Approval of the Agenda

• Approved: Agenda - Bob Shulstad/Orlando McMeans
  

Approval of ESCOP Minutes of February 22, 2010

• Approved: Minutes - Mark McLellan/Orlando McMeans
  

Interim Actions of the Chair - Clarence Watson

• Appointment of Dr. Ed Smith as the ECOP liaison to ESCOP
• Appointment of Dr. Nancy Cox to the Communication & Marketing Committee as a SAAESD delegate
• Appointment of Dr. Stephen Herbert to the Communication & Marketing Committee as a NERA delegate
• Appointment of Dr. Michael Hoffmann to the Communication & Marketing Committee as a NERA delegate
• Appointment of Dr. Jonathan Pote to the Science & Technology Committee as a SAAESD delegate
• Appointment of Dr. Marshall Martin as the ESCOP liaison to ECOP
• AFRI comment letter sent to Roger Beachy on May 18th
  • Response received on July 8
• Meeting with Roger Beachy on June 22
  • Follow-up letter

• Approved: Interim Actions

In meeting discussion:

Beachy meeting

• Most plant science funding may move from NSF to AFRI
  • If that happens without the funds it would be devastating
    

Full indirect cost issue

• Roger wants to increase AFRI indirect to full rate and Policy Board of Directors supports it
• Concern is that Congress sees capacity lines as a type of indirect
• Appointed small working group develop ESCOP position on this issue
  • Mike Harrington
  • Hunt Shipman
  • Mark McLellan
  • Steve Pueppke
  • Stave Slack
  • Bob Shulstad
• It would be helpful to know how much indirect comes back to each AES director
  

BAA-PBD Report - Nancy Cox/Eric Young

• The BAA Policy Board of Directors will meet on Tuesday, July 20 prior to the Joint COP's meeting. A brief report will be given on items discussed at the meeting.

Action Requested:  None, information only.

In meeting discussion:

• Nancy is representing Policy Board of Directors or N-CFAR
• FSLI/LEAD21 are both operating on the edge
• The two groups will discuss forming a common oversight board and financial management
  

Advocacy Report - Cornerstone

In meeting discussion:

• Senate full committee and House subcommittee have done mark-ups
• House is generally higher than Senate
  

Budget and Legislative Committee - Mike Vayda/Mike Harrington

In meeting discussion:

• Farm Bill survey has been completed and results will be compiled and sent to the CLP
• BAC has recommended that the number of high priority lines be reduced even further
  
• Also is recommending that as earmarks are reduced they be captured in capacity
  
• AFRI is going to be increased no matter what so shouldn't have Conerstone spend Lobbing effort on this
  
• Indirect cost rate increase
  
  • Some Congressional members think capacity funds cover indirect, but that's not clear
    
  • Probably could raise the rate to 30% pretty easily
    
• IPM Centers are not in '11 budget, if they are not funded, should the regional associations pick up that cost?
  
• It would have to be research & extension support
  

Communications and Marketing Committee - Jerry Arkin/Arlen Leholm/John Scofield

• Presentation PowerPoint 

In meeting discussion:

• Met this morning at breakfast
• Podesta has developed PowerPoint for ESS meeting that presents some metrics on marketing effort
• Op-ed placements are going very well and more op-ed pieces are in development, ~10 different articles now
• On target with ~12 placements per year
• Partnering with N-CFAR will write op-ed articles for this effort
  • Chair & Vice Chair of N-CFAR will write op-ed articles for this effort
• Op-eds will be put on the Cornerstone website at LandGrant.org
• Current 3-year funding ends April, 2011 

Science and Technology Committee and Science Roadmap - Bill Ravlin/Dan Rossi

In meeting discussion:

• Final versions of four sections received, other 3 in post-review revision
• A professional editor will be employed to do overall editing 
• Editor at UC-Davis est. $4,900 to edit whole document
• May also have an overall review by a few folks for total content and relevance

2010 SAES/ARD Workshop Program - Orlando McMeans/Carolyn Brooks

Since the last report of the ARD, the Association held its spring meeting on April 11 – 13, 2010 in Las Vegas, Nevada.  Members from the Association of Extension Administrators were also in attendance and reports from given from these colleagues accordingly.    Drs. Dan Kugler and P.S. Benepal gave the NIFA presentations and DR. Lorenzo Esters gave the presentation in his role as APLU staff for the Council of 1890 Universities.

The 2005 – 2010 Strategic Plan for the ARD was adopted with revisions offered that included attention to the national research priority areas of NIFA and the Scientific Road Map being developed by the Experiment Station Section (ESS) of the Board on Agriculture Assembly (BAA), as well as the economic, demographic and environmental impacts currently facing the individual campuses as they stay true to the 1890 land grant mission. The ARD Constitution and Bylaws were ratified as well.  A number of reports were presented by the membership, including requests for recommendations for the 2012 Farm Bill.   

The ARD is conscientiously planning to host the annual ESS/SAES/ARD Meeting and Workshop in Nashville, TN which will be held from September 27 – 30. 2010.  The ARD is the hosting region for this annual conference of State Agricultural Experiment Station Directors, and during this meeting Dr. Orlando McMeans, who is the current chair of the ARD becomes Chair of ESCOP.  Much activity is also underway as the ARD plans for its 16^th Biennial Research Symposium to be held in Atlanta, GA April 9 – 13, 2011.  Attendance at the 2009 symposium exceeded 700.   

Plans are also underway for the 1890 universities to send administrators and Capacity Building Grant (CBG) Proposal submitters to a meeting with NIFA officials who oversee this program.  The program has been considerably altered this year and the meeting will allow for an interchange of ideas on how this first cycle went under the guidelines of the new RFAs.  Time will also be given for a visioning process to assist NIFA as they develop a new strategic plan for the CBG program.  Since the new AFRI programs have new areas of funding exclusively for MSIs, small universities and EPSCoR State universities, the 1890s will evaluate these new inclusions as well and provide feedback to NIFA. 

It appears the workshop by Cornerstone for the 1890s at the last CARET meeting resulted in a better understanding of the new advocacy process dictated by Congress  and subsequently more “asks” have been made than in the past  by members to the appropriations committee on our behalf to increase the formula funding for the 1890 appropriation lines.

NRSP Review Committee - Mike Vayda/Dan Rossi

In meeting discussion:

• Proposed NRSP Development Committees with 2-year life on emerging issues to determine if full NRSP is needed
  • Germplasm
  • Climate change
  • Bioinformatics
  • Sustainable life cycle analysis
  • Functional foods
• Do we need to have groups looking for new NRSP's?
• Motion to bring this recommendation for NRSP Development Committees to ESS meeting
  • Not approved