CTAM Board of Governors Meeting

September 15, 2011

Crown Plaza Hotel, Bloomington

1. Call to Order

Attending: , Jan Urtel, Derrick Lindstrom, Jim Dimmock, Cadi Kadlecek Tracy Hagstrom, Kathy Ebnet, Deb Peterson, Mark Quinlan, Jodi, Saxton –West, Mark Fokken, Kris Kracht, Scott Duroscher, Gregg Sawyer, Larry Schnoor, Bonnie Spohn, DJ Brynetson, Rebecca Meyer Larson. Jan Urtel

2. Welcome and Introductions Welcome to our new members Cadi Kadlecek , Tracy Hagstrom, and DJ Brynetson.

3. Minutes from the meeting in January were accepted. Thanks to Jodi Saxton-West for submitting minutes from that meeting as Jan Urtel was unavailable.

4. Old Business – none brought forward

5. Reports

a. President’s Report Scott – BOG will be introduced at the luncheon early in the program.

b. Past President’s Report – Scott thanked CTAM for the honor of serving in this manner. CTAM BOG needs to be visual and out front. The BOG will have photographs to be posted on the website next to names. Completed at CTAM conference.

c. President-Elect’s Report: Conference Updates (see exec committee notes). More college offerings this year again. Discussion entailed the question, “How do we continue to engage in conversations to ‘bridge the gap’ between high school and college forensics and theater?”

d. Treasurer’s Report – good financial condition; Metro conf. cost much more. We are almost double on food budget. Good pre- registration 260, 14 not here. 274 members. Departmental membership offers one CTAM membership, which entails the ability to have a table at the convention to display as well as to apply for grants from the CTAM organization.

e. Historian’s Report: Not present; nothing to report and noted via email that with more web page usage, there is less need for an Historian. She has multitudes of physical documents that could be archived online. Possibly a graduate project.

f. Journal Editor’s Report - 16 submitted 6 accepted. Several people have offered to review for the Journal including high school as well as collegiate teachers from a broad selection of states. The Proofs are near completion. The next edition to put out Oct. 1 on the website, with a look forward for edition, #38. More articles and submissions from conference presentations would be welcome. Please be aware of this need as you go to sessions. In addition papers of scholarship are welcome as well.

g. Newsletter Editor’s Report: In August, David Brennan left the newsletter editor position to take a position as the Assistant Director of Forensics at Wartburg College. Cadi Kadlecek of Gustavus Adolphus College replaces him. Some new ideas from her: Activities, lesson prompts as well as student response section

h. BOG Member Reports

i. Roxy Janke: SW - re-alignment within the sub-section. This decision’s consequences will be examined more fully as the season gets under way.

j. Derrick Lindstrom – Metro –1. At times CTAM convention conflicts with a Jewish holiday, which is a concern for our Jewish colleagues who would like to attend the conference. 2012 will not conflict with the Jewish holiday. 2. Could dietary requests be added to the registration form? Larry responded menu planning is not always decided by the time the registrations go out. Members may need and do take responsibility for contacting Larry with special dietary needs.

k. Mark Quinlan – ITA – 3^rd annual thespian festival in Jan, 2011. Participating schools presented one acts on the Thrust Stage at the Guthrie. Edina’s performance of ANYTHING GOES was selected to perform at the Intl. Festival in Lincoln, NE. The state festival will be in March 2012 and will include an ‘All State Show’, The Laramie Project directed by Randy Reyes. The rehearsals will be during off school times. For more information, http://www.mnthespians.org/

l. Gregg – META- 1.Gregg clarified the distinct difference between the two theater organizations. ITA is student centered and META is teacher education oriented. The META website is: www.minnesotaeducationaltheaterassociation.org 2. Theater educators are able to link their website through it; resources on the site are available to all institutional members and include classroom resources for teachers, production page, with many links to props, wigs, paint techniques, etc. 3. Gregg will donate one hour per week of his time to update the website. 4. The Perpich center continues to be a quality partner with very helpful staff. Their purpose is to advocate on a statewide level for organizations such as CTAM. 5. Edinburgh is adding an International collegiate Theater Festival alongside the High school Theater Festival; participation is young in the collegiate festival at this time.

m. Kathy Ebnet – NE MN still needs more qualified judges for speech and one – act to travel to this area What about MN certification for ND and Wisconsin judges? The discussion following centered on different categories offered in speech would negate the cross border use of judges. Some discussion given to having contracts available here at CTAM for the more difficult areas to fill judges. Several BOG members shared information that several sections have brought contracts in the past to contact and offer contracts to preferred judges.

n. Bonnie Spohn – Central – Coaches will meet in ST. Cloud next week. This is an annual or semi annual event for their section. Bonnie shared the importance of the coaches’ meeting for communication and collegiality. Her section has added one new team Pierz, MN.

o. Tracy Hagstrom – HS classroom rep./ President- elect- Region shifting is a problem – 5AA wants to charge for one act activity at the state contest. Regions have autonomy to decide this decision.

p. DJ Brynetson - MEDA – new schools are adding debate. RDL – rural debate is growing. UDL – Urban debate encompasses all Minneapolis and St. Paul and remains strong.

q. Rebecca Meyer – Larson -NW – Technical theater in the NW struggles in keeping tech theater people as they graduate and move away; consequently jobs go unfilled for tech directors in the region. Rebecca also discussed the fact that judging for Section Speech in the NW region is also struggling to find enough qualified, certified judges.

r. Jody Saxton- West - SE – no issues at this time; however new mentoring program has 6 new schools. Inter city charter as well as rural schools who will need mentors.

6. New Business:

a. Tracy Hagstrom Durant (Buffalo HS) and Jason Olson (Adrian HS) will be on the ballot for President-Elect on Saturday morning at the Business Meeting. One or two minutes of intro at the Saturday meeting will be expected. Absentee balloting will be available from the registration table all weekend.

b. Jan Urtel has agreed to run for Secretary. She runs unopposed, so there will be no ballot. Nominations will be taken from the floor at the general meeting.

c. Gregg Sawyer: Request from the Scholars of Distinction. See copy attached. The Scholars of Distinction - Theater is the only SoD that gives monetary awards to their scholars. Because the Perpich center is undergoing large budget cuts they are asking CTAM for $2000. to support the Scholars program. Larry clarified that the CTAM did not receive a letter stating the names of the recipients and would like that to happen so we can publish that in the newsletter. Clarification from the MN foundation will help CTAM foundation to give out money. Larry made a motion to again give $2000. to the SoD. Seconded by Gregg passed unanimously

d. Larry Schnoor: BOG responsibilities for bringing sessions to the conference; brought forth a motion requiring each BOG member to plan and facilitate a session at CTAM, with the duty to also clarify and confirm the presenting panel. Seconded. Discussion: Mark brought up the chance of redundancy, but it the program planner will sort out redundancies. NCA works in the same manner. Scott concurred with Larry, that people indeed do drop out at the last minute due to lack of communication. Jim stated several national organizations tie names in the program to the confirmation of their registration. Mark F spoke to the same problem of communication for the planner with session participants to confirm near the conference date, and Larry’s proposal speaks to that in a formal way. Vote: unanimous approval.

e. Gregg iterated that the BOG previously introduced speakers in each session and maybe this BOG should revisit that practice. Kris K. picked up the thread and spoke to the idea that the BOG should be more visible at CTAM by introducing the speakers, welcoming them, etc. 2. Does CTAM provide the space for the regional speech / theater folks to meet and have their meetings? 3. Should we create a discussion room to ask participants as to what we, the board can do to be more helpful here at CTAM? An ‘ask CTAM’ table, per se. Support seems to be favorable to most of these ideas. No formal action taken.

f. Jan Urtel: Nominations for Outstanding New Secondary Teacher Award are few. Good discussion ensued discussing clarifying the wording as well as having the BOG bring names forward from the region. The board agreed to revisit the criteria. A promotion to table the issue at this meeting was offered by Larry and seconded by Gregg. Unanimous passage.

g. Kris Kracht

Ø Newsletter format and proposed changes A

Ø Advertising at CTAM in the conference program? Many pros and cons were discussed. What about philosophical differences? Will the choice of advertisers come across as a CTAM endorsement?

Ø BOG Visibility; discussed and noted earlier in minutes.

Ø Venders – Do we know of any that should be here?

h. Scott Durocher: Requests items for Saturday morning’s business meeting.

i. BOG - site issue. Open for discussion on Saturday.

Next meeting: Jan. 8^th. St. Cloud Holiday Inn, 11:00 am.

Respectfully submitted,

Jan Urtel

secretary

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