In order to promote productive working relationships, we have established a division of responsibilities:

Undergraduate President shall be responsible for the organization of faculty lunches and Corporate Night.

Graduate President shall be responsible for Spring Conference preparations and maintaining contact with National INFORMS.

Undergraduate Vice-President shall own panel discussions and the undergraduate mentoring program.

Graduate Vice-President shall own the organization of the Brown Bag Research talks and shall assist the undergraduate vice-president with the graduate dimension of the mentoring program.

Secretary shall schedule meetings, prepare minutes, and maintain the bulletin board and mailing list.

Public Relations Officer shall publicize activities through posters/flyers, emails, and website updates.

Treasurer shall process reimbursements for Stanford INFORMS expenses and provide budget estimates for upcoming events.

These talks will be held twice a month, perhaps on the first and third Thursday of the month, during the lunch hour. The format will provide an opportunity for advanced doctoral students to present their research or for advisors to discuss the frontiers of their research areas. Shikhar volunteered to assist Ozlem with the organization, and Julia Miyaoka has volunteered to be our first speaker.

Dalerie has acquired department funding to provide for two faculty lunches each quarter. The first will be held the week after Thanksgiving. The plan is to have a different faculty member host each lunch at the faculty club, with an opportunity for ten students to sign up to be that professor’s guests.

Berkeley participants recommend either February 23rd or March 2nd as an appropriate Saturday for the Spring Conference, and a representative from the Naval Post Graduate School in Monterey wants to get his students involved. We hope to have a series of speakers along with a keynote speaker. We plan to host a research paper competition for graduate students and perhaps a poster session similar to the one held in Miami. The organizer of the Miami poster session will be contacting Anne to discuss organizational issues and lessons learned. The president of Arizona State University’s INFORMS chapter, also an editor for ORMS Tomorrow, has offered to publish the top three papers from the paper competition in ORMS Tomorrow. She also talked to Anne about a case competition that they do at Arizona State that may be appropriate for the undergraduate portion at the Spring Conference; this idea met with mixed responses.

Corporate Night is still planned for the winter quarter, and the ACSSS may be willing to be a co-sponsor. Shikhar also suggested that Dalerie apply for special activity funding through the ASSU.

Omega Rho, the honor society for people in Operations Research, is now under the INFORMS umbrella. The national president of Omega Rho is strongly encouraging people to promote Omega Rho within their local INFORMS chapters. Membership is offered to the top 25 people in each undergraduate class, any graduate student with a GPA over 3.5, and any faculty member that has demonstrated strong teaching and research abilities in operations research. Anne will be receiving information soon.