Meeting began at 9:15 am

In attendance:  Executive Board Members:  Cliff O'Donnell, University of Hawaii (Chair) Jim Emshoff, Georgia State University (Chair Elect), Alan Tomkins, University of Nebraska-Lincoln, (Past chair), Alison Martin, University of Missouri, Kansas City (Student Representative), Cathy Stein, Bowling Green State University, (Secretary) Absent: Pat O'Connor, The Sage Colleges, (Treasurer)

1.  Welcome, introductions, review agenda:

2.  Draft of annual report:

Alan presented a draft of the Annual Report 1998-1999.  Cliff stressed the importance of the Annual Report to provide Council chairs with "history" of CPDCRA.  Cliff suggested some minor changes to document.  Alan agreed to make changes and to have it sent to David Lounsbury for posting on the Council website.

3.  Progress report on survey analysis papers to TCP.

Looked at draft of the diversity paper that David Lounsbury was working on for May 1st deadline of TCP.  Alan asked Council members to suggest priority of paper submissions to CP.  Cliff offered comments on paper drafts and offered to communicate feedback directly to David on his draft. Allen agreed to provide feedback to Stephanie Skourtes on her draft, Curricula and Principles of Community Psychology Communicated through Graduate Training.

4.  Treasurer's report:

Treasurer Pat O'Connor sent Cliff an update on the status of the Council's budget.  As of this meeting, the balance was $3,753. Cliff reported that Pat intended to do a second mailing to contact programs who have not paid
their dues.  It was noted that the Mid-Winter meeting is a major expense of the Council.  Cliff commented that the Council was in good financial shape, given efforts made by Board members to defray the cost of this Mid-Winter meeting.

5. Progress on recruitment of new CPDCRA members:

Cliff discussed upcoming plans for recruiting new programs. Pat is contacting programs who were included in the survey, but are not currently CPDCRA members.  Cliff generated a list of international schools who may wish to join CPDCRA and discussed sliding scale for dues for foreign programs on a case-by-case basis as necessary.  Cliff agreed to contact Paul Toro, the International Interest Group chair of SCRA to see if there were any additional programs.

Jim raised the issue of the definition of community programs for CPDCRA and the idea of actively recruiting outside of psychology.  Alan expressed discomfort with spending a lot of energy recruiting outside of psychology given that it is difficult to identify specific benefits that CPDCRA can provide interdisciplinary programs.  A suggestion was made to increase Council's awareness of parallel training councils outside of psychology and to help to increase links to other organizations that share our mission and values.  Alison said that she would ask Joe Hughey if Community Development programs have training councils.  Jim agreed to check the Public Health Division of APA.

6.  Progress report on distance learning article of TCP:

Cliff said that he was in contact with Kelly Hazel to contribute to the distance learning article for TCP as she has experience in this area.  Kelly has agreed to a May 15th deadline for her contribution.

7.  Proposal for award for Contributions to Training and Education in Community Psychology:

Cliff presented a draft of a description of the Contributions to Training award to Board members.  Members proposed changes to the draft and returned the draft to Cliff for revision.  It was agreed that Jim would submit announcement of the award to TCP, SCRA listserv, and council program directors.  It was agreed that the Board members would review nominations and that the Secretary would be responsible for providing the actual award that would be given to the recipient at the 2001 Biennial Conference. Cathy agreed to email a copy of the certificate presented at the 1999 Biennial to Board members

8.  Community psychology reading list:

Cliff presented members with a copy of the 2000 updated reading list on which he and Jim Dalton had worked.  The list will be put on the Council website, the SCRA listserve, and submitted to TCP for publication.  It was also suggested that there should be addresses to the websites of publishers of community psychology textbooks.

9.  Student representative report:

Alison reviewed items listed in the student representative report that she
submitted to members (see addendum).

10. Student exchange:

Alison suggested that some examples of student exchange opportunities be
made to trigger student interest in the program.  Cliff agreed to generate some examples and to contact program directors about hosting student exchanges and to send it to Alison so she may notify students. Alison agreed to email a list of student contacts in CPDCRA programs to Board members.

11.  Website update:

Cliff agreed to contact David about putting reading list on the website. Alison suggested that the job of taking care of the website be added to the role description of the student representative to the Council and that we recruit students who understand that website management would be part of their role.  Cliff agreed that he would contact David to arrange for the CPDCRA website to list the links to member programs, rather than the program descriptions. This way it would not be necessary to update our program descriptions.

12.  Progress report on policy issues via distance: Learning lecture series:

Alison discussed the works of learning lecture series at UMKC (see student representative report below) and suggested that we might open this opportunity up to the general membership.  Alison discussed the need to locate a tech person at departments interested in participating in such a series.  Alan suggested that Council members be approached about contributing to a learning lecture series and to assess what distance learning capacities are at interested universities.  Such an event could be communicated via email to Council programs and via the student and SCRA listserv.  Alan suggested that we think about content over technology and try to get interesting "speakers."  Jim discussed the APA policy training in advocacy in which he participated and thought that this training might be
appropriate as content for such an event.  Jim agreed to email Andrea Solarz to discuss this possibility and the technical pre-requisites.  Cliff suggested that Alison contribute to the TCP article on distance learning.

13.  Elections:

Jim agreed to conduct elections for EC At Large, Interdisciplinary/Other, and Masters representatives. Alison is to conduct the election for the Student Representative.

14.  Progress report on "partners in graduate programs" project:

Jim will communicate with Ken about the details of the project.  It was suggested that an email be sent to program directors to discuss the idea and get their feedback about the program.

15.  Presentation of interview information from program directors:

Board members reported on their conversations with program directors about the status of their respective programs.  The general impression from committee members were that most programs were doing well.

16.  New business:

Cliff presented an update on the student mentoring proposal. Andrea Solarz is arranging for the survey data to be entered in a database. She plans to create a task force to work on the project and asked for suggestions for members.

17.  Summer conference call:

Alan said that he would initiate the summer conference call.  It was suggested that the call take place on the week of July 17th, 2000.  Alan said that he would coordinate a time and date via e-mail as the time approached.

The meeting was adjourned at 4:15 PM.

CPDCRA Mid-Winter Meeting
March 25, 2000
San Francisco, CA

Student Representative Report

0. Student Liaison Network
¥ Via the listservs, I sent out an email explaining the purpose/mission of CPDCRA.  The purpose was to hopefully increase understanding of the organization.  I did receive some feedback that the information was very helpful.
¥ Currently have 11 (3 are from same program).
¥ In addition to one non-member school that is interested in maintaining contact (William & Mary – have they contacted about becoming part of CPDCRA?).
A second request was sent out on 03-22-00 via all listservs (SCRA, SCRA-students, SCRA-students of color). I’ve sent the current liaisons an email alerting them to this meeting, the student exchange information (#2), and the student symposium at APA (#5).

0. Student Exchange
I have prepared an email to be sent over all three previously mentioned listservs.  I need to confirm whether or not to include “Possible Host Programs for 1999-2000”.  See attachment 1.

0. Up-dating website
Regarding the Cultural Compatibility Project: I have to thank Cliff for picking up my dropped ball with this.

0. Progress Report on Policy Issues via Distance Learning Lecture Series
See attachment 2.

0. Other: APA Student Symposium on Graduate Funding

I have been working with Rae Jean Proescholdbel and Rachel Becker-Klein (SCRA Student Reps) organizing a symposium entitled, Graduate student stipend and research funding: Issues and directions.  The symposium will be presented at the Division 27 Program of the 108th Annual Convention of the American Psychological Association, Washington, D.C. this summer.

A series of email questions will be circulated over the multiple listservs concerning student funding issues, concerns, and experiences.

In addition there is a panel of approximately 9 panel members, all graduate students.

See Attachment 3: Questions

0. Election of Student Rep

I plan to consult with David on the election process (i.e., successes & opportunities).  I will begin circulating word about the position during the summer and actually begin the election process in September, when students are “in school”.

 Attachment 1: Student Exchange Email

I'm going to send this email, but wanted to know if I should include the interested programs from the previous information Cliff gave me.  The reason I am uncertain is that the information states "Possible Host Programs for 1999-2000".

OPPORTUNITIES FOR STUDENT EXCHANGE

Through its goal of serving as an information exchange network among graduate programs, the Council of Program Directors in Community Research & Action (CPDCRA) has compiled information on programs interested in hosting a visiting graduate student for a semester through student exchange.

For those of you unfamiliar with the student exchange concept, it is a wonderful opportunity for graduate students to participate in coursework and research settings different from those of their own programs, and to be exposed to the views and practices of community research and action faculty in greater depth than experienced via conferences or publications.  CPDCRA supports strongly student exchange ventures as they represent professional collaboration and promote graduate education and professional affiliation in community research and action.

All arrangements are negotiated among the student, home program director, and host program director.  For example, visiting students may arrange to register as unclassified students in their host program and pay for tuition, housing, transportation, etc.  Another possibility is to register in their home program, but take the courses in their host program.  The host program director would then inform the home program director of the student's performance.  In either case, credits earned and other requirements met (e.g., practicum, research experience) during the semester should count in the student's home program.

If program directors, faculty or students have any questions or would like additional information, please contact:

        Cliff O'Donnell, Chair
        Council of Program Directors in Community Research & Action
        Department of Psychology
        2430 Campus Road
        University of Hawaii
        Honolulu, HI 96822
        808-956-6271
        808-956-4700 FAX
        cliffo@hawaii.edu
 

 Attachment 2: Distance Learning Information

The Idea:
As far as we know, only one school has tried distance learning that was the University of Alaska within it's own university system.

Something I took away from SCRA was a growing interest in policy activities.  Some students mentioned they would like more training in policy work.  I though a great way to meet that need, AND promote distance learning would be through holding a lecture series focused on policy issues via distance learning.

The lecture series would not be a course, so no credit would be given to students.  Since it's a series, it would not originate from one campus.  Different programs would host one of the lectures in the series (any interested programs).  Objectives of this project would be to discover how challenging distance learning is to arrange, work the bugs out, and get programs collaborating.

The first thing to do would be to find out if there is interest among the membership of SCRA.  If there are interested folks, a committee could be formed to work out the logistics.  If there are only a few interested individuals, something smaller could be done.  Perhaps this is something that the Public Policy Office of APA would assist with after a committee was formed.  U of AK could serve as an advisor to the committee as they have logistical experience with distance learning.

The Logistics:
The tech person at UMKC suggested we use Polycom H.323 video conferencing system.  He said it is free, he uses it every day, and it works quite well.  It connects through the internet, and he could set it up at UMKC to connect to a 36" TV or some type of projection system so that many people could participate.  He also said that it is similar to telephone conferencing, so the maximum number we could have hooked in would be 9 different schools (however, I did not get the impression that the series would not have to consistently originate at UMKC).

Specific questions he said we should get answered are:
0. who wants to participate?
1. what capabilities does that school have? (to best select technology to use)
2. when would we want to schedule the lectures, i.e., time of day, day of week, etc.
3. how often per semester would we hold the lectures?
4. are there any other follow-up issues, e.g., adding new sites, the number of guests that would be participating at each site, etc., and
5. how long would the lecture last?

The tech fellow also said he is more than happy to talk with tech folks at other schools.  He added that UMKC will definitely support this endeavor.

Next Steps:
I think we need to open this up to the general membership and find out who is interested in investigating the feasibility of hosting something at their school.
 

 Attachment 3: APA Student Symposium Questions

The following are questions that will be sent out over the listservs to best inform our student symposium discussion topics.  The questions are drafts; prior to listserv distribution they are reworked to facilitate quick responses.  Each question will be sent one at a time to increase the rate of response.  Additional questions may be created as deemed necessary.

1. What challenges have you encountered in attempting to gain research funding? How did you address those challenges?

2. Have you sought funding from any unusual funding sources?  How did you hear about that source(s)?   What was the purpose of the funding?

3. Does your university offer graduate student funding opportunities for personal stipends and/or research and conference participation? Are there opportunities enough available?

4. Where do you seek out funding for research, conference participation, living expenses?

5.  Have you written, or assisted in writing, a grant proposal?  Was it for a personal project or a faculty project?  Was it funded?