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Minutes of the October 10, 2001 FRSA Business Meeting
Submitted by Mike Bricker, FRSA Secretary, USDA-REE-ARS, National Center for Genetic Resources Preservation (NCGRP), Fort Collins, Colorado

Note of Clarification:  You will notice a facility name change for Mike Bricker, FRSA Secretary.  The National Seed Storage Laboratory officially received a name change in early October 2001 to the National Center for Genetic Resources Preservation (NCGRP).  New mailing address for Cheryl Johnson, FRSA President; Mike Bricker, FRSA Secretary; Patricia Conine, FRSA Treasurer; and Annette Miller, FRSA web site Administrator will be:
       USDA-REE-ARS-NCGRP
       1111 So. Mason Street
       Fort Collins, CO  80521-4500

The October 10, 2001 FRSA Business Meeting was held at STA Laboratories, Longmont, Colorado.  Barbara Atkins and Mary Loring were the meeting’s hosts.

Members and Guests present were Barbara Atkins, Carri-Ann Bard, Mike Bricker, Pat Conine, Brigette Fishburn, Cheryl Johnson, Tim Loeffler, Mary Loring, and Laurie Thoma.  One guest was present, Mr. Nahm-Su Kim.  Mr. Kim is a visiting scientist from South Korea, who is training at the NCGRP in Fort Collins.

In September, Billie Jean Lundberg resigned the position of FRSA President when she accepted a position with the Wyoming Department of Transportation, leaving her duties at the National Seed Storage Laboratory.   At the October meeting, Mike Bricker, FRSA Secretary, presided at the meeting, and a new FRSA President was elected by the members present at the meeting.  Cheryl Johnson, at NCGRP, was elected to complete the present term as FRSA President for 2002.  An election of 2-year term FRSA Officers will be held at the October 2002 business meeting.

The FRSA business meeting was called to order at 1:09 PM by Mike Bricker, Secretary in the absence of the President.  Since the July 13, 2001 FRSA Seed Analysts Forum and Business Meeting Minutes had not been downloaded to the FRSA web site prior to the October 10th meeting, hardcopies of those minutes were made available at the meeting and time allowed for members to read the minutes prior to request for approval.  The minutes of the July 13, 2001 FRSA Seed Analysts Forum and Business Meeting were approved as presented.  These minutes are available on the FRSA web site at www.frsa.org under the scheduled meeting date for the Seed Analysts Forum and Meeting.

The Treasurer’s report was presented by Patricia Conine.  The report was found to be in good standing.

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Annette Miller, the FRSA web site Administrator, reported on updates made to the FRSA web site.  Annette has loaded the “Study Guide to Seeds of Colorado” a publication by Dr. Arnold Larsen with illustrations by Donald C. Menne.  This study guide is an
excellent reference for range grass species, as well as numerous crop species.  Annette and Laurie Thoma used the FRSA web site to set up the referee on “detectable
endosperm in grass species”, which was later loaded onto the AOSA web site for referee distribution.  Annette still has one year of the FRSA Seed Forum newsletters to download.  A tutorial for Appendix 4 “Determination of Weight of Working Samples for Kinds Not Listed in Table 1”of the AOSA Rules for Testing Seeds has been loaded (hardcopies of the tutorial were made available at the July 2001 Seed Analysts Forum).  And, a link to www.Invaders.com web site dealing with weed species data has been loaded.  Take a few minutes and check out these new additions to www.frsa.org .

Tim Leoffler announced the dates for the Distance Education 2002 Seed Analysts course’s workshops.  The Purity workshop will be the week of July 15th, and the Germination workshop will be the week of July 22nd.

Annette and Laurie Thoma provided an Outreach Committee Report.  CSU has a mobile investigations program which visits Colorado high schools.  The program allows students to pick a project, work the project by a selected group of students, than the students report on the project to the student body or appropriate classes.   FRSA will develop a seed analysis awareness program consisting of handouts and an attached seed sample of the species for each handout.  The Outreach Committee has set a target date of July 2002 for completion of the project for review at the 2002 Seed Analysts Forum.

Mike Bricker presented a draft of the SCST Continuing Education Points Form for final approval by the membership.  A few refinements were requested and a final draft was approved.  On October 11, 2001, Mike Bricker mailed the revised Form to Barbara Akins, SCST Membership Committee Chair, to forward onto SCST for review and, hopefully, acceptance as a standardized form for requesting SCST Continuing Education Points.  Barbara Atkins reported that SCST has hired Anita Hall of Cornell University as Executive Director of SCST.  Ms. Hall’s duties will include coordination of SCST memberships, Continuing Education documentation, and updating the SCST web site.  Barbara will forward the SCST Continuing Education Points Form to Ms. Hall for review.

Tim Loeffler reported on the Distance Education Seed Analysts courses, indicating there are four courses now available on the Internet.  These courses are available through Colorado State University’s Distance Education and are semester based with completion of course during that semester.  Present work involves creating on-line quizzes for the four courses and development of a Crop and Weed Seed web site.  The overall project has become so time consuming, the Development Committee is considering hiring a site administrator to oversee the existing web site and assist with future development. 

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The Committee is presently looking at ways to fund the hiring.  Possibilities for funding are Seed Trade contributions, grants, and/or on-line advertising of a number of the courses’ publications.

New Business
The members present at the meeting elected Cheryl Johnson to complete the term for FRSA President vacated with Billie Lundberg’s resignation.  FRSA wishes to thank Billie for her dedication toward the position of President and her past involvement with the organization.  Our best wishes go to Billie in her new endeavors. 

There have been some other active membership changes in the last two quarters of 2001.  Stacy Bieberdorf left employment at the National Seed Storage Laboratory (NCGRP) in July taking a position as a seed analysts with the Idaho State Seed Laboratory in Boise.  Laurie Thoma was hired full time by NCGRP, making the move from the Colorado State Seed Laboratory.  And, Mike Dideriksen joined NCGRP in December, leaving Syngenta (Hilleshog) in Longmont, Colorado.

Selection of 2002 FRSA meeting dates and locations are:
   Wednesday, January 9, 2002 at Seedex, Longmont, Colorado at 1:00 PM MST
   Wednesday, April 10, 2002 at Syngenta (Hilleshog), Longmont, Colorado at 1:00
     PM MDT
Friday, July 19, 2002 at NCGRP, Fort Collins, Colorado beginning at 9:00 AM
     MDT with the 2002 Seed Analysts Forum
Wednesday, October 9, 2002 at STA Laboratories, Longmont, Colorado at 1:00
     PM MDT

Laurie Thoma announced the referee on “detectable endosperm of grass species” will be distributed to all interested parties through the AOSA web site www.aosaseed.com .  The referee was expanded from wheatgrass species to include additional species of fescue and ryegrass.

There being no additional business, the meeting adjourned at 3:30 PM

The next FRSA meeting will be Wednesday, January 9, 2002 at Seedex, 1350 Kansas Avenue, Longmont, Colorado.  Host will be Brigette Fishburn.  The meeting will begin at 1:00 PM MST.  For additional information please contact Brigette at (303)678-7333 x111 or by e-mail at bfishburn@seedexseed.com .


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