[Flex] 8/29/01 Meeting

[Claire Reid]

Hey, Mary Ann,

Another fabulous job at recording both the information and the "climate" of
the meeting!! Thank you.  I just want to be a little picky - because it
impacts me, of course.

You state that "There will be a WHOI web travel page ...".  I think you
should say that we discussed it - or we recommend that there should be - or
maybe there will be one next year when we have an OMNI proposal...

I got the sense from the discussion that a link to the American Express site
(hint, hint) would be more useful that that old travel rate sheet.  Was that
just hopeful thinking on my part?

Also, if you all get a chance to look at the Human Resources Director's
response to the Staff Assistant Ladder Review Comm. recommendations, you
will see that Sheila Clifford and Ann Stone have been asked to organize the
first "luncheon".  I spoke with Sheila yesterday and volunteered all of us
to help... ;-)   I think you will be hearing more about this soon.

I looked at the Budget Information Sheet.  Would it be helpful just to drop
the last paragraph for FastLane proposals?  The other information seems
already to be pretty concise...  Plus the GRA paragraph could probably use a
little work.  Whatever we decide we better get Maurice's approval.

Cheers,
Claire :-)

Mary Ann Lucas wrote:

> Here's what we talked about (as far as I recall).  Please
> add/change/delete anything you feel should be different!   We missed you
> Chris, Deb S., BL, Faith, Jane and all others who were unable to
> attend.  Welcome to Susan Tomeo from Biology and Deb Taylor from PO who
> will be MaryAnn Lucas' backup.
>
> ***********************************************
>
> Discussions about Fastlane:
>
> Discussion about a "new?" Fastlane website compliance routine.  A file
> submitted to Fastlane that does not meet their requirements is
> automatically rejected through the website.  Just think, no more waiting
> around for weeks to find out if you're rejected.  Ah- hmmmmmmmm
>
> Some discussion about how LaTeX works.  It is an ascii file containing
> programming language (much like HTML) that is run through a LaTeX
> language processor (PCTex in our case) which creates a .dvi file (this
> is a printer language file) which we can then turn into a .ps file and
> .pdf for Fastlane submission.
> The absolute best figure files to use with LaTeX are Postscript or
> Encapsulated Postscript files.  There was some discussion about a figure
> that was created in LaTeX... this is not exactly correct.  The figure
> was most like a Postscript figure included in a LaTeX file.  *** Please
> correct me here if I misspoke any of this.****
>
> Questions about Microsoft Equation Editor:  It was noted that equations
> made through this editor come out as gobbledy-gook(spelling?)  when run
> through the pdf process.  Suggestion was made to make the equation in
> the equation editor as a separate file then insert it into your proposal
> as if it's a figure.  This seems to work just fine.
>
> Another comment... Fastlane has some trouble with Excel.  So watch out
> for problems when trying to submit budgets with your budget
> justification.  <MALnote:  One way to get around this might be to import
> the Excel file into your Word Document as a table.>  It was noted that
> the best font seems to be Arial and 11pt works very well.
>
> Some discussion about making up a new PD-rate paragraph for Fastlane...
> encapsulating the statement in order to give us more room in the 3-page
> limit.
>
> For collaborative proposals Kandace Binkley (NSF Fastlane) has said
> *Don't need final proposal numbers*   we only need to share the
> Temporary Proposal Number when we initiate the proposal on Fastlane...
> this and the password enables everyone to "link-up" and after all
> proposals are linked everyone can submit their proposals at will.
> Question brought up here:  If lead Institution submits on time and
> linked collaboratives are later (a week?) how does this effect
> submission?  How about vice-versa?
>
> Fastlane Training will be arranged.  We have many new Staff Assistant
> positions and many people ready to make the leap into Fastlane
> submissions.
>
> ****************************************************
>
> Discussion about Budget Creation process and sharing this process:
>
> Many thanks to Karen Littlefield who has given us a great travel hint
> (she gets hint-of-the-month-award!).  She has been using the American
> Express website for obtaining travel $$$ information and will send us
> all the link.. hint hint
>
> There will be a WHOI web travel page containing many cities frequented
> by WHOI that will be very useful especially when doing ONR OMNI
> proposals  This type of proposal is bound as one submission and the
> travel amongst the budgets should be as standard as possible.  It would
> be quite noticable if one budget contains a trip to San Francisco for
> $1000 and then next budget is $2000.
>
> The question of sharing our budget procedures with each other was well
> thought of.  Each department will volunteer a representative to give a
> demo of how their department collects the data, prepares the budget and
> submits it to the agency.  We will try to do this in the GTF in
> October... date to be announced shortly.  A questionnaire will also be
> sent around to these people to give them something to start with in
> preparing the demo.  Real informal here, y'all... this is only for
> sharing and picking up some new clues and hints to help us all.
>
> The tentative list for each department would be
>
> Donna Mortimer and Sheila Clifford -- Chemistry
> Jane Marsh -- Biology
> Karen Littlefield -- AOP&E
> Susan Tomeo -- Biology
> Diane Pinkola -- G&G
> PO is still up in the air!
> Claire and Helen
> Attendees will be discussed, but we think it should be the FLEX
> committee only.
>
> *********************************
> Administrative Assistants Get-Together
>
> Some discussion about putting together a luncheon? for Administrative
> Assistants and trying to get this show on the road....   anyone want to
> add to this? I forget!
> (heh heh... see, advanced years has brought out my inability to focus
> after more than 1 hour)
>
> *******************
>
> Respectfully submitted... just go ahead and hack away at this ladies!
> :-)
>
> --
> *+*+*+*+*+*+*+*+*+*+*+*+*+*+*+*+*+*+*+*
> MaryAnn Lucas
> Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution
> mailto:mlucas@whoi.edu +*+*+*+*+*+*+*+*
>
> _______________________________________________
> Flex maillist  -  Flex@whoi.edu
> http://www.whoi.edu/mailman/listinfo/flex