What is this petition? The petition signed by 11 ACS Past Presidents is aimed at updating the status of the International Chemical Sciences Chapters.
Bylaw IX, Section 4 “An International Chemical Sciences Chapter shall receive no allotment of funds from the SOCIETY and shall not be entitled to elected representation on the Council.” • Change to: An International Chemical Science Chapter may receive financial support in some form from the SOCIETY”. Leaving out “and shall not be entitled to elected representation on the Council.”
Background of the present Bylaw • This part of the Bylaws was written 25 years ago when the concept of the International Chemical Science Chapter was created placing financial and representation restrictions on them while waiting on to see how they will fit into the life of the SOCIETY thousands of miles away. The results proved the success of the experiment and it is time to bring them closer to the SOCIETY.
History of these Chapters • The first Chapter was the one in Saudi Arabia where a number of ACS members, mostly Americans were working and they wanted to have some type of group with similar background and activities as Local Sections. During the years of its existence, local chemists became ACS members and joined group. In 1996, ACS members in Hong Kong formed a Chapter to confirm their relation to the ACS ahead of the expected take over by China. The third chapter was formed In Hungary with close cooperation of the local national chemical society. This was the first chapter, which was formed to promote the goals of ACS through such cooperation. Their number started to increase rapidly. Presently there are 19 chapters
OPERATION • These Chapters are governed and operated in the same way as the Local Sections. They have meetings and conduct numerous activities in their own areas benefitting chemistry and the ACS. While total ACS membership rose by 0.6% in 2015, the foreign membership increased by 3.85%. Nevertheless, according to our present Bylaws, International Science Chapters cannot receive financial support and representation in Council. They might be called the “foster Local Sections” of the Society.
COMPARISON OF CHAPTERS AND LOCAL SECTIONS ACS members in countries with one Chapters except those marked by asterisk might have more than one in the future • • • • • • • • •
Australia: Brazil: China: Hong Kong: Hungary: India: Malaysia: Nigeria: Peru:
896 469 3497* 194 71 1683* 231 222 47
• • • • •
Romania: 73 Saudi Arabia: 215 South Africa: 141 South Korea: 794 Taiwan: 432 • Thailand: 85 • United Arab Emirate: 58 • TOTAL 9108 •
ACS members in Local Sections covering a whole State • • • • • • •
Alaska : Colorado: Delaware: Hawaii: Maine: Montana Puerto Rico:
115 2713 1442 236 374 283 1611
• • • • • •
Red River(ND) Rhode Island: Sioux Valley(SD) Vermont Wyoming: TOTAL 8241
257 512 255 281 194
What is needed to treat these chapters as we treat Local Sections? There are three actions to achieve this: • Provide yearly allotments based on the number of their members • Provide representation in Council, at least one councilor/chapter • Provide financial help for such representative to attend Council meetings
FINANCES Presently each Local Section regardless of their size receives a basic allotment of $4,746.38 plus $6.18 for each member up to 2000 members. For 16 chapters the basic allotment would amount to $75,942.08 and for their 9108 members $56,287.44 for a total of $132, 229.52. In the present ACS budget the basic allotment is based on 185 Local Sections. By the formula as it is calculated increasing the number of Local Sections by the addition of 16 Chapters the basic allotment would decrease for all Local Section by $377.82. This could be a stumbling block for trying to change the bylaws. However, if the allotment for the chapters would be a separate budget item any resistance to changing this part of the Bylaws could be easily eliminated
REPRESENTATION While some officials of these Chapters frequently attend ACS National Meetings and they consult with ACS Staff on various topics, they do not have representation on Council to discuss various matters important in the life of the Chapter and in overall ACS policies. If the size of the Council is an important factor in the consideration of councilors for amending the Bylaws, it again could be a stumbling block, because by adding 16 new councilors would decrease the allocation of the number of councilors to 16 local Sections. However, most probably the number of ISC will not be increasing to such a level that they would compete with the Local Sections for representation. Furthermore their size would not be high to require more than one councilor/chapter, the objection to representation could be overcome by not counting Chapter Councilors when councilors allocated to the Local Sections.
TRAVEL EXPENSES Councilors receive a certain amount of subsidy for attending two council meetings per year toward travel and hotel expenses. The Society pays 75% and the corresponding Local Section and Division pay 25%. Generally, this barely covers the expenses for domestic travels, therefore the same amount would not cover the international travel expenses. However, the Society already established a precedent by providing 50% support to non-councilors attending a committee meeting to which they are appointed.
WHAT WOULD THIS PETITION DO? • This petition is the first step to eliminate the obstacles of help. It is a slow approach to establish general support for the Chapters allowing negotiations for later steps.
Future plans • Once the financial help is allowed, some support could be started for helping with the travel expenses of one representative to National Meetings for regular meetings of Chapter representatives, before asking for representation. • Travel expenses could be helped with a similar 50% subsidy what non-councilors receive for attending the meeting of their committee. • Additional support could be obtained if M&E would provide free registration. • Also if the representative is a member of a Division of his/her specialty, the Division might provide partial support if participating in their program at National Meetings
WHY SHOULD WE DO THIS? • In today’s world the SOCIETY must maintain its interaction with the international community of chemistry professionals of the world. Our International Chemical Science Chapters can play a very important part in this effort. The removal of these restrictions would assure them that they are essential parts of the life and activities of our SOCIETY. When this is followed up later with appropriate conditions for their total involvement, they will be efficient partners in our worldwide effort to promote chemistry. •
