Council business in Denver

The 249th National ACS Meeting in Denver is now recent history, and our Councilors have returned with the newest issue of “Councilor Talking Points.” A disinterested (not to say uninterested) onlooker can excerpt the following, which may attract the attention of interested parties:

• A total of 13,940 attendees registered at the Denver national meeting.
• The divisor for local section Councilor representation has been set at 420. That qualifies the Saint Louis Section for 3.667 Councilors. Since nature abhors a fractional Councilor, all 4.000 of our current Councilors get to keep their positions and all of their appendages.
• The Committee on Education reported that there are now 1,900 members of the AACT. That is the American Association of Chemistry Teachers and not, alas, the American Association of Candy Technologists. Membership is heavily, but not exclusively, K–12 chemistry teachers. If you have an interest, idle or professional, in the primary- and secondary-level teaching of chemistry, this could be the place to be. Or you could join the Candy Technologists and pretend to be confused … and hungry.
• The Committee on Professional Training has published new guidelines for ACS-approved Bachelor’s programs in chemistry, the first thorough-going revision since 2003. They don’t make it easy to see what has changed, but the superceded guidelines are archived here.
• Committee on Economic and Professional Affairs (CEPA) reported the unemployment rate for new graduate chemists has dropped from 14.9% in 2013 to 12.4% in 2014. While unemployment is down, salaries have been overall stagnant. The ACS Career Fair had 715 seekers chasing 85 positions. The Virtual Career Fair had 918 seekers after 38 positions. There is nothing humorous that can be added to these facts.
• The committee highlighted the power of ACS member engagement in government affairs by relating the bipartisan effort, despite partisan roadblocks, to secure a resolution for National Chemistry Week in the United States Senate by Senators Chris Coons (D–DE) and Pat Toomey (R–PA). One wonders (at least this One does) what conceivable partisan roadblocks might have been encountered: an amendment prohibiting abortion within 914.4 m of any NCW event? a proviso encouraging drone attacks on the related celebration in Iran? One’s mind reels.

You can see it all, if you insist, here.