RENeW: Looking Forward to All the WORMS Activities at INFORMS Charlotte!

Wednesday, November 2, 2011

Looking Forward to All the WORMS Activities at INFORMS Charlotte!

The President of WORMS (Women in Operations Research and the Management Sciences) had emailed me whether or not I had received the latest announcement about the newsletter and upcoming activities at the INFORMS Charlotte meeting and I had responded that I had not but since I had spoken at McGill last Friday only to return to what is being called the biggest snowstorm on record for October with power outages that left over 3 million people in the dark, I figured that perhaps it was an Internet or related problem. (By the way, some of our neighbors as well as colleagues in Amherst and surrounding communities still do not have electric power and have been without electricity since last Saturday night and this is Wednesday).

Further inquiries revealed that others also had not received the message so it was forwarded today and is reposted below.

WORMS activities are some of my favorites at the annual INFORMS meetings from the WORMS lunch to the panels. These forums serve as great get-together and networking events as well.

Dear WORMS members,

The latest WORMS newsletter is available here.

We're looking forward to seeing many of you at the INFORMS annual meeting in Charlotte in two weeks. WORMS has several great events happening, including our biggest event - the Tuesday luncheon - two panels of thoughtful and high-profile panelists and the first-ever "Best Of" session featuring influential publications by women in OR/MS. In chronological order:

Best of WORMS – Sunday November 13, 1:30 PM – 3 PM

Amy Ward, Dorothée Honhon and Waverly Ding present their highly influential papers published in INFORMS journals in 2010. References including coauthors available by link.

Panel Discussion: Can we do anything about women dropping out? – Sunday November 13, 4:30 PM – 6:00PM

Panelists: Mor Armony, Cynthia Barnhart, Cheryl Gaimon, Ann Marucheck, and Linda Whitaker

In 1979 women made up less than 1% of full-time tenured or tenure-track faculty in engineering. More than thirty years later, how much has this percentage increased?

Panel Discussion: Leaders offer professional advice to women and men – Monday November 14, 8:00 AM – 9:30 AM

Panelists: Mark Daskin, Radhika Kulkarni, Anna Nagurney, Les Servi, and Eric Wolman

Business Meeting – Monday November 14, 6:15 PM – 7:15 PM

Meeting in the Convention Center, Room 209A, we will vote on amendments to the by-laws. Refreshments will be served to sustain a quorum. Please bring your energy and ideas for WORMS in 2012.

Luncheon – Tuesday November 15, 12:30 PM – 1:30 PM

Held in the Westin, Grand C, the luncheon will include reports on WORMS activities in 2011 and plans for 2012, as well as the presentation of the 2011 WORMS Award for the Advancement of Women in OR/MS. The biggest WORMS event of the year, the luncheon is almost sold out, so buy your tickets if you haven't already ($15, $8 for students).

Please remember to renew your WORMS membership for 2011 and for 2012. Many of us (including me) tend to renew just in time for the annual meeting – over 3/4 of the way through the year. Starting in 2012, non-members will be removed from the WORMS mailing list early in the year, so in order to be able to post to the list and continue receiving e-mails from WORMS, you'll need to be a current member. There are (at least) three ways to renew:

Renew online at http://www.informs.org/Membership/Renew-Your-Membership and, check “Forum for Women in OR/MS (WORMS)” under Fora.
Renew by phone by calling INFORMS member services (800-446-3676). Old-fashioned, but fast and easy, you can state specifically what you want to pay for, and have your questions answered on the spot.
Renew by mail using the form you will receive by mail or by downloading the form and following the instructions at http://www.informs.org/Community/WORMS/Membership. Even more old-fashioned, but it works!