The first board of directors meeting of the Canadian Welding Association was held as a conference call on September 28, 2001. Directors of the former Canadian Welding Society and Welding Products Manufacturers Association of Canada were in attendance. Richard Seif, President of CWA, laid out the strategy for the meeting and stressed its importance in getting the Canadian Welding Association off to a good start.
The board dealt with issues that are priorities in the launch of the new association. These related to the administration of the new association, communications with the chapters, the registration of the new name, bylaws and banking.
Two major meetings are planned for 2002, one in the spring and one in the fall. The fall meeting will include the Annual General Meeting, the Fall Symposium and the Awards Dinner. It will be held in conjunction with the Weld Expo trade show, scheduled to take place in Toronto in October 2002. Awards that were not presented in October 2001 will be formally presented at then.
CWA’s new national office will establish a monthly newsletter, which will be sent to all members by fax or e-mail. The CWA Website is currently being developed at www.cwa-acs.org. It is being designed to assist in the CWA chapters’ communications and be user-friendly. The Website will be live in early October with pages being added as information becomes available. It will provide a continuous report on activities in the association, including those related to committees.
The board will meet again in a conference call at the end of October to finalize many of the administrative details laid out in its first meeting.
Chapter operations of the former Canadian Welding Society continue, as do those in the Marketing and Technical Committees of the former Welding Products Manufacturers Association of Canada.
