Seventy-Fifth Meeting

July 10, 2006, 5:00 PM (Stellar-Chance 104)

1. Welcome / Attendance:

BPC: Frank Wilkinson, Stacy Gelhaus, Mikolaj Pawlak, Africa Wallace, David Hokey
Luana Atherly, Mark Lee (new member), Hedi Schelleman (new member), and Fiona
McGillicuddy (new member)

BPP: Yvonne Paterson, Kryste Ferguson

Guest: Karen Asenavage from English Language Programs (ELP)

Absent: Sam Murphy, Seyed Hashemi, Annie Curtis, Janice Young, Tiangang Zhuang,
Ying Xu

2. Update from Biomedical Postdoctoral Programs: Dr. Yvonne Paterson,

Associate Dean for Postdoctoral Research Training, Director, BPP

a. Update on ERACDA Grant: Yvonne talked more about the work being done on
the training grant to sponsor teaching fellowships for postdocs. Postdocs will
spend 75% of their time at Penn conducting research and 25% of their time
teaching at partnership institutions with underrepresented minorities. Currently
Lincoln University has partnered up to work with Penn while the goal is to have a
total of three universities working with Penn. Postdocs will be supported on the
training grant and also benefit from courses in teaching sponsored by the college
for further education. The NIH currently funds 7 of these programs across the
US. It is the goal of Penn to obtain funding for 2-16 teaching positions.
b. Interest from other postdoc groups: Yvonne also mentioned that there may be
renewed interest in other postdoc groups due to a new NIH guideline for T32
training grants, requiring these grants to contain training components.

3. Major BPC and BPP projects: Various, and Kryste Ferguson

a. Symposium: Wednesday, October 11, 2006, the call for abstract will go out this
week to the postdoc community. There is the expectation that we will have more
abstracts this year due to the incorporation of the CHOP postdocs. Also, the rooms
for oral presentations have been limited to those directly off the BRB lobby. This
will keep things in one location, but the number of oral presentations will be
limited to 16. This means that some requests may be turned down. It is estimated
that for two post sessions, a maximum of 80 posters can be accepted. There is an
attempt to hire Lisa Marshall for the day to give feedback on the oral
presentations. In this case, presenters would be taped during their session and
 then be able to go over their critique with Lisa. The council is looking in to the
cost and also the possibility of raising funds ourselves through donations from
vendors who would be allowed space in the BRB lobby for the entire day. Help
with the abstract sorting was also discussed at this meeting and it was noted that
Frank, Kryste, Stacy, Dave, Hedi, Fiona, and Mark would be participating in this.
There was also more discussion on speakers for the 2007 symposium and brief
bios will be sent out so the council can start voting on a contact list for next year.
Yvonne also suggested trying to use the Abramson next year for the symposium,
this way we can accommodate more oral presentations and still be adjacent to the
lobby.
b. Career fair: Company representatives have discussed the fact that they tend to hire
more in the fall and it was decided by career services that we should have the
career fair in September. The next career fair is scheduled for September 27th.
c. ELP: Kryste introduced us to Karen Asenavage who has recently joined the
English Language Programs department. She attended the meeting to get a better
picture of who we are, what we do, and what it is we hope to accomplish. In the
future, she will be working with us to help improve our publications, grant
writing, pronunciation, etc.
d. Kumar Memorial Lecture: Frank discussed his ideas about when to start the
lecture and who would be the first to give the lecture. Most likely, a postdoc in
Boyer’s lab will give the first memorial lecture. Boyer’s lab would also like to be
involved in the process of picking the upcoming speakers with the idea that PI’s
will nominate outstanding postdocs. Possibly the first lecture will be late
October/early November due to many programs already scheduled for September.
e. Upcoming Services/Events: New programming will include a teaching workshop
in November, career services sponsored events the first Thursday of every month,
a business etiquette course on Saturday, September 9th with Mary Mitchell, and
orientations in September and December.

4. Updates from subcommittees (20 min total)

New Postdoc Orientation / Foreign National Committee (FNC): Seyed – It was called to
our attention by Miku that Seyed is no longer available to conduct the Foreign National
Committee mini-orientations and someone needs to fill this position.
Diversity: Africa – Africa and Ivonne hosted a Diversity Committee meeting 1 week ago,
but no other postdoc attended. Improved advertising strategies include postdoc emailing,
flyers, and direct contacts to postdocs. It is also their wish to host a speaker and have a
dinner for 10-12 postdocs to gain interest in their committee and improve overall
attendance. The next meeting will be in August and the dinner may take place in
October. The possibility of combining forces with the graduate student diversity
committee was also addressed.
Medical/Dental Insurance: Dave met with Mary Ann and they are investigating a total
new medical package that would take care of health and dental insurance issues, which
the postdoc community is currently facing at Penn. The next enrollment session for the
United Concordia dental insurance will be Monday and Wednesday from 11-1, August 21
and 23rd. Postdocs need to be aware that they no longer carry even the minimal dental
insurance through Keystone.

5. Next meeting: August 7, 2006