Greater Phoenix Mensa

While this is my penultimate column as Local Secretary of Greater Phoenix Mensa, there are a lot of things going on within GPM in these few months that I’d like to share.

First, I would like to congratulate all those elected to ExCom next year including incoming LocSec, Paul Beaulieu. One new face to ExCom is Shane Olafson as Member at Large and I would like to welcome him to the committee. Other faces are familiar and I would like to thank them for their continued service. Additionally, Maynard, one of our members at large is moving away this month and I would like to wish him luck in the future and hope he stays involved in Mensa wherever he ends up.

Second, I wanted to mention that there is a winner to the logo contest. I will not state who won here as it’s published online before it comes out in the MAAM but I will thank all of the participants and voters. There was quite a bit of thought put into the submissions and there were some compelling comments among the dozens of people who voted. As I would like to recognize the submitters by name, if you wish to be acknowledged, let me know and I’ll thank you by name next month.

Third, we are having (in May)/have had (in June) our first forum co-sponsored by KJZZ on Solar Energy in the Valley of the Sun on May 18^th. This was brought about through the efforts of Richard Morris, Mel Anderson, and Jerry Corbin without whom this forum would not have been possible. While we do not know the success of this event at the time of writing, we hope to continue this relationship into the future. This helps both organizations and the community writ large. I would like to extend further thanks to Ravi Sharma and Russ Silverberg for supporting the increased testing we expect from the exposure.

Fourth, hotels for the Annual Gathering have been discounted beyond the previous rates and you may need to take action to take advantage. From AML, “the Circus Circus Sunday-Thursday room rate will be lowered to $45 plus $9 in fees and taxes. In order to be fair to AG attendees who have already booked rooms, Circus Circus has agreed to revise the bookings in the AG block to reflect the lower rates. If you have a Mensa room-block confirmation, Circus Circus will contact you. At the same time, the Silver Legacy, the AG's main hotel, is lowering Mensa's Sunday-Wednesday room rate to $59.99 with the Thursday-Saturday holiday period remaining the same at $99. All reservations will be automatically adjusted.” Feel free to enjoy the Colloqium the day before on Tuesday, July 3^rd where the topics of "Social and Video Games and Why We Play Them" or "Mensa on Steam!" will be discussed.

Fifth, we have had several Special Interest Groups (SIGs) become more active both locally and nationally and I have received considerably more e-mail from our members in regards to these groups. Due to these inquiries, I would like to share the benefits of finding a group, or five, or twenty, of people with the same interest as you. These span the gambit from Active Ms to Writers and your level of involvement is up to you. The SIGs with a local presence have people you can contact listed in the MAAM. While one would typically find like-minded individuals in other organizations within these groups, it is not the case with Mensans. You can find out more about the history of these groups and find active SIGs by clicking the link on: http://www.us.mensa.org/connect/sigs/ and I hope you enjoy it.

Finally, we have a main speaker for our regional gathering, Phoenix Phiesta XXX: More Desert Delights, this fall and it is Pulitzer Prize winning editorial cartoonist Steve Benson. Registration forms for the RG are coming out next month and while the website is still in work, some useful information is available there. The RG website can be found by looking up www.phoenixmensa.com and we look forward to seeing you there.

By the time you read this, my move to the state of Washington will be complete. I will be continuing as LocSec through the use of the internet and tele-presence until the term is up. I bring this up as I have really enjoyed the last two years as a member of our GPM community and would like to discuss a few facets on the topic of presence. While we hear preparation being lauded and the role of serendipity discounted in popular culture, it was the mere luck of being at the right place at the right time that guides my life (and perhaps yours as well).

I joined Mensa based on engaging chance conversations with different members at interesting ASU public lectures. I was invited to fill in as recording secretary on ExCom while I was at Mel's dine-in and liked it enough to run for a term in office. Similarly, Paul Beaulieu's presence at the ExCom meetings, to which all members are invited, led him to fill in the open Member-at-Large position. Greater Phoenix Mensa also benefits from the luck of having a very engaged volunteer base. While looking for activities in Western Washington through their newsletter, I realized how good our MAAM is in comparison to these other publications thanks to the efforts of Tagg Maiwald as editor and Gene Holmerud with distribution.

We have received responses in the double digits regarding the logo contest as of the beginning of April and hope to see responses in the triple digits by the time we announce the winner in the June issue of the MAAM. While this presence is one of attention and inattention, it emphasizes that not only the effort of the submissions but also the efforts of the voters are shaping our organization on a day to day basis. Additionally, our volunteers are setting up a moderated forum with KJZZ on Solar Energy and its impact on the Valley to be held on Friday, May 18^th at 6 PM and we would love to have you attend.

Finally, the presence I had intended to write about is of other's perception of you. There have been conversations where a person whose name eludes memory is described as lighting up a room or being a calming presence. I can only hope that my presence will be remembered as making you excited about being part of our community and your fellow members. If I have not done so, please call me or send me an e-mail with your suggestions to improve and I will work to get there.

Thanks,
Greg Chandra

LocSec@phoenixmensa.org
480.254.5771

Congratulations on reading this column! You will find the logo contest in this issue of the MAAM. This is where you can have your say as to what our organization, Greater Phoenix Mensa, will use as its logo. What is your favorite logo? Let us know your first and second choice and we’ll let the submitter know after the voting has ended.

We have a lot of new and exciting activities and events in the coming month including a moderated forum on solar energy in the valley co-hosted and moderated by KJZZ radio. ExCom has also reviewed the hotel contract for the regional gathering, RG, and offered comments. If all goes according to plan, these details will be ironed out by the time the May issue is published. Are you passionate about or an expert in a topic and willing to present? Can you demonstrate on the subject at the RG? Please contact Jerry Corbin at forum@phoenixmensa.org and let him know that you are interested. We don’t want to miss out on what you have to contribute.

Chryssoula DePuydt has resigned from her positions within ExCom and GPM. I wanted to send our thanks to Chryssoula for her contribution as Member-at-Large and Volunteer Coordinator and send our best wishes for her future endeavors. She has done a great job stepping up and handling these duties and will be missed.

Nominations and elections are coming up over the next month and as I mentioned in March, please consider how you would like to contribute. Take a look at the different positions offered and seriously consider how you can help. Roughly half of the ExCom positions will need someone to step up. These include LocSec, Assistant LocSec, several Member-at-Large roles, Secretary, and more. It would be fantastic to have competitive elections to support out organization. In addition, we have current opportunities both on and off the ExCom for a Member-at-Large, volunteer co-ordinator, communications chair, marketing chair, party co-ordinator, and as many proctors as are interested in helping test prospects and being the first contact with new members. Contact any member of the ExCom if you’d like to learn more and volunteer and nominating committee contacts will be sent out in a few weeks.

With regards to proctors and testing, I would like to commend Russell Silverberg and the other proctors as we had testing of a double-digit number of potential members testing on March 4^th and can only test more individuals with your support. I would like to thank the members stepping up to take on the responsibilities of test proctor. We cracked a thousand members this month and are well on our way in becoming one of the most robust chapters in the country. Hope you enjoy this journey and send in some of your experiences during this exciting time to our editor.

Greg Chandra
LocSec@phoenixmensa.org
480.254.5771

My column over the last few months have been very future oriented and this will re-emphasize the present and the many contributions being made by our members now. We have grown to 994 members over the last couple of months and this would not have been possible if not for our new webmasters, Carla Tillman and David Pivin, membership chair, Paul Beaulieau, testing co-ordinator, Russell Silverberg, RG chair, Mel Anderson, and more.

I would like to thank all the members who sent in contributions to the logo contest and who send in submissions to the MAAM. Disa McAlister needs to be thanked for putting together the Leap Year Party. I would also like to thank Jerry Corbin for stepping up to be the RG programming chair and Pete Constantino for helping in this endeavor. The Regional Gathering will be held over thanksgiving weekend so start planning to attend now. If you are passionate about or an expert in a topic and willing to present or demonstrate on the subject at the RG, please contact Jerry. We would love to hear what each of you has to share. You can help make this the best RG of the millennium!

In the short term, we are looking for a Marketing Chair to send out press releases advertising our public events (eg. Forum), a Communications Chair to co-ordinate our internal communications, a party co-ordinator to fulfill the role, and many proctors that are interested in helping test prospects and being the first contact with new members. Contact any member of the ExCom if you’d like to learn more and volunteer and Russell Silverberg if you’d like to be a test proctor. For the new members, the ExCom members include the Members at Large, Recording Secretary, Treasurer, Parliamentarian, Newsletter Editor, and the LocSec and Assistant LocSec.

In the longer term, please start considering how you would like to contribute to Greater Phoenix Mensa (GPM) as nominees will be needed for elections coming up. Consider how you would like to help fulfill our mission to connect and energize Mensans by providing an engaging intellectual and social environment. If you want to know what each role requires, you can contact and ask the volunteers in them now. Keep enjoying 11111011100!

Greg Chandra
LocSec@phoenixmensa.org
480.254.5771

Is everyone enjoying the not-as-short shortest month of the year? We expect to see you celebrate with your friends at the Leap Year party starting at 1 PM on Saturday, February 18^th. Even if you’ve never made it out to an event before, make your first foray out to the Mandarin Super Buffet Restaurant located at 1501 W.  Bethany Home Road, Phoenix, AZ 85015. Current members will have their meals covered by GPM and remember that guests are welcome. Please send your confirmation (your name, membership number, and number of guests you are bringing) to Disa McAlister with more details available in the calendar.

The GPM logo competition is still open. If you want to win two free entries to this year’s RG and can think of a logo for the group, please send your entries to the address listed in the MAAM and/or my e-mail address. Again, we are looking for a novel grayscale logo that fits within 2”x2” or 1200 x1200 pixels. We look forward to seeing your creativity.

Near the end of last year, several members met to discuss where we are now, what we have to offer, and where we want to be. The outcome of this meeting was discussed during the last two ExCom meetings and the vision, mission, and goals were laid out. These are in the minutes and I would like to engage each member to help us remain aligned with our vision, maintain emphasis on our mission and achieve or even exceed our goals.

Vision:  Discover! Learn! Create!

Mission:  To connect and energize Mensans by providing an engaging intellectual and social environment

Goals:

1) To be one of the largest 5 regional Mensa chapters within 5 years

2) Enhance our offerings to our members so that monthly events are available within 30 minutes of their home (for at least 90% of our members)

3) Increase our active volunteers by 100% within 5 years 

To reach our goals, we created a new post of volunteer coordinator this month and Chryssoula DePuydt has graciously volunteered for the post. We also created a “new member” committee to engage and welcome both new and inactive members and would appreciate your participation. If you are interested in volunteering in any aspect, you can contact Chryssoula or any member of the ExCom directly through the contact information listed on page 2.

Greg Chandra
LocSec@phoenixmensa.org
480.254.5771

First off, happy new year from your friendly neighborhood LocSec! As this is a leap year, I hope you take the extra day as an opportunity to do something special. It is the right time for new year’s resolutions so please share your thoughts with ExCom, in person, online, or over the phone. What do you think we are doing right and what should we do differently?

We are working to provide more opportunities to you, our fellow members, in the coming year. Some items we have coming up this year include social events, monthly forums, scholarship opportunities (with deadlines coming up soon), and the Regional Gathering (RG). I would encourage each of you to come out to our annual RG over Thanksgiving, the Phoenix Phiesta XXX – More Desert Delights. The RG chair this year is Mel Anderson and contact him if you’d like to contribute to the effort. In addition to having these events, we want to provide you opportunities to share your experiences, expertise, and passions with us. For us to provide these opportunities, we would really appreciate you telling us what you like to talk about, show, do/perform, listen to, or discuss.

            Our mission locally is to connect and energize Mensans by providing an engaging intellectual and social environment. If you want to increase your time with your peers and don’t have events nearby, we would love to help you set up local events. As shown in the dot plots in the November issue, we have members all over the state and another member might be a neighbor the next street over. From my observations, a majority of our events tend to take place in a geographically constricted area and while we want to keep those events, I would really relish the opportunity to help you connect with other members of your local community. Let me or Kebba Buckley Button know if you would like this and can meet up for lunch, dinner, or discussion even once a month. If we can set something up on a recurring basis, we can provide the community experience to local members and recent transplants for each area. I know from personal experience that moving to a new place is tough and finding somewhere to fit in makes all the difference.

            Finally, I would like to expand our membership through the coming years. If you know someone that might be interested and capable or even has prior evidence to qualify for Mensa, have them contact our testing chair, Russell Silverberg, or our membership chair, Paul Beaulieu. If you are a member that is involved in testing, working with the gifted, or know someone else who is, we would like to provide you the opportunity to share our information with future members. Hope to make it a great year and to quote Kanye West, “Work it harder, make it better, do it faster, makes us stronger... Our work here is never over.”

Greg Chandra
LocSec@phoenixmensa.org
480.254.5771

By the time the MAAM reaches you, we will be fast approaching the new year. I decided to reflect a little bit and look at the MAAMs from the previous year and change in honor of this and found a lot of positives alongside quite some turnover. I hope to have more of the positives and less of the turnovers. Our membership as of October is 969 and that is out of roughly 4 million Phoenicians. Let us get more involved in the community and reach others who would benefit from Mensa. I think we can go from the 14^th largest local group to the 6^th and we only need a 25% increase. The path towards this has to be both the quantity and the quality of activities.

                Another step towards this goal is that Disa McAlister has volunteered and been elected to the post of Gifted Youth Coordinator. She is looking for parents’ and youth’s input for events. Scholarship applications are open and students can submit them to Jennifer Hallden and the scholarship committee for consideration. She will be looking for volunteers to assist as well. We are also looking for people interested in being a proctor and the details on that role can be found on the website’s Member’s Only area under “How to become a proctor.” Finally, for volunteers, we have a marketing chair position open for someone looking to spend some time promoting the organization in local media.

                Another plan to increase our engagement with you is that we are looking for area coordinators for places like Prescott, the West Valley, and more. There are a few members in Yuma that may have never met each other and it would be great if we were able to get some activities started there. Any effort you can put in is more than we have now so please step up. Let Kebba Buckley Button or a member of ExCom know that you are interested.

                Finally, we discussed the creation of our own Logo at the November ExCom and decided to create a contest. We will take submissions from membership, followed by voting by our membership, and the winner will win two Regional Gathering (RG) entries. The deadline will be coming up soon so submit them as early as you can. The rules are published in this issue and will be up on the website. For entry details and official requirements, log into the National website, then under "LEAD", select "Logos", and there are details and a link to get the "Name and Logo Workbook." I look forward to seeing what you create.

Greg Chandra
LocSec@phoenixmensa.org
480.254.5771

I recently completed my first marathon and will have run another one by the time this is published. A few days after the race, I spoke with someone that had climbed Mt. McKinley and found that we shared a common experience. While mountain climbing and running marathons may seem unrelated, these are fundamentally tests of individual strength, willpower, and teamwork. Teamwork could strike people as unusual because while we can imagine mountaineers roped together, running is clearly an individual sport. I am one of those runners with uncommon sense who doesn’t train and chooses to test his willpower on the course so I am even more isolated than those who train.* During the race, I started friendships with several other first time marathoners and conversing with them made the miles go by quicker and somewhat easier. We saw several runners down during the course and each was surrounded by a group of four or five fellow runners helping them out. This is one of the fundamental things you learn about the sport, while finishing as fast as you can is the goal, helping others do the same makes it even more rewarding.

This very lesson is what I wanted to impart on my fellow Mensans. We are individually strong and while we can do great things alone, working together can help us accomplish even more and be rewarding to us as individuals. Over the month of September, we’ve had volunteers step up and help our organization do even more for you. I would like to thank Paul Beaulieu for stepping up as our new membership chair; David Pivin and Carla Tillman for bringing us into the current decade as webmasters; and all the current volunteers for keeping us going. If you would like to join us in this adventure, contact me or another member of ExCom and we’ll see how your strengths can help us and we can help you.

Finally, we have the results from the Bylaws election. If you wanted proof that your vote matters, it passed by a single vote. This means that the new bylaws are in effect and Article V, item 4, allows us to create provisions for remote attendance. If you are interested in participating or attending the monthly meeting but are not able to be there, let me know ahead of time and we can get something set up. Have a great November and I look forward to reading more of your contributions in the MAAM.

* The sentiment applies equally to those who train with others.

Greg Chandra
LocSec@phoenixmensa.org
480.254.5771

By the time you receive this issue, our Greater Phoenix Mensa bylaw election period will have closed and the 2012 federal election campaigns will be in full swing. While we will not know the results of the bylaws election until after this is published, the end of this election does not mean the end of your opportunity to get involved with our organization. I would personally like to thank everyone who decided to take an interest in these affairs and extend an invitation to all members to get a little more from your membership.

Your fellow Mensans are volunteering to bring you things from the MAAM to the events and everything in between. Have fun, be creative, meet interesting people, and jump on in. We have opportunities ranging from Webmaster to marketing and membership chairs and everything in between. Would you like to share an interest, story, or photo? Submit them to the editor. Feel like you don’t have much time to contribute? You can volunteer to proctor testing for Mensa or get involved in planning next year’s Regional Gathering. Have kids in Mensa? Help us provide engaging events for them as the Gifted Youth Coordinator. If you feel like you’d like to contribute but don’t see where you fit in, contact me or another member of the ExCom and we’ll work with you and your interests to see what we can do. More information on many of the positions is available on http://www.us.mensa.org/lead/handbooks.

Another item that has changed in this latest issue is that many of you received this Much Ado About Mensa electronically. With the paper copy, we can look for it if we misplaced it and with the electronic copy, we can do much the same (even if you happen to throw it away digitally). We can find the electronic copy after logging in through http://phoenix.us.mensa.org. I hope the new medium helps bridge the gap between the 15^th century and the 21^st century and connects more of our members.

In closing, I would like to encourage each person to get involved with your organization and enjoy the cooler weather that I hope we’re experiencing.

Greg Chandra
LocSec@phoenixmensa.org
480.254.5771

I am sure everyone greatly missed the LocSec column in the August issue of the MAAM. As a member of Mensa for less than 2 years, I am deeply honored to be elected LocSec of Greater Phoenix Mensa. I want to thank all of the outgoing volunteers, officers, and ExCom members for their service. I look forward to working with new and continuing volunteers during my term.

In my new role, I want to have more members get involved in the organization given the numerous opportunities that are available. I realize that the logistics of a city/region as large as Phoenix can prove challenging but with available tools and resources, need not be a hindrance. Special Interest Groups (SIGs) are perfect examples of this.

Jessica Burstrem has recently resigned her role as Gifted Youth Coordinator as she’s moving to Tucson and we thank her for her service. In addition to filling this role, GPM is looking for volunteers to take on roles as Webmaster, Assistance LocSec, and more. Bring your ideas and yourselves to the ExCom meeting and we’ll see what we can do to make each year better than the last.

You will also find voting on the bylaws update is set to close September 30th and we look forward to your participation.

Finally, my predecessor, Ben Boyle, was a better and more prolific writer than I so bear with me as I grow into the role. I look forward to guidance and information from all our membership.

Greg Chandra
LocSec@phoenixmensa.org
480.254.5771