The Convention

Now I'm going to leave before somebody gets the idea that this blog is active again >_>

Day 1

So I got out of the house just fine at about 4:50 in the morning. Tulsa's airport is fairly laid back and I went through the security check with no problems. I even had my toothpaste all ready to go in a zip-loc bag.

When I checked in and got my boarding pass, I was pleasantly surprised to see that I had seat number 1A, which meant I would be right in the front of the plane. “All right!” I exclaimed, “They must have bumped me up to first class or something, maybe there weren't enough first class passengers!” This however, turned out to be a false surmise as not only was it not first class, it had no storage area for my bag unlike everyone else's seats. And leg room was scanty. It was a smaller plane than I had previously flown in and they apparently put the passengers they referred to as “Elite Passengers” (which seemed a bit snobbish to me) in the back. I guess they do that on the smaller planes, I don't really know. It was a fairly uneventful flight and I was able to finish a book that I had started well before the semester had begun. This is the first section of time I've had to be able to do that, which was very nice.

The flight attendant (or whatever the politically correct term is) was a man that I think had mixed parents, he looked something like Obama in skin color and something like Barney Fife in mannerisms and looks. He was very polite and would always offer me things by saying “Sir, would you like.....” and with a long, flowing sweep of his arm, gesture toward whatever it was he was offering. When I got up to exit the plane (that was the one perk of being in seat 1A, I left first) he gave a slight bow, a sweeping movement with both his arms and showed me where the door was. I appreciated it but felt I probably could have found it myself. He was very polite and very obviously took his job seriously, which was one reason he reminded me of Barney.

Leaving the airport was no problem. I guess airports must trust each other's security because no one bothers to check anyone leaving the terminal. That's nice because it would take up more time if they did. I got to the group just as they were getting to drive off. They are taking multiple trips out to get all of the conference attendees. We made several more stops around the airport until we were full. I was seated next to a young man named Zack who is in bio-mechanical engineering but want to be a doctor. He is from Pennsylvania and is taking a “Shakespeare in Film” class this semester. We knew some of the same plays.

The Hilton hotel is very nice. It's eleven stories and mostly class on the outside. At the desk I found out I am sharing a room with a chap named Eli, who has yet to arrive. This didn't surprise me and I look forward to meeting him. I was a bit stunned when I opened the door to the room and saw only one bed however! Thankfully the couch does fold out into a sleeper sofa so it will be just like back home :)

The room is very nice but everything costs a lot. I would have expected that in a fancy place like this, most of the things would be already paid for and “complimentary”. Apparently they milk you for all you've got. Internet is not free. It's something like $10 for 24 hours. They offer movies and games on the TV but those likewise are not free. They also offer a continental breakfast.... in bed! But that's $11 and if you want juice it's another $4.

I get reimbursed for certain expenses but that seems like it would be overdoing it. I'll just go and get something cheap downstairs in a bit.

On second thought.... the cafe had sandwiches for $12 so I'll pass that up and just eat chips in the conference room. The dinner they have planned is free to the voting delegates but for any guests it is $57! And that's one of the cheap meals they have here. It had better taste good and there had better be plenty of it, is all I can say.

I also found out that they do have free Wifi in the lobby with an access code, so that's what I'm doing at the moment.

The actual business part starts in about 15 minutes so this is the Traveler, signing out for now.

Day1 (end)-Day 2

So now I have a brief reprieve. It is nearly 10:00pm at night and our committee has finally finished all its work and will be making a recommendation to the general assembly tomorrow.

Speaking of which, as soon as we got here we hit the ground running. As voting delegates, part of our responsibility was to conduct chapter affairs and review what had been happening. I was on the financial committee so we were looking at things such as expenses, expense reports for next year, fiscal reports, and if the chapter had been spending its money wisely. I volunteered and was voted to be the recording secretary so my little netbook came in very handy, once again.

Our Financial Review Committee was then broken up into five smaller sub-committees to review specific problems. One committee tracked down chapters that had not paid their dues, for example. My committee was probably the most controversial one.

You see, starting about 15 years ago, it was decided to start a program that would encourage secretaries to turn in their paperwork on time. Out of the 220 chapters, only about 50 of the chapters would turn in their paperwork when they were supposed to. So the committee back then decided to offer a $500 reward to those chapters who did their paperwork three years in a row. The number of chapters didn't rise significantly. This program was then evaluated and done away with but many people objected and a motion was made to have a five year trial period. Chapters would be given $100 for turning in their paperwork on time (regardless if this was their first time or not) and for the second year $200, for the third year in a row: $300. Over the past five years, the average number of chapters turning in their paperwork on time rose from 54 to 61 (I did the numbers). Out of 220 chapters that isn't very much and was spent $10,000 doing this. The answer was clear-cut to me and to most people in our committee.

The recommendation was that the trial program was not successful and the monetary award should be done away with.

However, those chapters who do get the money now feel as though they are having something taken away from them, and those who haven't feel they ought to have a chance to get some money too. One guy said “Well now there is no incentive to turn in paperwork on time!” I think this completely misses the nature of the thing. You don't /deserve/ the money in the first place, in fact it seems wrong to reward someone for doing what they are supposed to do anyway! Do I get paid by my teachers for turning in my homework on time? No, I get penalized for /not/ doing it on time. It's what I'm supposed to do.

I find that in general, there is a rather liberal mindset and people look at things in an emotional “that's not fair for me” way rather than objectively and for the good of the organization. There are SO many people saying things like “Well I feel like....” and I just want to say “I don't care how you feel about the money, just stick to the points at hand., seven chapter for $10,000 is not good!” Then some people say “but we have plenty of money” and that annoys me as well. This must be how government is run. “We have plenty of money so we can continue this thing even if it only helps one person.” Where do we get the money?

So.... minor rant aside :)

Our committee seemed by far the most busy. We debated, discussed, skipped refreshments and went straight until about 10:20 that night. Our chair had been so busy the whole time that he had skipped dinner and I had been busy trying to type up proposals and recommendations and the minutes. I did this during dinner and in-between the applau.

Yes, that's what they called it. Right at the beginning of the convention a rather down-to-earth looking chap stood up and said “I'm going to teach you guys something. We have a lot of ground to cover and lots of awards. In the past we've gotten behind schedule because people feel they need to applaud. Well at this convention we're going to “applau”. I'll teach you how it's done: hold your hands apart like this [visual demonstration] and then bring them together once [clap!]. That's it. We're done.”

I liked it very much actually. I am not one of those people that gets carried away with applause. I will clap a couple of times for a person and that's it. And if the rest of the people stand I will not do so simply because everyone else is doing it. If I feel moved by respect or something then I will, otherwise I remain stubbornly in my seat. I won't respond to peer pressure. So the idea of just clapping once delighted me. It got the urge to show some approval out of the way without wasting all the time. Brilliant!

My roommate and I hit the sack around 10:40pm, tossed around a while and went to bed.

Day 2

Breakfast in the morning was rather dull for a fancy hotel. They had some muffins that tasted a bit stale and croissants and that was about it. For drink all they had was coffee and tea, no juice or even water, which was kind of disappointing. Maybe that's to encourage people to buy the $15 breakfast in bed deal.....

Meetings with districts, meetings with chapters, committees, general business meetings, oh yes, it was all there. We met in the morning for our Business meeting, in which the various committees reported and then people voted or made motions.

Off topic, I was noticing that facial hair must really be out of style. I saw two other people (out of 500 delegates) that had any kind of facial hair. It made me think that Hollywood must really be setting the image in this country....

...anyway. The discussion was interesting but very long. The first couple of motions went over very well except that half the delegates seemed to be in a shouting contest to second a motion and be put on the minutes. The gentleman taking the minutes (retired military) was obviously rather peeved about it all since it was both disorderly and made his job harder because he couldn't hear anyone.

But then we hit a couple of propositions to accept the Computer Science programs of two different schools as being an “engineering program” and therefore the students of these programs would be eligible for membership. There was heated debate on both sides, ammendments proposed, votes called, votes contested, ammendments contests, the chair was contested and called out of order, a division was called for twice (which meant that a head count of 234 chapters had to be taken multiple times) etc. etc. The chair was amazing, I did not envy his job.

Some people on the one side were saying very “personal” things like “I feel that they don't have any other honor society to go to so we should accept them into ours.” Aw... how sweet of you.

And at the opposite extreme, one guy essentially said “engineers are better than computer science people and I don't want to be associated with them. It would water down the society.”

Votes were finally called, hours were spent on this procedure and probably 20 people were lined up to talk. It was a big circus and unfortunately our secretary award thing will also probably be hotly debated, tomorrow *wince*

Dinner was very “meager” with the cost only being $34. It consisted of pasta (and a bit rubbery in my opinion) and chicken with Parmesan cheese. It was good, don't mistake me, but it was something that I could have made myself and fed two families with $34. I should start a catering service, if people are willing to pay that kind of money. I guess the expensive part is that it looked pretty.

More chapter business, district business, and committee business. It's all rather a blur at this point. At dinner we had a nice steak and that was very good. Very tender and there was a good portion this time, with mashed potatoes and gravy. I was glad for that. It was more expensive though: $62.

More committee business (a couple of hours) and now I'm in my room and ready for bed. It's late and I'm tired, it was a long day. There were so many awards given out today it was staggering. Awards for having a good chapter, awards for doing a certain program, awards for turning in paperwork on time. Everyone gets this plaque and I wonder what is the point of it all. It seems so silly and pompous. We award each other for everything it seems! One girl was upset that she didn't receive a laureate award and felt she should have and didn't understand why she didn't get it. Maybe she just doesn't understand that some people might be more qualified. Maybe she needs to learn that no one /deserves/ any award at all! that in the real world, not everyone gets the trophy after the little league game.

But then again what do I know? I'm just the lowly backwoods guy from Oklahoma ;)

Day 3

So I began the day bright and early. Breakfast was slated for 6:45 but apparently there was nothing on the menu. I personally checked and after wandering around for a while and only finding the $11.00 breakfast from the cafe, I was pleased to find what looked like a continental breakfast. I grabbed a plastic-wrapped giant muffin and an orange and then realized that this particular continental breakfast came at a cost of $2.00 for the muffin and $1 for the orange. Out of principle (basically I couldn't reconcile paying that much money for a plastic-wrapped pastry) I skipped breakfast.

The main part of the morning was spent in the general assembly. The chair of the committee for which I was secretary presented our report. The ever-controversial Secretary Award was quickly passed by. Since we didn't actually need to make a motion (then it would just expire) we tried to be as low-key as possible. No one objected at the time but this definitely was brought up in “New Business.”

There were some other interesting and boring policies. People were making ammendments to the constitution which scares me because people often write these things on notebook paper without much thought and then we vote on it. I'm apparently very Presbyterian: I like my constitutions/Statement of Faith and I like them to be unchanged unless absolutely necessary! Short and carefully worded language is a must.

Anyway, once new business came there was a lot of discussion with one of our committee members (the one who had called for a vote to reconsider last night) and who seems the very “generous” and “knowledgeable” and “progressive” type from New York, put forward the motion that the committee may have acted hastily and asked for an extension of one year and to have another committee conduct a survey as to why the program did not work. It was a smart move on his part and very carefully worded. In effect it continued the program but only for a short while. He generously agreed that the program did not work but urged us to have a survey as to why it did not work. I could have told him but I don't think that “procrastination” and “moral depravity” are particular buzzwords on convention floors. People are lazy. People aren't naturally generous. If there is no personal incentive (i.e. “I don't get any of the money myself but my chapter does) then people don't do it for the chapter. People, like Adam and Even tend to dump their responsibility on others and don't bother to train new officers or to obey existing rules. It's all very simple really!

There was MUCH discussion and eventually someone put forward a motion to amend the motion. This is always a bad thing in my opinion. It means much MORE discussion without specifically addressing the point at hand. We then have to vote and discuss amending the motion, then go back and vote on the newly amended (or left unamended) motion. Then of course someone usually contests the vote (done by “Aye” or “No”) as needing a written vote because it was too close and much time is spent having the runners going around passing out slips of paper, then a vote is taken and we can finally get back to the vote at hand. Lots of people proposed amendments and I think all of them were stricken down. The one exception was to this particular motion about the Secretary Commendation Award.

The amended motion was broken into two different motions, one that proposed to keep the program for another year to be evaluated by the committee next year, which *cough* is /exactly/ what we did this year. It made no sense to me but again good for him. People are very free with giving away money for another year, especially when they think they can get some of it themselves. The second part of the motion was to set up a committee to survey and find out why the thing didn't work.

In the middle of it all there were members coming forward saying “I'm from a small chapter and we use this money for scholarships”, “we depend on this money, please don't take it away.” There was one older gentleman (the same who had addressed our committee personally and who looked as though he were about to cry) who said that the students at his school are not very wealthy, they have debt and they used the $300 (matched by the Dean) to set up two scholarships for Juniors and he didn't know what they were going to do if they didn't get the money.

I had to be calloused but I wanted to say “Cry me a river!” The point of the program is /not/ to help small schools who are struggling with money, it is to give incentive to secretaries to turn in their paperwork on time. It's not working. One shouldn't have to give a bribe for doing what you're supposed to do anyway. If they really want scholarships, raise the funds themselves instead of expecting to get money for turning in paperwork. Once people get it once, they feel entitled to it. Yikes people!

The survey passed (so there will be an official inquiry next year) but happily the extension to the program did not, and by a significant margin as well. I was very pleased to see that. Maybe democracy does work sometimes.

One group got up and gave a little skit about the goings on at the convention and made fun of so many awards being given out. This was particularly amusing to me since so many chapters got plaques for turning in paperwork, for having a project, for voting in members: all things they are supposed to do anyway but now they get rewarded for it. Yay! So the skit basically said “well, we know you're all special anyway and you /all/ deserve rewards so we're giving away Nobel Peace Prizes!” In light of recent happenings, this was a well-aimed remark :)

But overall, a good many of the people were well-behaved, intelligent, and reasonable. Though some appeared to be a bit prideful and even haughty, there were a good many that were down to earth and just wanted to get some work done. I think everyone I spoke to was planning on being in academia and in retrospect, it was a rather dry and dull conference without any children around. It seemed that most everyone there was childless, even some of the middle-aged folks. They had devoted their lives to academia and science and children would just get in the way. I found it rather depressing but the same thing happens at school. Either the professors are always talking about how messed up their kids are (yelling and screaming at each other) or they are married but have no children: that would ruin one's career after all......

Now for the interesting part (took me a while didn't it?!)

There was an event at the local university but... my plane left at 4:55pm, the bus going to the airport left at 3:15 and arrived at 3:30. However, the proceeding at the university ended at 3:00. and buses from there would not get back to the hotel until after the buses for the airport left. I talked with one of the local students and said that I probably should just stay at the hotel then. “No problem, I'll just give you a ride, I'll have you back before 3:00, it will be no problem.”

Upon his assurances I did go. We had a lunch outside, in 40 degree weather, under a tent, with the wind and drizzle. We had a box lunch consisting of a Fritos bag and a croissant sandwich that had been sealed in a bag. Oh, it was good and all, but not $25 good! Food prices still strike me as exorbitant....

So we went to the ceremony and about 2:45 I was getting a bit nervous, looking around because we would have to leave at 2:45 in order to get back by 3:00 and catch the bus at 3:15.

At 2:55 I was thinking we were going to be cutting it really close, the ceremony was still going.

At 3:05 I felt like we might be able to catch the bus (maybe) if it was late.

By 3:15 I gave up and finally found the guy as he was coming out. He gave a sign of recognition. “Oh yeah, you needed a ride didn't you? Well just get on the bus.”

“You don't understand, the bus from the hotel has LEFT by now. It doesn't matter if I get on the bus or get a ride.” He seemed.... slightly apologetic? He said I should have called him. I did. His cell phone was off during the meeting. That will teach me to trust student assurances! He said he couldn't give me a ride to the airport but did take me back to the hotel. I wasn't sure how much good that was going to do but when I got there I went up to the desk and ordered a taxi. It was the only thing I could do because otherwise I would not have made the plane. I was informed it would be about $70 and a call was made to “George.”

While waiting for George, another cab pulled up and looked at me and asked if I needed a ride. “Sure, how much?” He hesitated a moment and then said “Sixty dollars”. I jumped at the hesitation and feeling confident said “fifty.” He thought a moment and then said “Okay, get in.” I ran in to the desk to tell them that I didn't need George anymore and went with the new driver whose name was Josef. I tried chatting with him. He was from Lebanon and according to him had been working there for 10 years or so and was trying to earn money to get his family over. I hate to be suspicious but I have to admit that I'm not sure his story was true.

He called in to the office with my credit card number (I do have fraud insurance so I felt it was safe enough and besides that I didn't have any option) and noticed that he didn't give the person on the phone the amount we had agreed on. He didn't say any amount...... would I get it for $50 like we had agreed on?

As I got out he said “Okay, so that will be $50, then there is the $5 for the toll fee and the $5 for the credit card fee.” Tricky guy. A word to the wise: don't try to get the best of a bargain with a cab driver.

But now I'm in Chicago and things look like they are on schedule. I think I'll go get something to eat. Something that's cheap..... you know: less than $30 or something.