May 18, 2010

Location

Conference Room D, 21 Penn Tower

Present

Drs. Asbury, Dalinka, Goldfine, Hess, Kefalides, MacGregor, Nachmias, Saunders, Schleyer, Steinberg, Rachael Berget from the Office of Faculty Affairs and professional Development. Dr. Neville Strumpf, President of PASEF.

Absent

Drs. Downes,  Heppenstall, LaRossa,  McCarthy, and Meadows

Minutes

Dr. Goldfine called the meeting to order at 12:05.  The agenda for the meeting and other documents were distributed. Corrections to the minutes of the April meeting were noted. 

Dr. Goldfine introduced Neville Strumpf, the current President of the PASEF and indicated that the President of our sister organization would be invited henceforth to the monthly ASEF Executive Council meetings as a means of furthering interaction between the two organizations.  He noted that the ASEF President already attends the monthly Executive Committee meetings of PASEF. 

A discussion followed about the planned ASEF/PSAEF reception in the Headquarters space on 21 Penn Tower to be undertaken before the 15th of May.  This reception is intended to introduce PASEF members to our 21 Penn Tower facility.  It was agreed that Dr. Meadows and Goldfine would pick a date and have it announced very shortly. 

Dr. Strumpf then discussed PASEF activities and their efforts to expand participation in the activities of the organization by their members.  This issue found common ground with the ASEF Executive Committee.  She further commented that the invitation by ASEF for members of PASEF to “share” our headquarters space was very well received.  However, for strategic reasons, she asked that we amend our invitation so that PASEF members utilize the HQ space as "guests".  She summarized the frustrating efforts to gain dedicated space from the University for PASEF, pointed out that the notion of PASEF “sharing” ASEF space may not be such a good idea.  In a sense, it would complicate discussions with the Provost in that he could argue that PASEF already had space that was "shared" with the ASEF.  The logic of this argument was recognized by the Executive Council and the idea of PASEF members using the 21 Penn Tower area as “guests” was agreed upon.

Dr. Goldfine concluded his President's Report with the latest activity on an ASEF Scholarship Fund.  A statement of the purpose of this fund has been sent to the Development Office of the School of Medicine as per the request of the Dean.

The President reported that there were 33 attendees at the May 6th Retirement Planning Seminar presented by Vicky Mulhern and Hilary Lopez.  

Committee Reports

Service Committee

Dr. MacGregor.  The Advocacy Program is moving forward.  The Senior Leadership at HUP were enthusiastic about the plan but asked to review it one more time.  They wanted a "follow up" with the Volunteer Services Office to be sure there would be no overlapping or conflicting activities.  This office also does some advocacy activity.  There is a small cadre of emeriti physicians that advocate for members of the Penn Community when they enter HUP (Dr. MacGregor indicated that between 10 and 15 members of the Penn Community enter HUP a month) .  Dr. Strumpf added that PASEF was also seeking a mechanism by which HUP would "flag" the admission of Penn faculty so that both the PASEF and ASEF could respond to those admissions in an appropriate manner (PASEF sends cards and flowers wishing the patient well).  Dr. MacGregor indicated that there is a way in the HUP system to identify when a Penn Faculty member is admitted to hospital.  The issue is how to automatically forward this information to PASEF/ASEF.  He is working on that as part of the Advocacy Program.

Concerning other matters, the creation of a "Speakers Bureau" remains a good idea that needs additional work.

Luncheon Seminar – Dr.  Kefalides

The seminars undertaken during the first half of the 2010 season were summarized.  When held in the Lenape room the attendance was between 10 and 12 per session, and given the size of the room this was a comfortable number that allowed an intimate interaction with the speaker and attendees.  When the session was held in the Hourglass room, attendance was between 20 and 25 and this also permitted a good interaction between speaker and attendees.  All in all, Dr. Kefalides indicated that the ASEF Luncheon Program was working very well.  The program will now be in the hands of Dr. Asbury.

Education Committee – Dr. Schleyer

He is working to get his committee activity streamlined.  The committee is working to get a summary of the lecture titles with supporting information like reviews and articles, and to include this information on the ASEF website. There is an additional effort to streamline the access and content of the more general information on the website.  Also raised was the issue counting how many attend our events and posting that on the website.  This raised the matter of whether or net we sent too many announcements of ASEF events.  Dr. Schleyer had communications from some members concerned that they were being inundated with ASEF e-mail announcements.  The Executive Council felt that this was not the case.  It was also announced that the John Morgan Society was reconstituted in early April and that Emeritus faculty did not pay dues.

Program Committee

In the absence of Dr. Meadows and Dr. Pasquariello, the plans for the up-coming Spring meeting and ASEF/PASEF reception to introduce the PASEF members to our headquarters space were discussed.  Dr. Steinberg agreed to introduce Dr. DiNubile at the Spring meeting.

Membership Committee – Dr. Steinberg

The Emeritus Faculty survey was distributed through the Office of Faculty Affairs and Professional Development using the Survey monkey mechanism.  Forty responses were received as of the date of the Executive Council meeting. A second request for responses will be forwarded to Emeritus members in mid-May.  In early June, Dr. Steinberg will summarize the results of the survey and distribute them to the Executive Council.  A plan is in place now to use Departmental Academic Coordinators to keep track of Emeritus faculty in terms of activities and contact information..

Retirement Community Committee – Dr. Saunders

Between April 20th and May 3rd three consultants were interviewed by the Facilities and Real Estate Services Division and the Retirement Committee participated in each of them.  The consultants represented the following agencies; Third Age, Brecht Associates, the Adventis Group.  Essentially, the representative from each were asked how they would go about determining if there is a market for a University of Pennsylvania Retirement Community, and how they would undertake such a market analysis.  The problem of identifying such a constituency is that a site for a retirement community (which must be located near the campus if it is to be "Penn Branded") has not yet been determined.  In the absence of an identified site, it may be difficult to get reliable responses on a market analysis survey.  The Facilities and Real Estate Services Division subsequently contracted Brecht Associates to move forward with the plans for a market survey.

The PASEF/ASEF Retirement Committee met in June to plan strategy and is moving forward with the development of a Vision Statement for a Penn Retirement Community.  This statement may be presented to the University community as an article in the Almanac. 

Headquarters Committee – Dr. Saunders

Between April 20 and May 17 there were 22 working days on which there were 21 visits to the HQ site, totaling about 42 hours of use. 

Fourteen different members used the facility in various activities. 

New Business

It was suggested that ASEF could offer a service for Alumni Day in the Spring in which Emeriti Faculty would be invited to the Medical School Alumni reception to reconnect former students with their Professors.

The meeting adjourned at 1:30PM.

The next Executive Council meeting is scheduled for September in the Large Conference Room of 21 Penn Tower with the date to be determined

Respectfully submitted,

Jim Saunders

September 9, 2010