AWWA Minnesota Section – Young Professionals Committee

 

Water Treatment Facility, St. Cloud, MN

Tuesday, March 6, 2007 @ 7:00 AM

 

MEETING NOTES

 

             I.      Roll Call – David Brown, Todd Butz, Frank Cassidy, John Chlebeck (by conference call), Tracy Hodel, Jason Kosmatka, Kevin Renslow, Lisa Vollbrecht, Jeff Yeschick.

 

          II.      Approve Minutes from past meeting – Jason motioned to approve, and David seconded.

 

       III.      Review and Approve Agenda – Tracy motioned, and David seconded.

 

        IV.      Unfinished Business

 

A.    Community Service Project

 

1.                  Water Poster Competition

 

World of Water Student Poster Competition – Public Outreach Goal for 2007.  We are trying to get the Poster Competition underway this year.  The idea is to have grade-school aged kids (K-6) create posters or drawings related to water.  Drawings would be submitted to the YPC, and a winner(s) of cash prize(s) chosen.  Depending on how many posters are received, the idea was brought up that we could put together a calendar with every month highlighting one of the drawings. The calendars could be sold at the annual conference with proceeds going to charity (such as the scholarship fund or Water For People).  This would be a future fund raising opportunity after the poster competition gets off the ground.  Brian Z. volunteered to put together a draft contest flier and work with Public Affairs Workgroup Chair Doug Klamerus to get a draft together for the next meeting.

 

The key to the success of this project will be getting involvement from teachers.  We will ultimately need their help and support in getting the word out about the competition to their students, and perhaps even incorporate it into their curriculum.  One method of connecting with teachers who would potentially be interested in this competition is through MDH’s Water training program.

 

 

 

2.                  MDH (Minnesota Dept of Health) Water Training – Teacher List

 

Stew Thornley with the MDH runs a program specifically geared toward educating grade-school teachers about water treatment, and how they can incorporate water treatment lesson plans into their classrooms.  He does this by putting on a 1-week seminar every summer for a group of teachers. 

 

Brian Z. received the list of teachers who had attended the seminar in the last few years and received an okay from the organizers to use the list to contact teachers for AWWA water-related contests. This poster contest would be directed at elementary-aged children and the teacher list does include the school/grades taught.  In addition, perhaps we could work with Stew and have him even incorporate the Water Poster Competition as part of his seminar.  

 

B.    Guidance Document Update

 

Our current guidance document is under revision and will be uploaded to the MN AWWA website when complete.

 

           V.      New Business

 

A.    Metro Water Operators School Meet & Greet

 

The Metro Operators School is held on April 18-19 at the Earle Brown Center in Brooklyn Park, MN.  We had held a Meet and Greet last year at this event to promote YP, and we were going to do it again.  Lisa V. looked into the cost of food, drinks and room at the Earle Brown center and it was cost prohibitive for us to put on this event.  Lisa suggested that we take this opportunity to look at a different operators school where we could host a Meet and Greet, as we had done the Metro Operators School last year. 

 

The Central District School is being held in Deerwood, MN on June 7, 8, and 9.  Consideration will be given to host a Meet and Greet at this event.

 

B.    National YP Summit

 

On April 19-20, Todd B. (chair-elect) will attend the National YP Summit in Chicago.  This conference involves YP’s from across the country meeting in one location to discuss topics ranging from increasing involvement to strategic planning for the future.  Following this conference, Todd will write up notes.

 

C.    Fall Conference New Member Orientation

                       

                        This program does not currently exist, but the idea was brought up in the Minnesota Strategic Planning Meeting as a potential program. The YP committee would be involved with starting it.  The idea is that at the Section Annual Conference held every fall, the Section would recognize the new members that joined that year.  A dedicated ribbon color on a new member’s nametag would let others attending the conference that this person was a new member.  The idea would then be that other senior members could make the newcomers feel welcomed.  The new members could also be recognized at the lunch and introduced as new members.  In addition, YP could hold a short orientation meeting for the newcomers at the beginning of the show to teach them about AWWA and more specifically the MN Section.

 

                        Todd B. will talk to John Berigan, the chair of the Membership Committee, to get a list of new members and ask for input for this program.  We have lots of good ideas, but if we are going to push this forward, more work will need to be done to figure out the details.

 

D.    Workgroup Chair Positions

 

1.  Membership (Todd Butz) - Todd contacted Tim Lapara (U of MN professor) to determine if we could speak for 5 minutes at the end of a class period to introduce students to AWWA.  Tim could not allot class time, but said that we could set up a meeting outside of class, and that he would mention the meeting in his class.  Todd will be looking to move this forward in early May.  The idea would be to have several members of the MN Section (YP’s and Senior members) hold a panel discussion to introduce AWWA and the water industry to current college students. [This was not accomplished this spring, but we will look to hold a meeting this fall].

 

2.  Social (Lisa Vollbrecht) – Lisa will be working on getting information (cost, location, contacts) about hosting a Meet and Greet at the upcoming Central District Operators School (Deerwood, MN on June 7-9).

 

3.  Public Affairs (Doug Klamerus) – Doug and Brian Z. will work on drafting a flier for the Water Poster Competition.  

 

4.  Poker Tournament (Chris Glassing) – Chris has taken over as the workgroup chair because Jason Janisch has moved into another industry.  No report as the conference is not until October.

 

5.  Fresh Ideas (Brad Forester) – All YP’s should consider putting together a technical poster display and submitting it.  The 1st place prize is a trip to the 2008 National Annual Conference and Exposition (ACE08) in Atlanta to present the poster.  Contact Brad with any questions regarding format, technical content, etc.  Bo Johnston will be presenting at the ACE07 show in Toronto this summer as last year’s Fresh Idea’s section winner.

 

E.     Other items / ideas - None

 

        VI.      Announcements and Schedule next meeting – the next meeting will be tentatively scheduled for July, but a conference call meeting may be necessary shortly before the operators school meet and greet – date and location to be determined.