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       Meeting Minutes

INTERNATIONAL COMMISSION ON ACOUSTICS

Minutes of the Meeting


held in Antwerpen - 1996 March 31

1. Opening

Present were:
A Alippi, Secretary
P Bury
L A Crum
G A Daigle
T Kihlman, Chairman
A Krokstad
G Quentin
G Rasmussen, Vice-Chairman
C G Rice
G M Sessler

Apologies were received by S E Crandal, S Namba and R Zhang. There was also present W Heinicke, IUPAP Secretary General, specifically invited to follow point 6 of the Agenda, and A Dancer, to report on the European Acoustics Association, in place of J Blauert, who is contemporarily busy with the organization of Forum Acusticum Conference.

After a short introduction of the Commission Members, the Commission approves the proposal of the Chairman to change the Agenda, according to the following:

  1. Opening and presentation
    1,5 Approval of the Agenda with modifications
    • Chairman's report, point 1,6
    • Discussion of the IIAV matter, point 10
    • other matters, point 12,5
    1,6 Chairman's report
    1. Meeting calendar
  2. Minutes of the C7 meeting held in Tronheim, June 25 and 30, 1995
  3. Financial report and travel expenses
  4. ICA 15th, Trondheim 1995. Final report
  5. ICA 16th, Seattle
  6. New ICA: Statutes, shares, codes and rules of practice, procedures with IUPAP
  7. IUPAP General Assembly, Uppsala, September 18-21, 1996
  8. ICA home page
  9. ICA 17th, Rome 2001. Report
  10. IIAV
  11. Other reports
    1. Standards (Rasmussen)
    2. Eurospeech (Blauert)
    3. European Acoustics Association (Blauert)
  12. Next meeting
  13. Close of the meeting

1.6 Chairman report

a. Meeting calendar

The Chairman reports that meeting calendar will be publised in JASA (Editor, W G Mayer), according to what has been approved at the last meeting in Trondheim, as a joint service between ICA and JASA. No logo so far has been chosen, though it is desirable to find one soon.

2. Minutes of the C7 meeting held in Trondheim, June 25 and 30, 1995

Following Krokstad's proposal, the following statements is added under point 5. The Commission Role, just before the last sentence:
"The Commission agrees on the need of establishing a permanent Secretariat, which is foreseen as a prerequisite for the Commission to work regularly and thoroughly in its new role of coodination of the international acoustical activities."

3. Financial report and travel expenses

Alippi reports that IUPAP has just very lately transferred the amount of SF 2500 on the Italian ICA account, corresponding to Italian Liras 2,570,000. Then, he proceeds to the distribution of Lit 200,000 to Members from Europe and of Lit 300,000 to Members from overseas. It is also generally agreed that ICA residual money will be used for the payment of the Commission meal today.

4. ICA 15th, Trondheim 1995. Final report

A Krokstad gives the final report on ICA 15th, held in Trondheim June 26-30, 1995, and here attached as Appendix. It is divided into several sections, concerning: Initiative and application, Financial situation, Initial preparation, Budget, Local organization, Announcements, Time table, Abstract and manuscripts, Program structure, Proceedings, Exhibition, Participation, Scientific program, The congress, Presentations, Meetings, Economics, Responses, What to learn.

  • The core of participants from USA, Europe and Japan should be increased in the future;
  • Reasons for deficit mainly depends upon no-show participants; therefore, attention should be paid in the future to overcome this point;
  • Student participation should be stimulated, through the abatement of congress fee, obtainable by avoiding the distribution of Proceedings;
  • Credit card system should be widely used in the future, in order to avoid constly bank provisions.
At the end of the discussion, the Commission expresses unanimously its appreciation and thanks to Dr Krokstad for the information provided and the connected work.

5. ICA 16th, Seattle 1998. Report and discussion

L Crum presents the on progress report on the Seattle Congress, which is attached in the Appendix. Main points regard:

  • Nearly 15,000 First announcements brochures have been distributed;
  • A preliminary budget for ICA, according to the Commission new Statute to be approved;
  • Preliminary event program and deadlines have been prepared.

6. New ICA: Statutes, shares, codes and rules of practice, procedure with IUPAP

The Chairman recalls the main points of past discussions that convinced the Commission to establish a new Statute, that sets the Commission as an affiliated Commission to IUPAP. At the Commission 1994 annual meeting in Trondheim, the representation, mission and reorganization have been discussed, resulting into a number of comments and proposals, finally into a Statute draft, that was sent to the Commission Members on February 20th 1996. Reactions were received from several Members, and were mainly positive. On the basis of the first draft and of the comments, a final version has been prepared by the Chairman, and is now carefully discussed.

Prior to reading, general comments were made concerning:

  • Changing the Commission organization and status is welcome, as long as it does not affect its adhesion to IUPAP (Alippi);
  • Affiliation to IUPAP is not a problem; in case of separation, IUPAP will continue having its own Commission on Acoustics (Heinicke);
  • The reason for changing is mainly due to better representing the national societies (Quentin);
  • Connection with other international bodies, mainly engineering bodies, should be left open for the future (Sessler), though presently no general engineering organization have a framework to work in (Rice).
The Statutes, then, are approved in the form reported in the Appendix. It is generally understood that Guidelines will be approved by the first Assembly of the Commission at the Seattle neeting in 1998.

As it concerns the actual procedure, the Chairman will invite all the national acoustical societies to join the Commission before the Seattle meeting, where the Board will be elected, that a Nominating Committee will have prepared on consideration of regional representation and on the basis of the actual composition of the Commission participation (North America 2 members, and i each for China, France, Germany, Japan, Italy, Russia and UK).

7. IUPAP General Assembly, Uppsala, September 18-21, 1996

As a consequence of the resolution approved under previous point 6. New ICA: Statutes, shares, codes and rules of practice, procedures with IUPAP, the Commission proposes that at the Uppsala meeting, IUPAP General Assembly will leave the actual composition of the Commission unaltered up to the Seattle meeting of the new Commission, with L Crum, who will become an ordinary Member.

8. ICA home page

G Daigle has prepared a draft of a home page about the International Commission on Acoustics, that is now on internet available under the following address:

http://nrcphy1.nrc.phy.ca/daigle/icahome.htm

The home page available is reported in the Appendix

9. ICA 17th, Rome 2001. Report

Alippi refers to the report presented at the Trondheim 1995 meeting for the general features of the Rome Congress, and states that the dates of the meeting could well be set at the beginning of September 2001, presumably 02-07/09/2001, instead of August, when temperatures are milder in Rome.

10. IIAV

The Chairman had taken a number of actions last autumn which were approved by the Commission. The Chairman further reports about the follwoing: IIAV will have a meeting in St Petersburg this summer which interferes with Internoise in Liverpool. In a letter to the Institute of Acoustics in England, Sir Lighthill, President of IIAV, has assured that such collisions would nver happen again. Nevertheless, IIAV has now proposed a congress on sound and vibration in Adelaide, Australia, the week before Internoise 98 in New Zealand. That is again in direct conflict with Internoise. A letter has recently been sent from International INCE to Sir Lighthill expressing the organization's serious concern.

The Chairman points, then, the necessity to strengthen the mechanical engineering activities in future congresses and the Commission consequently approves that in the ICA congress in Seattle these activities will be treated withe the congress program. A satellite conference must not occur. The congress organization should not cooperate with IIAV in this matter.

11. Other reports

  1. Standards (Rasmussen)
  2. Eurospeech (Blauert)
  3. European Acoustics Association (Blauert)
Because of the shortage of time, reports on this point are left to the next meeting.

12. Next meeting

The next meeting could be hel in connection either in Budapest in connection with INCE 1997 at the end of August, or in Tokyo, in connection with the 2nd World Congress on Ultrasonics, August 24-27, or in San Diego in connection with the ASA meeting in autumn 97. Decision will be taken by mail.

13. Close of the meeting

The meeting closes at 5:30 pm.

The Secretary

(A Alippi)

The President

(T Kihlman)