Ex-executive officer's column.

It's true. After thirteen years as Executive Officer of the Mississippi Academy of Sciences, I have stepped down to allow new blood to flow into this office. Dr. Charles Swann of the Mississippi Mineral Resources Institute at Ole Miss has been ratified by the membership at our Annual Meeting as the new Executive Officer. Charles is an outstanding individual and will provide superb service to the Academy.

I would be remiss if I did not thank the people who helped me in my attempts to provide guidance to the Academy. All of the Presidents I worked with were excellent choices. Each had a different style of operation, but that made life interesting. I was fortunate to be able to follow in the footsteps of former Executive Officer Dudley Peeler. Dudley left the MAS in great shape and made the start of my tenure especially easy. But I was most fortunate to have the incredibly able assistance (and frequent guidance) of three fantastic Associate Executive Officers. They really ran the office; I just tried to fix the computers. Arlene Adams got me started; Gretchen Gulmon kept me on the path, and Cynthia Huff has tried her best to keep the path clear of land mines. Charles will soon find out how fortunate he is that Cynthia is in charge! In my opinion, the heart of the Academy has been its Journal editor. Ken Curry has been a rock in this position and has always strived for excellence. He also showed me the path.

I'm not vanishing, so I'll still be doing MAS things. And Charles has my phone number and email address if he has trouble filling out the income tax forms. On second thought, perhaps it would be best if I changed those numbers!

I can't go away without pointing out what a great Annual Meeting we just had! I must confess that I was really hesitant when, as President-Elect, Bob Bateman said we should try to have our meeting at the Hattiesburg Convention Center. We had already investigated and knew that it was a lovely facility, but it was expensive! Bob is a determined kind of guy and he charged ahead; found funding for the meeting; and convinced us all that we should do this. Boy, was he right! The exhibitors were located in the main hallway and the posters were collected together as in a real poster session. The breakout rooms were excellent. It had a really good feel about it!

Dr. Marie Danforth must have some connections. She served as Publicity Chair and may be in that position for life. For the first time in memory, we had coverage of our meeting by Public Radio in Mississippi. There were two presentations about the MAS and our meeting. I was fortunate enough to hear both live (just luck since they did not tell us about them!). But you can check them out at the PRM archive at: http://www.etv.state.ms.us/news/0302/stories.html #030219. The first story was aired on February 14 and was titled "67th Annual Statewide Science Conference in Hattiesburg." The lead-in was: "Scientists are in Hattiesburg for their annual statewide science conference. PRM's Scott Phillips will have a report." The second story was a major piece, over four minutes long, and was presented on February 19. Its title was "Scientists Converge On Hattiesburg for 67th Annual Science Conference" and the lead-in was very complementary to us: "Last week some of Mississippi's brightest minds gathered in Hattiesburg for the 67th annual Mississippi Science Conference. PRM's Scott Phillips was on hand for the event and files this report."

As that story says, it's been my honor serving "some of Mississippi's brightest minds"! See you the next meeting.