REPORTS OF MEETINGS

44th General Assembly Meeting

The 44th Annual Meeting of SVU General Assembly was held in Cedar Rapids, Iowa,
June 26, 2003, in conjunction with the 2003 SVU Conference.

The meeting was scheduled for 4 PM but because of insufficient members present, it was reconvened one hor later, as the SVU Bylaws prescribe. After opening the meeting, SVU President Mila Rechcigl welcomed the members and thanked the Iowa organizers for making the necessary arrangements for the meeting. He then asked Layne Pierce to serve as Recording Secretary and Vera Borkovec and Dagmar White the verifiers of the Minutes.

The first order of business was the approval of the minutes from the last year's annual meeting held in Plzen in June 2002. Rechcigl then named the Resolution Committee, consisting of John Fiala, Chair and John Rocarek and Layne Pierce, members. He then asked the members to briefly stand to honor the deceased members.

SVU President then proceeded to present his traditional annual report on the State of SVU in 2003. He recapitulated various commitments made last year and summed up the progress made in each area during the last year. Among the new initiatives, he mentioned the establishment of Women's Issues Group, Civil Society Issues Committee, SVU Leadership Search Committee and the reactivation of the Accent on Youth initiative. Among specific tasks accomplished he referred to the successful transfer of the SVU archive to University of Minnesota 's Immigration History Research Center and the activation of SVU Research Fellows.

With reference to new publications, the greatest news was the publication of the new SVU Directory, containing some 3000 biographies of SVU members and other important information about the Society. Other good news was the publication of two volumes of selected Czech and Slovak papers from the 2002 SVU World Congress in Plzen, thanks to the diligent work of Dean Ivo Budil. The selected papers by the American speakers at the Congress are being edited and readied for publication. Effort is also made to publish, at least electronically, the papers from some of the other SVU conferences. Among the planned publications are two monographs, one on Czech and Slovak theatre abroad and another on Czech and Slovak opera abroad.

The greatest effort in the last year was afforded to the preparation of the 2003 Conference whose successful outcome has gone beyond anybody's expectations. Similar effort will now focus on the organization of the next SVU World Congress to be held at Palacky University in Olomouc.

There was considerable debate about the dates for the Congress, the majority expressing preference of holding the meetings in June rather than in September, as was originally proposed by the representatives of Palacky University.

There have also been significant developments regarding the SVU local chapters, i.e., the Cleveland chapter has been reactivated, while a new chapter in Spillville, IA is in process of being formed. Of the ongoing chapters, the Nebraska Chapter is most productive.

Rechcigl also favorably commented on the status of finances, the quality of two SVU periodicals, Kosmas and Zpravy SVU, and the effectiveness of the SVU Website.

SVU Treasurer Frank Mucha then gave a favorable report on the status of finances which collaborated the statement of SVU President. Then followed reports of other officers, including David Chroust's report on Kosmas, Kacenka Oslzly's comments on the organizational aspects of the Iowa conference, and the reports on the activities of several local chapters, namely that on Nebraska (by C. Oslzly), Chicago (by Jana Tuzar) and Pittsburgh (Carol Hochman).

By this time, the Resolution committee was ready with their resolution which was subsequently read and approved by the Assembly.

SVU President thanked again the local organizers, especially Kacenka Oslzly, for their splendid work and adjourned the meeting.

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