Committees

AIAA New England - Committees & Activity Groups:

Section Officers:

  • Chair: Shreyas Hegde
  • Vice Chair: Jason Hui
  • Secretary: Durgesh Chandel
  • Treasurer: Osa Osaretin

 

Activity Leads & Officers:

  • University & College Outreach
    • Lead Officer: Thomas Phoenix Robbins
    • Student Projects Grants Program: Thomas Phoenix Robbins
  • K-12 STEM & Educator Outreach:
    • Aero-Robotics Competition (ARC) New England: Shreyas Hegde
    • Beaver Work Summer Institute: Bob Shin & John Blandino
  • Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion: Osa Osaretin
  • Professional and Technical Programs
    • Webinars & Professional Talks- Nanditha NH, Jimmy Wetzel
  • Newsletter: Aaryan Nagarkatti

 

Activities & Committees 

Universities & Colleges Outreach

The primary goal of the outreach is to establish relationships with the student branches within the section’s geographical area, support their activities, and support the development of student leaders and recognize their contributions.

  • Invite and encourage the student branch chairs to participate in the council meetings.
  • Oversee the distribution of Section newsletters and meeting announcements to individual student members.
  • Hold joint meetings with Student Branches on campus and promote inter-college networking.
  • Review requests from Student Branches for financial supports.
  • Represent AIAA to college students:
    • Inform students of the various undergraduate and graduate scholarships.
    • Organize local professional members to speak at student branches.
    • Encourage graduating student to volunteer and to be a part of a committee and activities.

 

K12 STEM & Educator Outreach

The primary goal of the outreach is to establish relationships with the educators within the section’s geographical area, support their activieis that ties to promoting STEM and Aerospace.

  • Develop a network of active STEM educators, promote collaboration and offer support (financial or other means avaialble through AIAA).
  • Liaison for the AIAA STEM K-12 Committee.
  • Examples of STEM activities are:
    • Organize STEM / Science fair
    • College, industries & other aerospace related tours
    • Build projects/competitions

 

Diversity, Equity & Inclusion (part of AIAA Diversity Working Group)

Improve the diversity - Grow the number of women and people from different races and ethnicities. Make AIAA membership more representative of current industry demographics. The work of the committee is accomplished by sub-groups within the greater AIAA organization: Outreach Subgroup, Programming Subgroup, Leadership, Growth, and Retention Subgroup and the Communications Subgroup. More information is available at https://www.aiaa.org/docs/default-source/default-document-library/diversity-event-grant-request-form.pdf?sfvrsn=b92f173b_0.

  • Promote STEM and Aerospace careers to underrepresented groups
  • Represent AIAA-NE and liaise with the AIAA Diversity Subgroups to plan and incorporate the activities to promote diversities.
  • Plan the event/activity for yearly Local Section Grant (~$500).
  • Take an active role in attracting and retaining a diverse membership. Be a role model for diversity leadership. Establish a positive mentoring and nurturing environment.

Professional and Technical Programs

Provide professional members opportunities to present to the fellow members. Provide support for graduating seniors entering the job market by offering them opportunities to gain experience presenting to professional members.

  • Key Technical Areas - Spread the awareness and to the members & the public on the topics related to:
    • Sustainable aviation
    • Space systems & technologies
    • Hypersonic flight
    • AI/ML/Autonomy
    • New manufacturing technologies & materials

 

Public Policy & Government Lobbying

Represent AIAA and the section’s geographical area. Provide inputs, reachout and address and discuss key issues with locally elected officials.

  • Leverage the section members with expertise in the AIAA Key Issues who can explain the local impact of those issues in layman’s terms.
  • Organize local members for the region and national public policy activities such as Congressional Visits Day.
  • Initiate and organize local public policy activities such as round tables with locally elected officials, facility visits, and policy speakers for Section events.
  • Liaise with AIAA-Headquarters and the region’s Deputy Director of Public Policy regarding policy activities and alerts.
  • Maintain records and submit Section public policy activities report for consideration for AIAA Section Public Policy awards.

 

Membership Outreach

A significant part of the role is reaching out to new members, delinquent members, as well as active members to solicit feedback to improve the program.

  • Responsible for tracking and reporting monthly membership trends.
  • Integrating membership development and retention programs into all scheduled Section activities.
  • Determine section demographics so that up–to–date membership needs can be determined and addressed.

 

Honors and Awards Committee

The Honors and Awards Committee is responsible for promoting and recognizing excellence within the Section.

  • Establish Local or Section Awards - These awards may consist of an Engineer of the Year Award, a Distinguished Service Award, a Technical Award, etc…
  • Plan for Anniversary Program: Recognize 25–40–50-60 and 70–Year Members. Ensure that these dedicated members are recognized properly in your section, such as an annual award ceremony, special Section meeting, etc.
  • Nominate a Person(s) for an AIAA Award: Your section members need to think of possible candidates for AIAA national awards and complete the nomination process.
  • Promote advancements in membership grade -- List membership upgrade criteria in your Section newsletter, along with nomination and reference deadlines. Contact eligible members and encourage them to upgrade their membership status.