View - ACS Network - American Chemical Society

contracts for meeting space. Arranging no-penalty contracts for blocks of rooms at local
hotels also reduced budget uncertainty.
Arrangements for the awards banquet were the largest single budgetary planning
parameter. It was necessary to sign contracts with the Museum of Glass and a caterer in
one year in advance, in June 2008. The economic downturn at the end of 2008, however,
brought significant uncertainty as to whether NORM 2009 could afford these plans for
the banquet. We reduced our original registration estimate from 750-1000 down to 500,
which in turn reduced projected income for the meeting. Final iterations of the budget
were made in spring 2009 as vendor registrations and grant support settled into place.
F. Lessons Learned
(1) Attendance estimates made four years in advance are very unreliable, especially
when circumstances like the economic crash of 2008 take place in the interim.
(2) Holding NORM on a university campus helped keep costs low and minimized
inflexible financial commitments. In turn, this allowed a bit of financial risktaking
with regard to the Awards Banquet (at the Museum of Glass, Tacoma).
(3) Blocks of rooms reserved at area hotels went largely unfilled. Most attendees
commuted to the meeting.
(4) It was a good decision not to print abstracts in the program book, for both
financial and environmental reasons.
II. Meeting Program
A. Program Overview
Program Chair – Dean Waldow (Pacific Lutheran University)
General Chair – Craig Fryhle (Pacific Lutheran University)
A block schedule overview of the program is attached as an appendix. Please also see the
program book and website: www.chem.plu.edu/norm2009.
NORM technical sessions, symposia were as follows.
Sessions
• Analytical, Chair - Gary Christian (University of Washington)
• Biochemistry - Stacia Rink (Pacific Lutheran University)
• Chemical Education, - Dharshi Bopegedera (The Evergreen State College) and
Carole Berg (Bellevue College)
• High School Chemistry, Chair - Steve Ufer (Washington High School, Tacoma)
• Inorganic, Chair - Mark Wicholas (Western Washington University, Emeritus)
• Medicinal Chemisty - Kerry Fowler (Past-chair, Puget Sound Section)
• Organic - Kerry Fowler (Past-chair, Puget Sound Section)
• Physical - Dean Waldow
• Undergraduate Program, Chair - Neal Yakelis (Pacific Lutheran University)