FOREIGN AFFAIRS FORUM
A Proud Member of the World Affairs Councils
of
P.O.
CFAF
CFAF WEB
SITE: www.charlestonfaf.org
CFAF EMAIL ADDRESS: Secretary@charlestonfaf.org
SPRING 2007 NEWSLETTER
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Summer is upon us for sure…and your Editor apologizes for the lack of
an earlier Spring newsletter…but that’s how it is. Now we have had the Annual Meeting of our
members and the new Board Members have been elected. In addition, our new Officers for the
upcoming 2007-2008 Program Year have been chosen by the Board at its meeting
on June 20th. And we had a wonderful
set of speakers during the most recent year.
All of this is given some detail in the paragraphs to follow. We look forward to seeing all of you in the
new year…the Program Chair, Al Thibault has promised another good year of
topical talks…so plan to re-up when the Dues Notice appears in the mail in August. BOARD AND
OFFICERS FOR 2007-2008-- At the Annual Meeting of the Forum held on May 20th, the membership voted by acclimation for the slate of nominees for the five open Board positions (Class of 2010). The new Board Members include Tom Kern and Bill Prewitt. Myron Harrington, Bill Mahony and Al Thibault were elected to a second three-year term. The President thanked Bob Prioleau for his service on the Board. As a result, your CFAF Board now looks like this:
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The Board at its
meeting on 2007-2008
CFAF OFFICERS: Kathy Rhodes, President Bill Prewitt, Vice President Al Thibault, Program Chair Bruce Skidmore, Treasurer In the near future, the President will be making Committee assignments and appointing Committee Chairs for the program year. PRESIDENTIAL MESSAGES— Immediate Past President Jim Hodges gave the Newsletter
the following message: “With this issue of the Newsletter, I end my term as your CFAF President
and turn the reins over to the newly-elected Officers. My thanks to the Officers and Board Members
who served with me, and to the Committee Members who have helped to deliver
what I think have been two very successful years of operation. “In the last two years our membership has grown to the point where
the Board has been faced with an issue of a ‘comfortable’ venue. For the time being, the new Board has
chosen to continue to fit the reception and lecture into The Riverview Room. We will be a bit crowded because of our
response to the great programs, but the membership likes this room and its amenities
(except, perhaps, for the somewhat difficult parking when it rains!). “Why have we grown: good food;
tolerable wine; good companionship; interesting topics and informative
speakers. That’s one man’s opinion--six
years ago when I first joined the Board of the Foreign Affairs Forum (we
didn’t officially become the Charleston Foreign Affairs Forum until
2003), word was that people came to meetings mainly for the friends and the
food—the speaker was perhaps an ‘afterthought.’ That may have been true, but I think the
last two years have shown that as you improve the quality of the speakers and
the programs, interest, membership and attendance will expand quickly. “A possible new venue may be necessary primarily because meeting
attendance has grown from some 40-50% of the membership to almost 70%, plus
the number of guests rises each time.
That is growth of the best kind.
When you come to meetings that tells us that you believe you are
getting VALUE for your membership dollar.
Even as a voluntary association, we need to remember that members are ‘customers.’ I hope this Newsletter finds you as a
SATISTIFED customer, and I am sure Kathy and the Board will work to keep you
satisfied with our overall 2007-2008 program.” Jim Hodges. Newly elected President, Kathy Rhodes, also writes: “I send greetings to you as the new President of CFAF. As my first pleasant duty, I express
thanks to Jim Hodges, Past-President; the Executive Committee, the
Committee Chairs and the full CFAF Board for the successes of the ‘06-‘07
lecture series, planning meetings, and business meetings. It was and continues to be my pleasure to
work with the committed individuals who care about our organization. “I look forward to another great CFAF year. We have three fine programs scheduled which
are described in another section of this Newsletter. I hope you will mark your calendars now
with the dates of the fantastic lectures and receptions we have scheduled for
the Fall. “One of the things I
would like to emphasize this year is Member
involvement. We have several
standing committees and at least one ad hoc committee that will be actively
functioning. The ones I would like to highlight in this Newsletter are
Awards, Membership, and Public Relations.
We are interested in members who like to do meaningful work. Some committees do not require a lot of
meetings. Most committee chairs rely
on e-mail to some extent. If you think
you would like to have a more active role in the
“Thanks for your loyal participation in the Forum. I look forward to seeing you again on
September 25 for our first lecture of the new season.” Kathy Rhodes. TREASURER’S
REPORT— At the CFAF Board meeting on June
20th, the Treasurer, Bruce Skidmore, reported that the assets of
the Forum, as of The results to date of the fund
raising effort for the Awards Programs are detailed in a later section of
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UPCOMING PROGRAMS— Board Member
and Program Chair, Al Thibault, a retired US Foreign Service Officer, reported
to the Board that he had firm dates for our three speakers in the Fall of
2007. Each presentation will be at The
Riverview Room of The Citadel and will begin with a Reception at September 25; Tuesday TOPIC: “The Dragon and the Eagle: The speaker
will be Jay Taylor, a retired US Foreign
Service Officer who is now a Research Associate at the November 1; Thursday TOPIC: “ The The speaker
will be Dr. Susan K. Purcell, who
is the Director of the Center for Hemispheric Study at the November 27; Tuesday TOPIC: “ The speaker
will be Dr. Simon Serfaty,
Director of European Studies in The Center for Strategic International
Studies (CSIS) in More detail on the speakers will be
forthcoming in the Meeting Notices, sent to the membership about three weeks
before each event. We hope to see each
of you next program year. WACA 2007 NATIONAL CONFERENCE--
BRIDGING
THE DESERT: The In the Winter Newsletter, we
advised that Stuart and Tootie Dawson would be going to the 2007 WACA National
Conference in “The
2007 Conference was different in that it dealt entirely with The “The
Conference was again extremely well attended.
But like all conferences which invite very high-level speakers, some
(like Condi Rice this time) had to cancel at the last minute…disappointing to
us, but totally understandable. “We
attended an interesting luncheon hosted by the Moroccan Ambassador, a man of
great charm. And because his country
borders Israel, Lebanon, and of course Irag, we had signed up for a luncheon
given by the Syrian Ambassador; however, it was hopelessly oversubscribed but
by all accounts it was a fascinating and enlightening talk. On the other hand, by good luck, we ended
Friday at the Embassy Reception hosted by the “There
were six plenary sessions and several related discussion sessions—you could
pick one from those offered. There was
a Keynote Luncheon on Saturday and a Closing Banquet that evening. At the Banquet, we had the pleasure of
talking with Bob Ebel and his wife.
Bob was—in our opinion—one of CFAF’s finest speakers. At the Conference he teamed up with John Duke
Anthony, President and CEO of the National Council on US-Arab Relations for
one of the plenary sessions entitled ‘Oil in the GREAT DECISIONS PROGRAM--
This affiliate
of Forum is going extremely well. The 2007
Coordinator, Bill Prewitt (722-3331 or bill@charlestonfinancial.net ),
reported the following: “Four Great Decisions Groups were
organized to meet the growing demand for these discussions--meeting on
different days of the week and at different times, for accommodation of the
Members. Over 50 CFAF Members
participated. Many thanks to the Group
Managers: Ed Davis, Kathy Rhodes, Al
Thibault and Pat Vitkovic. “The main discussion topics included: the The new GD groups will be formed in the
Fall of 2007, and the discussions will begin in February of 2008---contact Bill
if you want to participate or to learn more. CFAF
AWARDS UPDATE-- HARRINGTON AWARD On a regular meeting of the Forum on April 17th, CFAF President Jim Hodges presented Citadel Senior Cadet Douglas Schmid with the Charleston Foreign Affairs Forum/Colonel Myron C. Harrington Award. The award is given to the graduating senior who, in the eyes of the political science faculty, has achieved academic excellence in international studies and shows great future promise. Doug Schmid was an exemplary senior officer in the Corps of Cadets and was awarded the distinguished Truman Scholarship for post-graduate work, which he will undertake at The Australian National University A
native of After
that school year, he left for the Following
graduation, he was commissioned into the US Marine Corps and was married in
May to his fiancée whom he met while attending a Youth Leadership Conference
in HIGH SCHOOL AWARDS The Forum has instituted a series of awards in each public high school for the county, to a junior who shows good aptitude in the study of world affairs. These awards, under the Chair of Judy Hines, were made at the CFAF Annual Meeting on May 10th, and will be summarized in the next Newsletter. At its recent
meeting, the Board was advised that we are very near our goal to reach
funding for these high school awards.
The CommunityFirst Bank (John Settle and others) has given a matching
grant of $15,000 for the support. The Forum
has raised all but $2,400 of the needed match, based on member contributions,
a grant from Pitney Bowes, and a vote of the Board to use $5,000 of our surplus
funds. If you wish to help us reach the goal,
please send a check to the Treasurer at the address at the top of this Newsletter. The attained total of $30,000 will then
create an endowment to support the annual presentation of these awards in our
high schools. PROGRAM
SPONSORSHIPS-- During the year, we had Program Sponsorships from 6
sources: The Bank of South Carolina,
the South Carolina State Ports Authority, Charleston Place Hotel (in-kind
services), Jim and Sheila Hodges, The Beach Company, and Pitney-Bowes. These sponsorships go a long way to helping
with the hosting of the speakers and we look forward to continuing the
sponsorship program in the new year. If you, or some
organization you know, would like to be a $500 Sponsor of a future program,
please contact Bill Mahony at (723-9155), or by email at contest@att.net. *************************** NEWS ITEM1: The NEWS ITEM 2: At its latest meeting, the Board voted to keep the dues structure the same for the 2007-2008 year: Individual, $75; Couple, $100; and Institution, $500. The Guest Fee will remain the same: $10/$15, single/couple, which is deductible from the membership dues if the guest(s) then signs up. Jim Decker Newsletter Editor (newsletter@charlestonfaf.org) |
