ACS News
Council defines "chemist," acts on petitions The ACS Council at its meeting in Anaheim last month dealt with a wide array of issues. Highlight of the session came when councilors finally agreed on a definition of a chemist, following a prolonged discussion and an unsuccessful attempt to table the issue. Councilors also accepted several modifications in the Professional Employment Guidelines and gave limited support to a certification program for chemists. And councilors acted on five petitions, approving two and part of another, postponing one, and defeating one. Under the chairmanship of ACS president Anna J. Harrison, the council session had its historic moments, too; it heard for the first time reports from the two experimental commissions as well as from the three new society committees (C&EN, March 20, page 4). (For more on the two commissions, see the following article.) The issue of defining a chemist generated a good bit of controversy last year at the council meeting in New Orleans (C&EN, April 18,1977, page 44). At that time the Committee on Professional Relations (CPR) put before the council its proposed definition, explaining that ACS should have an officially recognized definition of a chemist so that the society and its subunits can make clear to legislators, government departments, and regulatory agents just whom they are talking about when they speak of chemists. During a spirited debate in New Orleans, councilors made a number of attempts to modify the proposed definition, but they couldn't
ACS president Harrison presided over five-and-a-half-hour-long
agree, and the definition was recommitted to CPR. Thus, it was a modified definition that CPR proposed to the council in Anaheim. Although the initial debating may have dashed some councilors' hopes of reaching agreement, a motion to table action was strongly defeated, and councilors went on to accept the revised definition without amendment from the floor. The definition finally agreed upon: "A chemist is a professional who possesses an earned bachelor's or higher degree with a major in a chemical science from an accredited institution and who develops, applies, or communicates the principles of chemistry and exercises independent judgment and discretion in conceiving, planning, coordinating, or executing chemical projects, or who has experience in so doing.
Council acted this way on five petitions at Anaheim meeting
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meeting
"The chemical sciences deal with the composition, structure, and properties of substances and of the transformations they undergo." CPR scored another success with the council's approval for changing the society's Professional Employment Guidelines, which have undergone several other modifications in the past year. The changes made in Anaheim, many of which were relatively small, generally involve termination conditions and employment environment. Among changes in the first category was the addition of a guideline for employers that CPR says is, in fact, already board policy. The new guideline states: "The employer should by appropriate forward planning provide stability of employment and avoid multiple terminations." Other modifications involv-
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Major provisions
Proposed amendment
council
Council action
Fair «taction procedures, Parti
Constitution, Article X, Sec. 7; Bylaw V, Sec. 11
To require reports of campaign contributions and expenditures
Defeated
Fair «taction procedures, Part IV
Bylaw III, Sec. 3
