Recent Updates and News

March 2007

A GREAT SUCCESS!

The Executive and Members wish to acknowledge the tremendous work of Tom Lazzara and An Ngo on the Pizza Student Reception for the Dr. Reghan Hill following his talk.
We were all apprehensive about this first for the McGill-Montreal Chapter! It was inspired by the success of our Christmas Evening Reception. However, we were all delighted by the turnout of the students. About 20 people joined the speaker for some pizza. The speaker stayed and for half an hour. The students continued talking in good Sigma Xi tradition for much longer!
We saw more young people this time than at any other talk. The reason for this be was obviously the free food!
The pizza invitation was only directed to members, and the turnout would have been even better if more people were contacted. Tom and An asked people whether they were interested in becoming members. 95% of the time, the answer was: what do I get by being a member?
Tom and An believe that if we want to keep the Chapter active and alive we must address this question. If we ask people to pay $50, the McGill-Montreal Chapter must have a clear and convincing answer to the question: We need to develop a McGill-Montreal Chapter Membership package to sell our ideas and dreams.
Tom and An for this month's lecture also tried Targeted Publicity, where other organizations were contacted in addition to Sigma Xi members. These were selected according to the topic of Hill's talk:
1) CSACS (the Centre for Self-Assembled Structures),
2) RQMP (Regroupement Quebecois de Materiaux de Pointe),
3) Science Undergraduate Society,
4) Engineering Undergraduate Society,
5) McGill Chapter of the National Society for Black Engineers,
6) Engineers Without Borders.
As usual the Chemistry Graduate and Undergraduate Students were emailed. We
all need special thanks to Prof. Yelon for helping the talk get onto the
RQMP schedule!