Brief Summary of Minutes of Annual Meeting

Minutes
Southern Crops and Soils Department Heads
Aug. 11-12, 2008
North Carolina State

North Carolina State University served as host for the 2008 meetings and expression of appreciation for the meals, tours and local arrangements is hereby given to co-host David Smith and Michael Wagger.

2008 Attendees:

Michael Wagger, North Carolina State University Michael_wagger@ncsu.edu

David Smith, North Carolina State University wdavid_smith@ncsu.edu

David Baltensperger, Texas A&M University dbaltensperger@ag.tamu.edu

Jac J. Varco, Mississippi State University jvarco@pss.msstate.edu

David Weaver, Auburn University weavedb@auburn.edu

Jerry Bennett, University of Florida jmbt@ufl.edu

Michael Barrett, University of Kentucky mbarrett@uky.edu

Steven Hodges, Virginia Tech hodges@vt.edu

Freddie Martin, Louisiana State University fmartin@agcenter.lsu.edu

Meeting began at 4:00 pm with a tour of the NCSU sedimentation education center, waste water training, and turfgrass field lab. A meal was provided by the hosts with special support from their staff and Mrs. Smith--Thanks.

Following dinner Keith Oakley, Executive Director of Advancement, College of Agriculture and Life Sciences, NCSU lead a discussion of the role of Department Heads in fund raising. Meeting adjourned for the evening at 9:30 pm.

Tuesday morning began with introductions and discussion in Williams Hall.

Administrative comments presented in behalf of Clarence Watson included:

1. The need to elect officers
   
2. The need to select a location for next year
   
3. Appreciation for help with project reviews
   
4. Multi-state research award
   

Election of officers followed: David Baltensperger was elected chair for the next year and David Smith and Michael Wagger were elected co-chair/secretary elect for the next year.

Next meeting will be held at Mississippi State University with Jac Varco hosting. Dr. Bennet is in search of rotation of locations that was developed in the past, but collective memory was that Mississippi was skipped the previous year.

The SRAC-1 survey results were reviewed. Discussion included variation in how data was reported and based on this Dr. Smith is going to resend the survey for modifications and to request participation from a few states that had not provided information. This was highlighted as leading to some of the most valuable discussion of the meeting.

We highlighted discussion on faculty FTE, graduate student stipends versus total costs, salary issues as we compete for top scientist, various methods of reward evaluation for full professors, finances, operating budgets, start-ups, fundraising, and marketing. Student enrollment and recruitment were discussed with a particular need to replace field oriented professionals. We also discussed the various assortments of discipline to department assignments and naming concepts utilized to delineate departments and majors.

The meeting adjourned at noon.