draft policy statement on DTC testing and is
being reviewed by the Board. It will be posted in draft form on the website
while it is still in formulation. The second issue is not necessarily to
develop policy statements for the Society but to look to other societies for
policy statements that might be of relevance to ASHG. The International
Society of Stem Cell Research has recently developed draft guidelines for
the conduct of stem cell research. The committee recommended to the Board
that a small group of stem cell researchers and members of the Social Issues
Committee get together to review that document for possible adoption by the
Society. The document was developed under the leadership of George Daley
from Harvard who is speaking at the ASHG meeting this week.
Dr. Hudson mentioned that the committee was looking for members as there
will be two openings beginning in January 2007. If anyone is interested or
would like to nominate someone, please let her know.
INFORMATION AND EDUCATION
COMMITTEE – Dr. Susanne Haga
Members of this committee are: Susanne Haga,
Chair; Elizabeth Balkite; Yvette Conley; Siobhan Dolan; Carl Huether; Howard
Levy; Christa Lese Martin; Howard McLeod; Leta Tribble; Kenna Shaw (staff
liaison).
Dr. Haga urged members to submit proposals for the 2007 Education Sessions.
The submission form will be on the ASHG website after the meeting.
She reported that on Monday, the annual high school workshop was held with
over 200 students and teachers from the New Orleans parishes in attendance.
There was another workshop, a pilot activity, offered on Monday, to 36
undergraduate faculty in the New Orleans region. The feedback for the
undergraduate workshop will be reviewed and the workshop will hopefully be
offered next year as well. She thanked the undergraduate subcommittee for
organizing this workshop. Also, the trainee/mentor luncheon was once again
held on Tuesday with over 120 registrants and 15 mentors.
Dr. Haga explained that during the Information and Education Committee
meeting held here in New Orleans, the development of a strategic plan was
discussed and the need to focus efforts on what the Committee and Society
should be addressing within the next five years.
She reported that her tenure on the committee will end in December of 2006
and the new chair will be Neil Lamb.
PROGRAM COMMITTEE -
Dr. William Gahl
Members of this committee are: William Gahl,
Chair; Christopher Amos; David Beier; Leslie Biesecker; David Goldstein;
Susanne Gollin; Elizabeth Hauser; Jeannie Lee; Jeffrey Long; Michael Lovett;
Hope Northrup; Mary Norton; Margaret Pericak-Vance; Katherine Schneider;
Lisa Shaffer.
Dr. Gahl thanked all of the Program Committee members and discussed a couple
of changes in the program that occurred this year. The committee thought
there should be an additional free night as the number of invited sessions
was lower this year. But, he said, there were more abstract topics. Next
year Beth Hauser will be the chair. He expressed his gratitude to the
Society for making the decision to come to New Orleans as it was “the right
thing to do.” Dr. Gahl left the stage to sincere applause.
PROFESSIONAL ETHICS
COMMITTEE - Dr. Ethylin "Mimi" Jabs
The members are: Ethylin Jabs, Chair; Bartha
Knoppers; Helga Toriello; Daniel Van Dyke; Barbara McGillivray; Vivian
Weinblatt.
Dr. Jabs stated that this committee’s responsibility is to respond to the
Board as it considers ethical issues within the Society as they relate to
the scientific community, the general public and industry. The committee
drafted a “Code of Ethics” and it was approved. The code provides an ethical
framework for the members as they work to further the aims of the Society.
The members are to act in a manner consistent with the good reputation of
the Society but the members do not represent the Society as such, as the
Code of Ethics does not replace the ethical or legal obligations of
individual members except by their own professional bodies, employers or
legislation. She reviewed the principles outlined by the code, which will be
posted on the ASHG website.
The ethics committee will continue to work with the Board and the committees
in regard to informing the membership about responsible conduct, use of
basic and clinical scientific expertise, the disclosure of conflicts of
interest, respect for racial and cultural diversity, and avoidance of
misconduct and misrepresentation. On behalf of the committee, she thanked
the Society for letting it serve its constituency.
NEW BUSINESS - Dr.
Steve Warren
President Warren opened the floor to new
business. From the floor, Dr. Jerome Rotter had two very different issues to
put forth. The first issue that geneticists must face is the current
proposal of the NIH-wide RFI (The Genome-Wide Association Study). He
explained that this data, if it is placed on the web and therefore to the
world at large, will be maximally available. However, these studies, which
subjects had consented to years ago , were done before people had any
concept of forensically equivalent data sets and had no idea it would be
available to a large number of investigators via the web. He felt that it is
a violation of IRB consent issues and important for the Society to tackle as
it is fundamental to the privacy issue that is part of a geneticist’s
ethical code of conduct. He stated that it was essential that the Society
and other groups respond to the RFI and soon --because time is of the
essence – as the deadline for comments is October 31.
Dr. Rotter made a motion that the Society raise concern by letter to
NHGRI that the consent process is inadequate and to study it requires that
the deadline be extended in order to be well vetted by the Society and the
public. The motion was seconded and passed. The ASHG will immediately
send a letter to NIH to extend the time period and will put together an ad
hoc group to craft a response by the Society. Dr. Warren suggested that if
any members have opinions or comments and would like the Society to know
these, they should email Dr. Joann Boughman, and those comments will be
shared among the committee. (Staff note: The appropriate NIH/NHGRI
representatives were notified. The NIH was very responsive and extended the
deadline to November 30.)
The second issue brought up by Dr. Rotter relates to the ethics of
presenting work at the annual meeting where a gene was supposedly identified
but very deliberately not named and the chromosomal location was not
identified. Two presentations, one on Crohn’s disease and the other on
breast cancer, violated the ethics of scientific collegiality, by leaving
out this information. He suggested that if one is going to present data it
should be the policy of the Society not to allow presentations where the
gene is not named or identified.
Dr. Rotter made a motion that specific policy should be instituted that
when such abstracts are submitted, they be flagged to indicate to the author
that they must present the gene at the meeting or the abstract will need to
be withdrawn. Furthermore, if they still violate that policy when presenting
at the meeting, they should be immediately removed from the session. Dr.
Gahl said that the issue was addressed in the Program Committee meeting, and
it came to the conclusion that abstracts be scrutinized carefully. However,
those two abstracts did not give any indication that there would be a gene
mentioned in such secrecy so that in those two cases the committee could not
have known what would happen at the presentation. Dr. Kurt Hirschhorn
seconded the motion, and it was concluded that policy will be established by
the Program Committee. Next year it will be made more explicit that this
behavior will not be tolerated. Dr. Rotter withdrew his motion stating that
he was confident that the Program Committee will handle this issue in the
future.
Dr. Warren offered is thanks to the staff of the Society.
The meeting was adjourned.
Respectfully submitted,
David Nelson
Elaine Strass
Jane Salomon
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