Announcements

MAPOR EXECUTIVE COUNCIL MONTHLY MEETING AGENDA
February 21, 2022
12:30 – 2:00 CST / 1:30 pm – 3:00pm EST
Zoom invite

Attendees: Kevin, Evgenia, Ben, Rebecca, Leah, Erin, Jerry, Justine, Patrick and Lindsey

MAPOR SPOTLIGHT of the MONTH:  This month we spotlight Leah’s efforts to engage and negotiate with the Embassy Suites staff to review and renew our contract. Thanks for making this happen, Leah! This is not the most exciting task but is necessary to ensure we have a nice cozy, place to land in November for the next three years. 

MAPOR Mission Statement

We provide high-quality educational and conference programs to encourage scholarly exchanges across disciplines and geographies, broaden member access to mentors and resources, and bolster opportunities for leadership and innovations. We join forces with AAPOR, academic institutions, and government and industry employers to develop a thriving community that supports all MAPOR members, including students, scholars, and professionals in every stage of their career.

MAPOR Vision Statement

MAPOR is a leading voice in public opinion, survey, and social science scholarship, methods, and practice among regional professional associations. We are an inclusive and supportive community that enables our diverse members to achieve their educational, professional development, and networking goals. 

Agenda:

1. Approval of last meeting’s minutes 

2. 2022 Conference             (Leah)
   1. Conference support committee 
   2. Check with hotel about 2021 contract plans

Contract is done. There is a new contracts folder. Patrick is trying to get Daniel Merkle for the keynote. Leah has reached out to Jolene Smyth about the short course and Jill Dever for the pedagogy hour.

3. Secretary / Treasurer’s Report (Lindsey)              
   1. Financial updates
      1. Checking: $26,767.94
      2. Savings: $46,972.38
   2. Membership list updates
      1. The new member list is done. A new list has been created in Cvent and MAPORnet is updated. 
      2. AAPOR should be reaching out soon with new members from the AAPOR renewal option.
   3. Tentative tasks for 2022
      1. Taxes are done
      2. Member survey for 2022?
         1. Lindsey has questions from Leah, and will dive into the survey tomorrow.
      3. Not for Profit Annual Report filing
         1. Lindsey will tackle this in May
      4. Cvent billing – Should we drop our other platforms?
         1. Lindsey will tackle this once the Member Survey is in the field.
      5. MAPOR address ‘move’ to NORC building
         1. CVENT- Lindsey will see if it needs to be done.
         2. Chase bank- Done
         3. IRS- Done
         4. State of Illinois- Sent a form in for this

4. Communications                     (Benjamin)
   1. https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1862vi9ewY7ytZTiF3Ok6w17NpWRacPmuN1cPd2Gd3c4/edit

is the MAPOR comms calendar for 2022. People should review, and feel free to make additional suggestions – I’m mostly basing it off of Justine’s calendar from the last couple of years, with tweaks for AAPOR in Chicago.

2. Spring newsletter
   1. Conference Survey Results
   2. Conference Recap (non-survey, e.g. ‘how did it feel, from the conference coordinator perspective’)
   3. Upcoming Online Activities
   4. Any other topics?

The newsletter will go out in March, and will include a student section, announcement for the MAPOR fellowship program, and the conference survey results as part of the letter from the president. Please have materials to Ben by March 2^nd. 

5. Website                             (Hillary)
   1. Meeting minutes to website

6. Awards, Grants, and Support Committee (Bob)
   1. Student fellowship program communications

MAPOR will communicate with fellows after the abstracts have been received so the fellows can be chosen based on the abstract topics.

7. Sponsorship (Dana)

8. Online Learning Committee           (Justine)
   1. Meeting to discuss goals for 2022
   2. Webinars
   3. Other events? 
      1. Resume review? 
      2. Speed networking?

The committee had a kick off meeting a couple weeks ago. Ideas include resume reviews, speed networking, lunch and learn. They plan to have three to five events a year, including an event or two that cater to students or mid-career. Their next step is to set up a regular meeting schedule and work towards something in April. If you have any ideas, please send them to the committee. Justine will send Lindsey a question for the membership survey.

9. Student Award Criteria Review Committee – Allyson Holbrook

Kevin sent Allyson the survey responses on why people did not apply for the student paper. She may have a question to add to the Member survey. Kevin will pass that along to Lindsey.

10. Other business
    1. Mixers in 2022 – waiting for COVID rates to decline – any suggestions for locations

Kevin will reach out to John to see if Madison is ready for a mixer.

Council members

President – Kevin Ulrich

Vice President / President Elect – Justine Bulgar-Medina

Past President – Dana Garbarski

Conference Chair – Leah Dean

Associate Conference Chair – Patrick Hsieh

Secretary-Treasurer – Lindsey Witt-Swanson

Website Coordinator – Hillary Hanson

Sponsorship Coordinator – Dana Garbarski

Student Liaison – Evgenia Kapousouz

Communications Chair – Benjamin Schapiro

Members at Large – Bob Davis, Erin Heiden, Rebecca Powell, David Sterrett, Jerry Timbrook

Committees

Conference Committee – Leah Dean (Chair), Patrick Hsieh, David Sterrett

Online Learning Committee – Justine Bulgar-Medina (Chair), Erin Heiden, Rebecca Powell, Jerry Timbrook

Awards, Grants, and Support Committee – Bob Davis (Chair), Evgenia Kapousouz

Secretary Treasurer Support – Lindsey Witt-Swanson, Kevin Ulrich 

Communications Support – Benjamin Schapiro, Justine Bulgar-Medina, Evgenia Kapousouz

AAPOR Conference Committee – TBD

GO MAPOR GO!

MAPOR EXECUTIVE COUNCIL MONTHLY MEETING MINUTES
Bob Davis
January 24, 2022
12:30 – 2:00 CST / 1:30 pm – 3:00pm EST
Zoom invite

Attendees: Kevin Ulrich, Leah Dean, Benjamin Schapiro, Jerry Timbrook, Evgenia Kapousouz, Hillary Hanson, Erin Heiden, Y. Patrick Hsieh, Rebecca Powell, Justine Bulagar-Medina, Bob Davis, Dana Garbarski, David Sterrett

MAPOR SPOTLIGHT of the MONTH:  The MAPOR spotlight of the month goes out to new members Erin, Ben, Rebecca, and Jerry. Welcome aboard and we appreciate your willingness to serve on the council! 

MAPOR Mission Statement

We provide high-quality educational and conference programs to encourage scholarly exchanges across disciplines and geographies, broaden member access to mentors and resources, and bolster opportunities for leadership and innovations. We join forces with AAPOR, academic institutions, and government and industry employers to develop a thriving community that supports all MAPOR members, including students, scholars, and professionals in every stage of their career.

MAPOR Vision Statement

MAPOR is a leading voice in public opinion, survey, and social science scholarship, methods, and practice among regional professional associations. We are an inclusive and supportive community that enables our diverse members to achieve their educational, professional development, and networking goals. 

Meeting notes:

Meeting started 12:30PM Central

1. Approval of last meeting’s minutes 

Approved by Unanimous consent.

2. Conference Survey Data (Kevin)

Kevin reviewed Review of survey highlights

• 201 surveys sent, 114 completes – 57% response rate.76% in person very

Conference Survey Highlights

Keving led a discussions about the conference survey.  Key areas include:

General conference satisfaction / attendance comparing in person vs virtual.

• In-person more satisfied than virtual (76.1% Very Satisfied in person vs 45% Very Satisfied virtual), but the difference is less noticeable when looking at top 2 box (97.2% in person vs 87.5% virtual).

Discussion for 2022 conference in person vs virtual

• Three main drivers for virtual attendance were concerns surrounding Covid, convenience, and scheduling.    Convenience factor is a good reason to offer a virtual offering.  10.6% would attend virtually and 9.7% would attend as a mix in the future.
• Most people who would attend in person next year cite easing of Covid and dissatisfaction with the technology/experience as the main driver to return to in person.  
• While the hybrid model does expand participation to those who were not able to attend, 44.4% of in person said virtual attendance ‘somewhat or significantly took away’ from the in-person experience.

Student support grants

• 33/36 students did not participate in a student grant program
  • 21 were not aware of the program.  This provides an opportunity to educate students that funding is available.  There was general discussion about how to best reach out to students directly and/or through professors, mentors and other student organizations.  Justine mentioned that she has seen diminishing returns for communications because at some point the students are not getting/reading the alerts/emails.
  • 12 already had / didn’t need funding for the conference
  • 3 participated in the student grant program

Evgenia observed that this survey only addresses those who did come, not those who didn’t come so we are not informed to their reasons for not participating.  Dana also observed that putting this on the survey increases awareness of the program.

The results on the survey regarding the amount of out of pocket expenses student incurred was discussed.  Evgenia brought up that the need for money will vary greatly depending on the student’s location.  For example student’s in Chicago will not incur hotel expenses.  Patrick suggested that since the average out of pocket cost for students was $66 ($91 for those who spent some money) some students were likely not including hotel expenses in their calculations.  Kevin suggested that we may want to consider breaking out the expenses by category in the future.

Student paper

• Allyson Holbrook is working on a subcommittee for student paper, potentially adding a ‘non-student co author’ category.
• Evgenia suggested that we should start the process for discussing how we are going to do this next year.  For example defining the amount of contribution to determine if a paper has a  ‘non student co-author’.  
• General feedback
  • Kevin has made the survey results in the MAPOR drive so we can review.  Use the following link for access https://drive.google.com/drive/folders/1GEcV-gCGmNVfo5G0frCpAxSSb1QSgDrf?usp=sharing

3. 2022 Conference             (Leah)
   1. Conference support committee 

Leah  researched the costs for maintaining Zoom licenses year round for the conference. The base pricing is $150 / year / license ( e.g. 4 = $600 / year,  5 = $750 / year).  This includes  1 GB cloud storage per license.  There are additional add ons for more than 100 participants – $50 per month more to expand to 500 participants.  This ‘large meeting’ feature can be activated on a month-month basis.  In addition there are expanded cloud storage options available that can be activated per month.  Rough estimate is that a year round Zoom license will cost $1000 / year to maintain Zoom as a sustainable add on.  This was provided for informational purposes only and was not voted on or approved by the council.  We will have a more formal proposal as we get closer to the annual conference.

2. Check with hotel about 2021 contract plans
   1. Leah had questions about the level of detail of what needs to be finalized before signing the contract.  For example do we need to know if dinner would be plated or buffet, if the short course would be virtual / in person, and what the conference schedule would be. Kevin and David conveyed that the hotel is flexible and the contract is just establishing a reservation for the dates and a minimum $ spend.  Specific details will be identified later.

2. Leah will reach out to hotel today for more details on contract and will reach out to members for ideas for speakers.
3. Kevin – Guess is that they will secure the space and then punt the details as we get closer to conference.

4. Secretary / Treasurer’s Report (Lindsey)                
   1. Financial updates
      1. Checking: $25,482.49
      2. Savings: $46,971.99
   2. Membership list updates
      1. Lindsay is working on compiling a member list.  Details discussed in next month’s meeting.

3. Tentative tasks for 2022
   1. Member survey for 2022?
      1. Details discussed in next month’s meeting.
   2. Not for Profit Annual Report filing
      1. Details discussed in next month’s meeting.
   3. Cvent billing – Should we drop our other platforms? (Will be discussed in next month’s meeting)
   4. MAPOR address ‘move’ to NORC building (Will be discussed in next month’s meeting)
      1. CVENT
      2. Chase bank
      3. IRS

5. Communications                     (Benjamin)
   1. Spring newsletter

Benjamin will circulate a draft of the spring newsletter to council by the end of the day today.  Will be reaching out for specific content for February newsletter.  Potentially it will be postponed pending member survey results.

6. Website                           (Hillary)
   1. Updates

Hillary – New members will be updated today on the council page and will apply WordPress updates.

The question came up as to whether Hillary should be applying updates to the WordPress database / addons.  Patrick (2021 webmaster) informed the council that each month you log in there will always be messages to upgrade and spam messages.  He spent time last year reducing the number of plugins to only those used by the website.  The webmaster should feel free to accept updates unless you see something that requires additional payments.

7. Awards, Grants, and Support Committee
   1. Meeting on January 11

Bob & Evgenia met with Mentors / students to discuss the experience with the MAPOR Fellowship program.  The overall experience was positive.  Bob will meet with 1 more mentor later today and will provide a more detailed report.  In general the timing of the program was sufficient, although Evngenia proposed that we need to balance giving the students more time to apply (potentially accepting applications into March or April) against having enough time in the program to deliver something for the conference in November.  Bob suggested providing additional structure would help the program.  Evgenia added that the structure still needs to be flexible to allow room for individualization.

8. Sponsorship (Dana)

Sponsorship calendar doesn’t really start until June.  John will provide additional notes to allow documentation to stand alone as it move from past president to past president.

9. Online Learning Committee           (Justine)
   1. Meeting to discuss goals for 2022
   2. Webinars
   3. Other events? 
      1. Resume review? 
      2. Speed networking?

We are going to start with speed networking as our first event for Feb/March.  Goal for committee is to do something every 4-6 weeks in spring, slow down in the summer and pick up in fall.

10. Other business
    1. Mixers in 2022?

Timing is uncertain.  Kevin challenged the group to think about how can we piggyback to other events / conferences.  AAPOR has so much built around it already we should think about other conferences with which we can have a breakout dinner.  Justine added that we can consider adding on to virtual events in addition to in person.

New Business

Patrick led up a discussion about potentially adding job announcements as a service to our sponsors. 

Kevin – Concerned about timeliness of information and suggest that we post to AAPORnet.  Evgenia posed that rather than posting information we post the job application directly so that if the job is closed the link will say so.  Benjamin added that we could consider using social media but we should also consider the implications of MAPOR providing  an ‘endorsement’ of the position and how it might upset some people / companies.  Kevin suggested that we might be able to mitigate this through the inclusion of a disclaimer.  The net recommendation was that we should steer these opportunities to AAPORnet and MAPORnet.

Meeting adjourned at 1:21PM Central

Council members

President – Kevin Ulrich

Vice President / President Elect – Justine Bulgar-Medina

Past President – Dana Garbarski

Conference Chair – Leah Dean

Associate Conference Chair – Patrick Hsieh

Secretary-Treasurer – Lindsey Witt-Swanson

Website Coordinator – Hillary Hanson

Sponsorship Coordinator – Dana Garbarski

Student Liaison – Evgenia Kapousouz

Communications Chair – Benjamin Schapiro

Members at Large – Bob Davis, Erin Heiden, Rebecca Powell, David Sterrett, Jerry Timbrook

Committees

Conference Committee – Leah Dean (Chair), Patrick Hsieh, David Sterrett

Online Learning Committee – Justine Bulgar-Medina (Chair), Erin Heiden, Rebecca Powell, Jerry Timbrook

Awards, Grants, and Support Committee – Bob Davis (Chair), Evgenia Kapousouz

Secretary Treasurer Support – Lindsey Witt-Swanson, Kevin Ulrich 

Communications Support – Benjamin Schapiro, Justine Bulgar-Medina, Evgenia Kapousouz

AAPOR Conference Committee – TBD

GO MAPOR GO!

MAPOR EXECUTIVE COUNCIL MONTHLY MEETING AGENDA
December 20, 2021
12:30 – 2:00 CST / 1:30 pm – 3:00pm EST
Zoom invite

Attendees: Kevin Ulrich, Lindsey Witt-Swanson, Leah Dean, Y. Patrick Hsieh, Benjamin Schapiro, Rebecca Powell, Erin Heiden, Hilary Hanson, Justine Bulagar-Medina, Bob Davis, Jerry Timbrook, Dana Garbarski, and Evgenia Kapousouz

MAPOR SPOTLIGHT of the MONTH:  Our MAPOR Spotlight of the Month is for Conference Chairs David Sterrett and Leah Dean and the entire supporting crew who made the Conference a successful event! Thanks to all for your hard work and your service to MAPOR.  

MAPOR Mission Statement

We provide high-quality educational and conference programs to encourage scholarly exchanges across disciplines and geographies, broaden member access to mentors and resources, and bolster opportunities for leadership and innovations. We join forces with AAPOR, academic institutions, and government and industry employers to develop a thriving community that supports all MAPOR members, including students, scholars, and professionals in every stage of their career.

MAPOR Vision Statement

MAPOR is a leading voice in public opinion, survey, and social science scholarship, methods, and practice among regional professional associations. We are an inclusive and supportive community that enables our diverse members to achieve their educational, professional development, and networking goals. 

Agenda:

1. Welcome Executive Council! 
   1. New members: Erin Heiden, Rebecca Powell, Ben Shapiro, Jerry Timbrook
   2. Introductions

2. MAPOR documents and procedures
   1. Vision and Mission Statements: https://www.mapor.org/about/mapor-mission-vision/
   2. Bylaws: https://www.mapor.org/bylaws-as-amended-august-10-2018/
   3. Robert’s Rules of Order: https://www.boardeffect.com/blog/roberts-rules-of-order-cheat-sheet/

3. 2021-2022 Council Transition           (Kevin/All)
   1. Monthly meeting schedule
      1. January 17th is MLK day. Move to 24th?

Will meet 1/24 instead

2. February 21st is President’s Day. Will meet 1/28 instead. 
3. June 20th is Juneteenth. Will move to the 13th.

Kevin will send revised meeting invitations

2. MAPOR Google Group for group email (mapor@gogglegroups.com)
3. Google Drive
4. Website
5. Revisions to committee structure – Committee members/new roles/transition meetings (listed below and for discussion)

4. 2021 Conference Debrief                         (Leah/David/All)
   1. General Discussion about the hybrid model

A conference evaluation survey was sent the week after the conference. The survey had a 57% response rate. Leah would like to have Zoom licenses year-round to better facilitate the hybrid model going forward. This would allow keeping the recordings up longer than three months. Zoom could replace Go to Webinar as well. There was discussion about maybe upgrading one Zoom account to be able to host more users if needed. There could also be additional fees for storing recordings. PAPOR has a PAPOR channel to share recordings after the conference. The Conference Committee will get more information about the costs of keeping Zoom regularly, so the Council can discuss more next month. 

Kevin will share the survey data with the Council. One respondent asked why the conference was held on Friday and Saturday instead of Thursday and Friday. Council discussed the pro’s and con’s of each. Dana suggested decoupling the short course from the conference to wrap the conference up earlier on Saturday before the parade crowds develop. We discussed the networking lunch and how to make it more about “networking” than hanging out with your friends. Also, discussed coupling lunch with the awards or the short course.

2. All expenses paid?
   1. Hotel – PAID
   2. Tech rental – PAID
   3. Speakers – All but one are paid
   4. Student award winners -PAID
   5. Student grants -PAID
3. Thank you notes to sponsors

Sent

4. Business meeting items
   1. Student Paper Criteria – Ad Hoc Committee to review criteria led by Allyson – Kevin to send some applicable Conference Survey data to committee

The conversation was around the role faculty can have on student papers. The fellows will work on this.

5. 2022 Conference             (Leah)
   1. Conference support committee 
   2. Check with hotel about 2021 contract plans

The contract goes one more year. We will renegotiate the contract this year. 

3. Review of Conference Survey data for next month’s meeting?

6. Secretary Treasurer’s Report                     (Lindsey)
   1. Financial updates

Checking: $23,412.04

Savings: $46,971.60

2. Membership list updates

3. Tentative tasks for 2022
   1. Member survey for 2022

Worth doing, but maybe shorter than usual 

2. Not for Profit Annual Report filing
3. Cvent billing – Should we drop our other platforms?
4. MAPOR address ‘move’ to NORC building
   1. CVENT
   2. Chase bank
   3. IRS

7. Communications                     (Benjamin)
   1. Spring newsletter

Benjamin and Justine have met to understand what needs to happen. The plan is to have newsletters around February, April, summer, and October.

8. Website                             (Hillary)
   1. Updates

Winners have been posted on the website. 

2. Need to add new councilors and photos to websites

The Executive Council page is mostly updated.

9. Awards, Grants, and Support Committee
   1. Set meeting and goals for 2022

Kevin suggested meeting earlier in the year while all their thoughts around the student paper are fresh and to get the student fellowship evaluation and 2022 application process going.

2. Tentative tasks for 2022
   1. Review Conference Feedback Survey for January
   2. Evaluate Student Fellowship Program
   3. Evaluate Student Grants Program
3. Sponsorship (Dana)
   1. Sharing contact information with AAPOR?

11. Online Learning Committee
    1. Set meeting to discuss goals for 2022
    2. Webinars
    3. Other events? 
       1. Resume review? 
       2. Speed networking

12. Other business
    1. Mixers in 2022?

Council members

President – Kevin Ulrich

Vice President / President Elect – Justine Bulgar-Medina

Past President – Dana Garbarski

Conference Chair – Leah Dean

Associate Conference Chair – Patrick Hsieh

Secretary-Treasurer – Lindsey Witt-Swanson

Website Coordinator – Hillary Hanson

Sponsorship Coordinator – Dana Garbarski

Student Liaison – Evgenia Kapousouz

Communications Chair – Benjamin Shapiro

Members at Large – Bob Davis, Erin Heiden, Rebecca Powell, David Sterrett, Jerry Timbrook

Committees

Conference Committee – Leah Dean (Chair), Patrick Hsieh, David Sterrett

Online Learning Committee – Justine Bulgar-Medina (Chair), Erin Heiden, Rebecca Powell, Jerry Timbrook

Awards, Grants, and Support Committee – Bob Davis (Chair), Evgenia Kapousouz

Secretary Treasurer Support – Lindsey Witt-Swanson, Kevin Ulrich 

Communications Support – Benjamin Shapiro, Justine Bulgar-Medina, Evgenia Kapousouz

AAPOR Conference Committee – TBD

GO MAPOR GO!