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Taskforces
ENGINEERS ACROSS AMERICA
Planning Document
Planning Document
MISSION
The mission of Engineers Across America is to improve the awareness and understanding of public policy makers on issues of importance to engineers, and to increase the participation of engineers in the public policy making process.
GOALS
The Engineers Across America Task Force has agreed upon three broad goals for the program. The first of which is to provide engineering input to key policy-makers in Congress on selected issues of concern to the participating AAES societies. The second goal is to motivate, train and assist engineers to be personally proactive in communicating with their representatives in Congress, especially through personal contacts, district office visits and related activities that help build lasting relationships. The third goal is to provide a mechanism for participating AAES societies to identify, recruit and train members for participation in their respective society public policy activities.
PARTICIPATION
All AAES societies are encouraged to participate. It is the responsibility of each participating society to choose individual members for these visits, and to coordinate amongst other societies to schedule visits. At this critical time in American politics, engineers must have input and involvement in the policy decisions that affect this country. This program will provide engineers with the opportunity to express their opinions on specific issues of concern, as well as give them the opportunity to become personally familiar and interact directly with their Member of Congress. This familiarity will benefit the engineer and the Member of Congress.
TIME FRAME
Visits should take place in the district offices of Members of Congress during the various Congressional district work periods. The August work period is the target for the first year of the program.
MEMBERS OF CONGRESS
Members of the House Appropriations Committee Subcommittees on Labor, Health and Human Services and Education and VA, HUD and Independent Agencies are to be targeted for visits, but other members of the House and Senate may be approached. If member societies are unable to coordinate their delegations to visit on the same day or days, individual societies are still encouraged to send their members to visit a Member of Congress who may have already been visited by another society. It is important for all active engineers to become familiar with their congressional representatives.
ISSUES
The Engineers Across America Task Force agreed on two broad issues to focus this year's visits, and they were-R&D Funding for the physical sciences and K-12 Math and Science Education. These issues are broad enough to encompass the concerns of all member societies and may be specifically tailored as needed. (Detailed position papers and summary sheets will be provided to all participants.)
TRAINING/BRIEFING
The steering committee, composed of representatives from participating member societies will construct briefing papers on the mentioned issues for all participating societies. AAES position papers will be used for the visits and the individual society will provide appropriate materials as needed.
At least once before the visits take place, representatives from the participating societies as well as AAES must meet with the volunteer visitors, either in person, by conference call or through a web based training curriculum, to prepare them for the visit. In some cases, volunteers will be experienced in this arena and not need much guidance, but in others, the volunteer will need to be completely briefed on the issues and prepared for any possible questions that may arise. Whenever possible, it is recommended that representatives from participating societies and/or AAES accompany all visitors regardless of experience level. This will provide an extra level of comfort to the volunteers, and it will serve to strengthen already existing relationships between AAES and its member societies and the Members of Congress.
FEEDBACK
Following each congressional visit, all participants are required to fill out a feedback form that will be provided to them. This document will serve to gage the response of the Member of Congress to the visit, the participant's opinion of the program, and any other specific comments that they might have.
MEASURES OF SUCCESS
For the first year of the program, success will be determined on several levels. The first and most obvious is the number of visits and the participation of the member societies.
The next level of success will be determined by the results of those visits. How did the Member of Congress react to the visit? Did the Member of Congress offer to introduce legislation, co-sponsor an existing piece of legislation, or support a particular engineering initiative? Did the Member ask to use the volunteer visitors and/or their respective societies as a resource as technical issues arise?
The final measure of success will be determined through the reaction to the program. Did the participants find it useful and/or productive? Do they want to begin visiting their Member on a regular basis? Did the participants feel that it was a negative experience? If so, why?
These measures will be determined by talking with each of the participants and by the feedback form that all will fill out. Through this form, member societies and AAES will judge the program and determine what, if any, changes need to be made.
PARTICIPATING SOCIETIES