2010
Dear SAIR Colleagues:
This is a two part message: 1.) a call for participation and 2.) a call for proposal submission; the proposal submission site for the 2010 SAIR Conference is now open! Please make every effort to be a participant in the 2010 SAIR Conference. The Board has agreed that we will not raise the registration fee this year; it is still $150 for early bird registration and $175 for those registering late. Previous messages (below) have indicated that the InterContinental New Orleans has reduced our room charge to $149 for the evenings of the 23rd through the 28th of September. It is with that reduced rate in mind that I invite you to come in a couple of days early and enjoy New Orleans. The Crescent City is a wonderful, rowdy, beautiful Southern city with the most colorful locals of any city in the world. The Ain’ts are gone and the Saints reign supreme! The city is still recovering from Katrina, but you wouldn’t know it in the French Quarter! Oh, have I mentioned the food? You might want to do some palate and taste bud cross-training to get said body parts ready for a cornucopia of tantalizing entrees and desserts.
Your attendance at our conference is extremely important, thus I invite you to participate in our 37th annual conference by submitting one or more proposals. Presenting a paper, work share session, or workshop will be beneficial to many of your SAIR friends (“Pay It Forward”). Your presence at the conference will almost certainly guarantee opportunities for “Networking for the Future”. I look forward to seeing you in New Orleans in September!
Roy “Ike” Ikenberry
Program Chair – 2010 SAIR Conference
Theme
An explanation may be in order for the theme: Pay it Forward: Networking for the Future. Evaluations of our state group and those available from SAIR have indicated an interest in more networking during the meeting. We know we have limited time for such activities but if we couch it in terms of ”pay it forward" everyone is or can be a participant. Pay It Forward, a novel published in 2000 by Catherine Ryan Hyde (later made into a movie of the same name), describes it as an obligation to do three good deeds for others in repayment of a good deed that one receives. We all have been recipients of good deeds by someone in the IR profession and we in turn should be willing to help others (pay it forward). Our Newcomers need to know that those of us who have been up on the porch with the "big dogs" for a while started under it! And maybe some of us that have been on the porch too long need to remember our humble beginnings. There are several IR professionals, living and in the eternal IR office, who helped me a very great deal and I want to pay it forward. How about you?
Board Members Nerissa Rivera and Cara Mia Braswell have created a Facebook group called “SAIR 2010”. For those of you, who already have a Facebook account, simply search for the group and request to be added to the group. For those of you who haven’t set up a Facebook account, please take this as a prompt or an invitation to do so. Setting up a new Facebook account is a relatively simple matter. Go to Facebook and complete name, email, password and some demographic data (very little required). Once you’ve established your account you can search in “GROUPS” or in the search box in the upper left corner for “SAIR 2010” and request to become a member. You must have a Facebook account in order to access the SAIR2010 group. You do not have to add any other personal information to your page. You will be able to read News Feeds and post public comments and questions.
In keeping with the theme of SAIR 2010 “Pay it Forward: Networking for the Future”, we hope to use the great networking facets of Facebook to bring our members together. It provides a forum to discuss the upcoming conference in New Orleans, and the many volunteer opportunities available to get involved in the annual conference and this outstanding organization. SAIR 2010 will give us a forum, before and during the conference, where members can touch base, ask questions, and share ideas. In addition, members can also use the site to make dinner plans or share favorite restaurants in the area.