by Jim Cornell
After nearly two decades of amiable anarchy, the New England Science Writers group finally has a real organizational structure, with about 200 members, dues, a bank account, jobs line, Web site, and even an official letterhead. As of October, NESW has shifted its base of operations to the Whitehead Institute in Cambridge, MA, where Seema Kumar of Public Affairs will look after finances, mailings, and membership lists. Delia Cabe of Madison Publishing is serving as a modestly compensated Meetings Coordinator, Ethan Herberman of WGBH is running a "Jobs Line," and Art Clifford of University of Massachusetts/Amherst is maintaining the Web site and listserver. An "organizing committee" provides general governance and journalistic integrity.The emergence of structure, order, and efficiency is quite remarkable considering NESW's nearly accidental birth and organic evolution. In 1978, Bob Cooke, then of the Boston Globe, and I, in a fit of altruism and optimism probably inspired by cocktails at the CASW meeting we were attending, responded to a call to establish more local NASW chapters and agreed to co-host an informal talk by MIT computer guru Michael Dertouzos. The session was held at the Smithsonian Astrophysical Observatory. Bob and I invited any local writers we could think of and catered the beer and cold cuts ourselves. In the years that followed, NESW maintained an equally casual approach to organization, with subsequent meetings usuallydependent on whenever Cooke or I were moved to make arrangements and send out announcements. Despite this slapdash air, NESW managed to hold some interesting and sometimes newsworthy affairs, such as the introduction of Retin-A and the revelation that jet-lagged airline pilots often dozed at the controls. We heard Henry Lee before O.J. made him famous, watched electronic cockroaches skitter across the MIT Robot Lab, petted pilot whales at the Aquarium, and walked warily around cages of SIV-infected monkeys. We also schmoozed a lot and networked and made friends and found jobs.
The loose and collegial group expanded to encompass almost anyone-working press, public affairs officers, students and teachers, free-lancers, and journalistic wannabes- interested enough to show up. The mailing list (and other sundry services) was maintained at the Observatory, which, more by default than design, became unofficial headquarters for NESW.
Bob moved to the Atlanta Constitution and then Newsday, but several other members, including Alison Bass of the Globe, served at various times as my working-press partners. Indeed, the new era for NESW was inspired and engineered in large part by the most recent partner, Laura van Dam of Technology Review.
Two years ago, Laura suggested that an "organizing committee" gather each spring to map out a series of meetings for the next year, with a committee member responsible for arranging the details for at least one such meeting. Inspired by what could be accomplished with even a modicum of organization, we met with the committee to forge the new structure described above.
A description of the new NESW, and a call for dues ($15 annually) went out October 10 to current members, as well as to a wider mailing of all NASW members in other New England states drawn from a list provided by Diane McGurgan.
The first meeting of the revivified group was held at the Whitehead Institute on September 27. On October 28, NESW members had an opportunity to socialize with national and international environmental writers attending the Society of Environmental Journalists' annual meeting at MIT. And, in early December, the group will visit the sleep lab at Boston's Brigham and Women's Hospital.
The organizing committee-Clifford, myself, Dan Haney of AP, freelancer Jonathan Harrington, Jeff Hecht of New Scientist, Herberman, Kumar, Ann Parson and Ellen Ruppel Shell of Boston University, Wade Roush of Science, Richard Saltus of the Globe, and van Dam-hope to mount a full schedule for the second semester.
Any NASW members traveling to New England are welcome to join us, and can check the dates of scheduled events electronically by querying nesw@admin.umass.edu, or scanning the Web page at http://www.umass.edu/pubaffs/nesw/
#