First thing first - I guess what I naturally should do at the very beginning of a section like this is to list the members of the 1998-99 Society for Social Research steering committee. We have 5 members, all of us 2nd year students in the ph.D. program in the sociology department. Tradition holds that normally the steering committee is mainly to consist of the 2nd years, albeit assisted in a significant manner by the experienced past members of the committee. Which means that in not a very long time we've got to go and yield (happily?) our places to the following 2nd years after they have gone through the time-honored ordeal of the prelim. To facilitate that transition, we are hoping to develop this section eventually into a systematic itemization of all things we do to achieve our organizational purpose of enriching the social lives of sociology students and faculty. Here we are individually (in an alphabetical order).
Anne Bartlett
Jennifer Buntin
Kosuke Nikaido
Kimberly Raue
Kirby Schroeder
In addition, we have two associated members of Jane Fueyo and Heather MacIndoe. We are grateful for their thoughtful inputs of ideas, as well as help on various matters.
Right now, we are still thinking about what would be the best format in which to organize the systematic "Job Manual". At this point all I can give is a brief account of what some of the things we do as members of the steering committee are like.
1. Planning and Organizing aspect
Kirby Schroeder is the leader of this year's steering committee. Which means that the majority of planning tasks, especially those of the longer term, falls on his shoulder. His talent at overseeing and coordinating a number of multifaceted tasks is unusually remarkable and this year's committee is fortunate to have a person who is so dedicated in paying attention not only to tasks he does himself but also to those that must be done by other members. That said, we meet about once every week, or every two or three weeks when we are busy or can't make up the time. Usually one meeting takes an hour or so. One of us also attends the SSGSAC - Social Science Graduate Student Activity Committee is I think what it stands for but I may be wrong for one or two alphabets - meetings held in the 2nd, 5th and 9th weeks of every quarter. We do this because often we have to get the funding for social events we organize from this larger committee that encompasses the entire social science division.
2. Cocktail Hours
This must be one of the department's time honored tradition. It involves a bit of planning - we have to reserve an appropriate place, usually the Social Science Tea Room or the Albion Small Room. Usually this is handled by Kirby or Jennifer Buntin. Beyond that, organizing this just involves lots of leg work, odd tasks and some dirty jobs. Two or three of go for the shopping trip to get a whole bunch of beers, soft drinks, potato chips, salads, paper plates and plastic utensils, etc., a couple of hours before the cocktail hour. Then whoever can participate do all the physical labor of setting up tables and all that. One particularly good feature about this year's cocktail hours is that (or at least we believe so!) we have been able to improve the quality of our drinks considerably, as Kirby seems to have some professional knowledge of the magic of bartending. Needless to say, after the event is over there are one or two hours of clean-ups that await us. Finally, the funding for this is usually obtained from the SSGSAC - meaning that we have to get an approval for it by bringing the matter up in one of their meetings.
3. Brown Bags
Jennifer is mainly in charge of this task. Actually I'm not sure of all that she does, but I guess that it takes quite a bit of contacting and talking to a bunch of professors before a few of agree to be the speaker. Obviously, the place, usually the Small Room, for this occasion also needs to be reserved in advance, so that is another task. The good thing is that this year we have eliminated the need for the "brown bags", since we now serve free pizzas and sodas! Though the amount needed to compensate for this nicety is not large, nevertheless the funding for pizzas and sodas needs to be approved at a SSGSAC meeting ordinarily.
4. The Spring Institute
Needless to say, the organization of this largest departmental social event is one of the biggest task whoever happen to be in our organization must face year after year. There are several important jobs that need to be done if the event is to be successful. First is the organization of the banquet, and Anne Bartlett has accepted a brunt of this task this year. This is a job laden with some serious responsibility since it involves dealing with large sum of money (perhaps 2,000 dollars are needed to finance dinners and all that) and talking to outside caterers who come to prepare the dinner. Another important, and unfortunately quite difficult, task is finding the speaker. This year Kimberly Raue has accepted this challenge. You know that all those famous professors are busy, busy, busy - so thanks to all of Kim's efforts in writing letters, sending e-mails, sometimes making phone calls... She, along with Kirby, also handled the task of printing and conducting the student poll asking for your opinion in who should be the speaker? How did we arrive at the 15 or so candidates we had initially listed on the poll? It was mainly random brainstorming, actually. Next, we can't overlook the task of organizing the student presentation session. Jennifer is doing this this year. For this, obviously, your enthusiastic participation in submitting papers can ease our task greatly! Finally, this year we found out that the task of finding a place for the banquet could be quite an ordeal. Popular places like Ida Noyes, well, ideally they should be booked as early as one year in advance.
5. The Web Page
Finally, a word about myself. Besides contributing some leg works and odd jobs as much as I can, the upgrading of this web page has been my most significant participation so far. I have to admit that being an only foreign student in the committee, this job of dealing with the inanimate things from my home computer appeared as most comfortable considering my sometimes shaky confidence in social communication in English. Nevertheless, I just wanted to do whatever that I could. Personally I am a bit concerned as well as disappointed that there is an inevitable tendency that the great majority of foreign students tend to be "invisible" in official social events of the department. Here, I like to end by encouraging that foreign students can be involved in all of those things that we at the SSR do.
- Kosuke Nikaido