Membership Levels Down for 2003

IEEE ends the year down 21,345 members, a decline of 5.6% from the previous year. While this does represent a slight improvement from the -5.8% drop reported in November, it is also the first year since 1996 that we have had an annual decline in our membership.

It should be noted, however, that a good portion of this loss had been anticipated. Over one-quarter of the decline is the result of a change in process that required Life members to return a renewal profile in order to keep their membership active. At the end of the year, 5,670 Life members had not returned their profile, and these members have been removed from our membership statistics. This process change will continue for 2004 and beyond, although it is not expected that the results will be as dramatic as they were this year. In addition to Life members, an additional 40% of the membership decline came from Students – particularly those in R9 and R10. While this is of course disappointing, it was not an entirely unexpected result from the 2003 increase in Student dues rates. In fact, some early projections were for Student losses as high as 20%, whereas the actual decline ended up at 11.7%.

Factoring out the above two issues (Life members and Students) would put our remaining Higher Grade membership loss at approximately 1.9% for 2003. We believe this is likely the result of weak global economic conditions, such as high unemployment rates in the U.S. and the economic turmoil in several R9 countries. Our records show that we had an increase this year of 2,705 members who are taking advantage of our dues discount for unemployed members. We expect it is probable that many more unemployed members simply did not renew at all. It is anticipated that we will see many of them return as economic conditions hopefully improve.

If we exclude the two new Societies, Neural Networks and Product Safety Engineering, we find that memberships in our “existing” Societies declined at a rate of 8.7% in 2003 - a loss of nearly 35,000 memberships. Just two of our Societies ended the year on the positive side (Social Implications of Technology at +11.8%, and Magnetics at a modest +0.4%). Please keep in mind, however, that these statistics are also being affected by process changes implemented for Life members. At year-end, 62.2% of our Higher Grade members belonged to at least one Society. This compares to 63.3% of HG members at the end of 2002. The percentage of students who belong to a Society also declined, from 41.7% last year to 38.4% this year.

Election of Prof. Adam Skorek to the grade of Fellow of the EIC

Prof. Adam Skorek is an IEEE Senior Member, current Chair of the IEEE St. Maurice Section, Professor and Head of the Electrical and Computer Engineering Department of the Université du Québec à Trois-Rivières (UQTR). Prof. Adam Skorek has been elected to the grade of Fellow of the Engineering Institute of Canada.

Here are some relevant links on this great news:

Engineering Institute of Canada, Fellows page:
http://www.eic-ici.ca/english/tour/fellows.html

Announcement (in French), Electrical and Computer Engineering Dept. of UQTR:
http://www.genieelectrique.ca/ (then you click on "Fellow de l'Institut canadien des ingénieurs")

Other announcement (in French), UQTR:
http://entete.uqtr.ca/description.php?no_fiche=3317&section_cat=1&section_sommaire=oui

New UCE/Spam Filtering Service

The IEEE Email Alias Service now includes a new optional feature to help IEEE members manage the amount of unsolicited commercial email (UCE), or spam, that they receive. The service is offered free-of-charge to all active IEEE members with an IEEE email alias. Members who elect to take advantage of this new service will have the option of either tagging or completely blocking suspected unsolicited commercial email.

Choosing the tagging option allows the recipient to still receive all messages, but a prefix “***[Possible UCE]***” will be appended to the subject line of any suspect message for easy
identification. Recipients can then use filters or rules that are normally available in email software to either automatically delete these messages or have them routed to a special folder for later review.

Selecting the blocking option will automatically stop these messages from being delivered at all. If you choose this option, the sender will receive a bounced mail message indicating that the recipient did not receive the intended email.

Whether you use the blocking or tagging option, users will have the ability to set the filtering strength to low, medium, or aggressive. The more aggressive the setting, the greater the likelihood that most spam will be filtered – however, it also increases the possibility that legitimate email traffic will be filtered as well.

This is an optional service, and all active IEEE members with an email alias are eligible to use it. You can signup at the following URL: https://uce.ieee.org.

The following members were upgraded to Senior Member status at the February  2003 Admission and Advancement Panel meetings in Savannah, GA:

• Philip A. Zinck - Canadian Atlantic
• Hamid Sheikhzadeh Nadjar - Kitchener-Waterloo
• Sudhir Mudur - Montreal
• Pierre Couture - Montreal
• Jody N. Defazio - Ottawa
• Xavier Fernando - Toronto
• Ramesh Senthinathan - Toronto
• John F. Christie - Toronto
• Zbigniew Noworolski - Toronto
• Liang Chen - Vancouver

For more information on the Nominate a Senior Member Initiative (NSI) Program, please visit http://www.ieee.org/ra/md/smprogram.html.

Montreal

• International Conference on Educational Multimedia

15-17 March 2004
Quebec City, Québec
For more information, please visit http://www.rima2004.org/

• Seminar on Modern Power System Protective Relaying

22-23 March 2004
Hotel Ramada Aerport Montreal
Montréal, Québec
For more information, please contact Julia Davison at EPIC Educational Programs Innovations Centre 888-374-2338 ext.222; fax 800-866-6343, by e-mail at register@epic-edu.com or register on-line at http://www.epic-edu.com/

• Insulated Conductors Committee Spring Meeting (PES-ICC 2004)

1-5 May 2004
Marriott Chateau Champlain
Montréal, Québec
For more information, please visit http://www.ewh.ieee.org/soc/pes/icc/meetings/spring_2004/spring_2004.htm

• International Conference on Acoustics, Speech and Signal Processing (ICASSP 2004)

17-21 May 2004
Fairmont Queen Elizabeth Hotel,
Montréal, Québec
For more information, please visit http://www.icassp2004.com/

• International Workshop on Quality of Service (IWQoS)

7 June 2004
Montréal, Québec
For more information, please visit http://iqua.ece.toronto.edu/iwqos04/

• Northeast Workshop on Circuits and Systems (NEWCAS 2004)

20-23 June, 2004
Montréal, Québec
For more information, please visit http://www.newcas.org

• International Ultrasonics, Ferroelectrics, and Frequency Control 50th Anniversary Joint Conference (UFFC 2004)

23-27 August 2004
Montréal, Québec
For more information, please visit http://www.ieee-uffc.org/fcmain.asp?page=2004fc

Ottawa

• LEOS Seminar: Temperature sensitivity in photonics

8 March 2004
CRC Auditorium,
3701 Carling Ave.,
Ottawa, Ontario
For more information please visit http://ottawa.ieee.ca/news/Thermal.pdf

• Quantum Well and Quantum Dot Intermixing for Optoelectronic Device Integration

17 March 2004
M-50 Auditorium, NRC,
Ottawa, Ontario
For more information please visit http://ottawa.ieee.ca/news/Jagadish.pdf

• Decoupling and the role of Symmetry in PCB Layout

24 March 2004
FIDUS Systems Inc
Ottawa, Ontario
For more information, please contact Syed Bokhari at Syed.Bokhari@fidus.ca
An IEEE Distinguished lecturer Presentation

• The Emerging Trends in Next Generation Services and Applications

16 April 2004
Ottawa, Ontario
For more information please visit http://www.opra.ca/event_feb2004.html

• Photonics North

27-29 September 2004
Ottawa Congress Centre
Ottawa, Ontario
For more information please visit http://spie.org/conferences/calls/04/pn/

Toronto

• Order and Chaos in Atomically Assembled Photonic Crystals

10 March 2004
University of Toronto
Toronto, Ontario
For more information, please visit http://toronto.ieee.ca/events/mar1004.htm
An IEEE Toronto Circuits and Devices Chapter presentation

• Engineering Applications of Adaptive Neuro-Fuzzy Networks

10 March 2004
Ryerson University
Toronto, Ontario
For more information, please visit http://toronto.ieee.ca/events/mar10204.htm
An IEEE Toronto Neural Networks Chapter presentation

• Quantum Well and Quantum Dot Intermixing for Optoelectronic Device Integration

16 March 2004
University of Toronto
Toronto, Ontario
For more information, please visit http://toronto.ieee.ca/events/mar1604.htm
An IEEE Toronto Circuits and Devices Chapter presentation

• An Introduction to Intellectual Property Protection

17 March 2004
University of Toronto
Toronto, Ontario
For more information, please visit http://toronto.ieee.ca/events/mar1704.htm
An IEEE Toronto Communications Chapter presentation

• Transmitters for Wireless Communication

23 March 2004
University of Toronto
Toronto, Ontario
For more information, please visit http://toronto.ieee.ca/events/mar2304.htm
An IEEE Electromagnetics and Radiation Joint Chapter presentation

• IEEE Toronto Women in Engineering - First General Interest Meeting

2 April 2004
University of Toronto
Toronto, Ontario
For more information, please visit http://toronto.ieee.ca/events/apr0204.htm

• Using the Internet to Access IEEE Services

20 April 2004
Galbraith Building, Room 150,
University of Toronto
Toronto, Ontario
For more information, please visit http://toronto.ieee.ca/events/apr2004.htm
Please confirm your attendance with Wallas Khella at wkhella@ieee.org or 905-279-2976

• International Symposium on Multiple-Valued Logic (ISMVL 2004)

19-22 May 2004
University of Toronto
Toronto, Ontario
For more information, please visit http://www.eecg.toronto.edu/~ismvl2004/

• Real-Time and Embedded Technology and Applications Symposium (RTAS 2004)

25-28 May, 2004
Le Royal Meridien, King Edward,
Toronto, Ontario
For more information, please visit http://www.cs.virginia.edu/rtas04/

Vancouver

• Field Programmable Gate Arrays in 2004 and Beyond

18 March 2004
Richmond, British Columbia
For more information please visit http://ewh.ieee.org/reg/7/vancouver/grs/Pages/upcomingEvents.htm
An IEEE Vancouver Aerospace, Geoscience and Remote Sensing Chapter presentation

• Synthetic Aperture Radar: Theory and Signal Processing

21 April 2004
Richmond, British Columbia
For more information please visit http://ewh.ieee.org/reg/7/vancouver/grs/Pages/upcomingEvents.htm
An IEEE Vancouver Aerospace, Geoscience and Remote Sensing Chapter presentation

• Advanced Process Control Applications for Industry Workshop (APC 2004)

26-28 April 2004
Vancouver, BC
For more information please visit http://www.ieee-ias.org/apc2004/index.html

• IEEE International Symposium on Circuits and Systems (ISCAS 2004)

23-26 May 2004
Sheraton Vancouver Wall Centre Hotel
Vancouver, BC
For more information please visit http://www.iscas2004.org

Rest of Canada

• Seminar on Environmental Site Assessment and Remediation

4-5 March 2004
Hotel Saskatchewan Radisson Plaza
Regina, SK
For more information, please contact Julia Davison at EPIC Educational Programs Innovations Centre 888-374-2338 ext.222; fax 800-866-6343, by e-mail at register@epic-edu.com or register on-line at http://www.epic-edu.com

• Precision Data Acquisition Application Seminar

9 March 2004
Coquitlam, British Columbia
For more information please visit http://ewh.ieee.org/reg/7/vancouver/powerelec/
An IEEE Vancouver Power Electronics Chapter presentation

• Trends in Power Electronics in Japan

12 March 2004
University of Waterloo
Waterloo, Ontario
For more information please visit http://ece.uwaterloo.ca/~ieee_kw/Present/Seminars/04Sem_mar12.pdf

• Canadian Conference of Electrical and Computer Engineering

2-5 May 2004
Sheraton Fallsview
Niagara Falls, Ontario
For more information please visit http://www.ieee.ca/ccece04

• Distributed Resources Workshop

10-11 May 2004
Fairmont Palliser Hotel
Calgary, Alberta
For more information please visit http://www.ceatech.ca/workshops/upcoming.html

• Communication Networks and Services Research (CNSR 2004)

19-21 May 2004
Fredericton, New Brunswick
For more information, please visit http://www.cnsr.info/Events/CNSR2004/events.php

• Large Engineering Systems Conference on Power Engineering

28-31 July 2004
The Delta Halifax Hotel
1990 Barrington Street
Halifax, Nova Scotia
For more information please visit http://is.dal.ca/~lescope/

US

• Nanotechnology Conference and Trade Show

7-11 March 2004
Boston, Massachussets
For more information please visit http://www.nanotech2004.com/

• IEEE Wireless Communications and Networking Conference

21-25 March 2004
Atlanta, Georgia
For more information please visit http://www.comsoc.org/confs/wcnc/2004

• IEEE International Conference on Data Engineering (ICDE)

30 March - 2 Apr 2004
Boston, Massachusetts
For more information please visit http://www.cse.uconn.edu/icde04/

• IEEE Radio and Wireless Conference (RAWCON 2004)

19-22 September 2004
Atlanta, Georgia
For more information please visit http://rawcon.org/

• Digital Avionics Systems Conference (DASC)

24-28 October 2004
Salt Lake City, Utah
For more information please visit http://www.dasconline.org

International

• International Conference on Computer Communication (INFOCOM 2004)

7-11 March 2004
Hong Kong
For more information please visit http://www.ieee-infocom.org/2004/

• Managing Next Generation Convergence Networks and Services

19-23 April 2004
Seoul, Korea
For more information please visit http://www.noms2004.org/

• IEEE Power Electronics Specialists Conference (PESC)

20-26 June 2004
Aachen, Germany
For more information please visit http://www.pesc04.org/

• European Signal Processing Conference (EUSIPCO-2004)

7-10 September 2004
Vienna, Austria
For more information please visit http://www.nt.tuwien.ac.at/eusipco2004

Many IEEE Canada sections maintain their own listings of upcoming events:

Canadian Atlantic Kitchener-Waterloo Montreal Newfoundland and Labrador New Brunswick Northern Canada

Ottawa Southern Alberta Toronto Vancouver Winnipeg

For more IEEE conferences, visit IEEE Conference Search at http://www.ieee.org/conferencesearch/.

You can send any submissions by email to the editor:
Abhi Gupta at newsletter@ieee.ca

Please ensure you send in your submission by the 20^th of the month