Minutes of the Fusion Annual General meeting, held on 20th January 2007 at Yarnfield Park training and conference Centre.

1. Jim Grozier chaired the meeting and welcomed those present

Digby Tarvin, Maria Griffiths, John Small, Christine Seaman, Fred Muirhead, Cynthia Muirhead-Webb, Sandra Keen, Irfan Ali, Dennis McCaffery, Liisa Jahkonen, Chris Waddington, Steve Murphy, Mike Nugent.

2. Apologies for absence

Paul Ruffle and Dwyn Padfield

3. Minutes of 2006 AGM

Approved

4. Reports

Jim stated that since there was no "events coordinator" no report would be made on this item. Also ideas for future events had been discussed fully in the preliminary meeting held in the morning so this would not be covered again in the AGM. Below are the brief verbal reports made at the meeting, full details are available from the secretary.

(a) Treasurer

Jim Grozier (JG) stated that the accounts were healthy, there was spare money due to an under spend in previous years. He described the items in the accounts noting that the spare money may go down in future years since total membership was no longer increasing. JG reported that the accounts for the year ending September 2006 had been audited and he displayed the list of transactions which Maria Griffiths (auditor present) assured us she had checked and was completely happy with.

(b) Membership

John Small reported that membership was declining with peak membership having reached 655 now being down to a current paid up membership of 510. He suggested that we should launch a publicity campaign but noted that he was personally finding the job of maintaining sources of publicity difficult to maintain. The reduction in course mailings to students and therefore less opportunity to raise awareness of Fusion was mentioned as a cause.

(c) Newsletter

In Paul Ruffle’s absence JG reported that only 3 issues had been produced this year although they were fairly substantial in content. The loss of Paul as the editor and the importance of the newsletter were discussed in the morning meeting. Most of those present at the AGM agreed that ideally 4 issues should be made a year and Graham Foyle suggested that we aim for this even if some newsletters were less substantial than the norm.

(d) S207 Prep weekend

Graham Foyle (GF) reported that there were only 10 students attending the preparation course this year. The income from student fees and grants obtained from the IoP and the OU Physics and Astronomy Department did not cover the costs. Therefore Fusion had suffered a loss by running the event. [However the loss was largely offset by holding the AGM/Fusion day at the same location.] GF stated that getting information to potential students was a major problem and he was disappointed that a news item in the Sesame winter edition had been cut at the last moment. JG was still keen to run the event next year and hoped that with help from the OU dept all potential students could be notified and a better response obtained.

(e) Revision weekend

Digby Tarvin (DT) reported that the revision weekend was a success. Yarnfield Park Training and Conference Centre was excellent and a better value venue than York University although there were travel problems particularly on a Sunday. He felt that excursions were limited and there was a lack of interesting on site facilities. A London based venue would possibly be more interesting. UCL and Imperial were possible alternatives to be given future consideration.

(f) Merchandise

Christine Seaman (CS) reported that 106 T-shirts had been sold in the year which was about half the amount in the previous year. This was thought to be due to inevitable saturation of the market since probably only new members would buy existing designs. Sandra Keen suggested a more discrete design may be more popular with female members and a choice of white or other light colours. Irfan Ali suggested a V-neck design and this seemed to strike a chord with other AGM attendees. CS said she would look into possibilities noting that 24 was a minimum order and storing more stock would be a problem for her.

(g) Website

In PR’s absence there was nothing to report on this except that DT had obtained the access codes from Paul and would attempt to keep it updated. A link to Pay Pal for on-line membership applications and subscriptions was a future aim.

(h) Ousa Conference

Nothing to report

(i) Nexus

DT stated that link with Nexus (the student branch of IoP) was an important one for Fusion not least for the grants we receive to help with the running costs of the society and the S207 weekend, but also our participation through JG and JS in the international Young physicists Conference was important. This had proved to be an inspiration for Fusion members to go on and achieve Ph D and Masters.

(j) OU Liaison

JG reported that our link to the OU P&A Dept was useful and Lindsey Shaw Greening had proved to be a real asset and an ideal representative. Lindsey was reaching the end of her research term at Milton Keynes and felt someone else needed to take over. Nick Braithwaite as head of the department was keen to support the efforts of Fusion and would be actively seeking a suitable replacement for Lindsey.

5 Elections for Officers, Committee posts and various delegates

JG stated that all posts were open for election and invited members to put them themselves forward for election. Nominations were taken in the following order and elections made with a block vote at the end.

Position	Nominee	Nominated	Seconded
(a) Statutary Officers
Chair	Jim Grozier	Sandra Keen	Dennis McCaffery
Treasurer	Graham Foyle	Digby Tarvin	Jim Grozier
Secretary	Digby Tarvin	Jim Grozier	Sandra Keen
(b) Functional Officers
Membership	John Small	Jim Grozier	Fred Muirhead
Events	Maria Griffiths	Graham Foyle	Digby Tarvin
Newsletter	Chris Waddington	Maria Griffiths	Jim Grozier
Website	Digby Tarvin	Jim Grozier	Dennis McCaffery
Merchandise	Christine Seaman	Jim Grozier	Digby Tarvin
Science Revision Weekend Coordinator	Digby Tarvin	Jim Grozier	Christine Seaman
OU Liaison	TBA*
S207 Preparation Weekend Coordinator	Jim Grozier	Graham Foyle	John Small
(c) Additional Committee Members
	Dwyn Padfield	Jim Grozier	Maria Griffiths
	Sandra Keen	Jim Grozier	Maria Griffiths
(d) Other Positions
First Class Conference Moderator	Christine Seaman	Jim Grozier	Maria Griffiths
Nexus Rep	Irfan Ali	Jim Grozier	Maria Griffiths
OUSA SSC delegate	No nominations
OUSA Conference delegate	No nominations
Auditor	Mark Jones	Jim Grozier	Fred Muirhead

All were elected unanimously

* Anne-Marie Gallen was later co-opted into this post.

6 Other Business

JG proposed a vote of thanks to Paul Ruffle and that he be given a life membership for his service to the society and this was agreed by all at the meeting.