This newsletter write-up will summarize some of the news from the IEEE Technical Activities Board (TAB) meeting series directly relevant to our society, and describe some of the discussions from our June AdCom meeting, which was held virtually on June 23^rd/24^th.  I will emphasize areas where member involvement at higher levels is desired, reflecting potential for synergistic interaction: benefit to the growth of IEEE TAB activities and opportunities for individuals from our community to pursue a broad range of interests, including scientific, leadership, humanitarian and educational possibilities.

Following the initial brainstorming session on Strategic Directions among TAB leadership and Society/Council (S/C) presidents in February, the following were identified as the four most important areas: 

1-Improve industry engagement via conference activities beyond traditional contributed presentation/publication; 

2-Improve IEEE TAB operational efficiency via organizational change; 

3-Increase STEM engagement; 

4-Improve engagement with underrepresented communities. 

While 3 and 4 can be addressed through existing leaders/bodies (Jamie Moesch is the contact for those interested in 3, and the TAB level Diversity and Inclusion committee is already working on priority 4 (Jane Lehr and Mitra Safavi-Naeini are our D&I liaisons); new TAB-level committees are being formed to address 1 and 2 and need volunteers to participate in these efforts and provide input.

Consistent with the spirit of increasing resources/collaborations between S/C, the Presidents’ Forum was focused on activities/resources that can be shared between and derive input from several S/C. Examples include the report by the IEEE WIE chair (our liaisons are Cinzia DaVia and Audrey Corbeil Therrien) on current activities, together with a presentation of several possible action items aimed at enhancing the global impact and dissemination of WIE activities. These include Creation of a Society/Council Corner in the WIE Newsletter and WIE Magazine to promote events or women in their entity; Creation of a podcast program that would highlight women from Societies/Councils; Summarize all funds, scholarships, travel grant, award opportunities from societies in one place for WIE members’ information; Mentoring for IEEE Fellow drives among WIE members; Soliciting experts on climate change from Societies/councils and others.

Paul Cunningham, the chair of the TAB FinCom Ad Hoc on Society/Council Initiatives suggested relevant modifications to the initiatives application process: a new application form will be adopted by the societies which will require the submitter to provide more detailed information and encourage a higher level of strategic thinking while planning initiatives. Applicants will be encouraged to reach across societies, if of benefit to any particular initiative and, likewise, the initiative approval committee will look for potential synergies across S/C. Interestingly, this process parallels to some extent our own new approach to initiative submission described in my June write-up.

Another interesting program for which input from S/C is solicited is the Industry Days Concept. The objective of this program is to rebuild the value of the IEEE community to industry based on the company needs, not ‘IEEE thinking.’ In this scenario the industry suggests topics of interest and IEEE finds expertise among its S/C that can best provide technical advice on the specific topics and organizes meetings termed Industry Days. Importantly, seed funding for such an effort exists. We, as a society, may want to participate in such by possibly compiling a list of our expertise and associated relevant industries.

Climate change remains a very strong strategic priority for the entire IEEE; there are efforts to unify activities among the Educational Activities Board (EAB), Member and Geographic Activities (MGA), Publication Services and Products Board (PSPB), Standards and IEEE  USA ­­— to promote an efficient and coherent approach to exploiting technical expertise to identify solutions addressing sustainability challenges. If aware of any such activity in your immediate area, please contact Cinzia DaVia, our IEEE Climate Change liaison, who is compiling an inventory of our recent and planned activities that can be related to sustainability.

The Chair of the TAB Future Directions Committee, C. Miyachi, reported on a recent senior IEEE representation US congressional visit, where, among other topics, they urged investment into Nuclear and Fusion Technology, which would be of direct relevance, interest and benefit  to our members in the Fusion Technology area. 

The TAB Technical Community Outreach, Engagement, and Society membership committee is holding S/C-wide forums to gather ideas on increasing the value of membership to diverse audiences including students and industry. This effort is to result in the production of a User Guide of Best Practices. It is seeking input from any S/Cs that have successful membership initiatives. This also seems to parallel the ‘best practices’ effort that we started within our own society (see June Newsletter and below).

A very important development is the change to the IEEE Fellow Evaluation Process. Please find details in the relevant write-up by Alberto del Guerra in this issue of the Newsletter. I would also like to bring to everyone’s attention the fact that we have a Fellow Search Committee headed by Alberto which can help with the application process. It is composed of experienced evaluators; thus, their advice can be very helpful.

Switching now to our own AdCom meeting and the updates I promised in the June Newsletter. 

Our own ‘best practices’

Sara Pozzi, our Vice President, presented a thorough summary of our February breakout session on ‘best practices’ across technical areas. The following action items emerged as priorities:

Collaboration between technical areas: 

• Submission of joint initiatives whenever appropriate;  
• Common use of Basecamp and inclusion of all TC chairs on Basecamp emails. 
• Participation of TC chairs in each other’s ExCom meetings. 

Member engagement: 

• Each IEEE-sponsored conference General Chair (GC) is to show slides describing IEEE and NPSS in the introductory talk. A set of slides will be made available and each GC can use any subset in a personalized presentation. 
• Promotion of tangible benefits of being a member and senior member; 
• Increase of first year members and young professional (YP) engagement; 
• Development and dissemination of videos to promote NPSS at conferences and on social media and websites.

Newsletter

Significant progress has been made on the format of the new newsletter, which is to become entirely online and interactive starting in 2024. Stay tuned! We also now have a new brochure describing NPSS, which will be available at membership desks at any of our conferences.   

AdCom ranking of submitted initiatives

AdCom ranked the 15 newly submitted initiatives — the ranked list has been submitted to IEEE TAB  FinCom for approval.  We are expecting to be able to fund most of them as our society continues to be financially sound. 

Several other reports on the status of Publications, Awards, Educational and D&I activities and from the Communication Committee were presented and they were all overwhelmingly positive.

This AdCom meeting was relatively short, as it was held online. Nevertheless, there was a lot of energy and progress was described by each presenter – many thanks to all the committee members for their dedication and work. As you can see from this short write-up and other articles in the Newsletter, there are many opportunities for involvement at several organizational levels; we are always looking for enthusiastic and capable volunteers. While these activities do require effort, they are also very rewarding and they offer the opportunity to interact with remarkable people working in fascinating areas.  If anyone reading this Newsletter is interested in volunteering for any activity, please come forward! You’ll be greeted with enthusiasm, and we’ll be pleased to answer any questions you may have.

Vesna Sossi, IEEE NPSS President, can be reached by E-mail at [email protected]