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FORGING A 'SILVER CIRCLE' OF SENIOR MEMBERS ELI M. PEARCE, ACS IMMEDIATE PAST-PRESIDENT

CHEESE AND WINE AREN'T THE

only things that improve with age, especially when served on a silver platter or in a silver gob-let! At the Kanawha Valley Lo-

cal Section Meeting a few months ago, I had the pleasure of meeting Ray Crist. Not only is he a 77-year member of the American Chemical Society, but he also was recently honored by the nonprofit or-ganization Experience Works for being the oldest worker in America (C&EN, Sept. 23, 2002, page 93). This 103-year-old chemistwhose research career spans 80 years and includes working on the Manhattan Project still logs 40 hours a week in his laboratory at Messiah Col-lege. Crist says that the opportunity to mentor students is a big part of what keeps him going.

Crist is becoming the norm, not the ex-ception. One of the recipients of the 2003 Nobel Prize in Chemistry 85-year-old John Fenn, did not begin his Nobel-winning re-search until he was in his 60s. Thanks to of coursechemistry, people are leading longer, healthier, and more productive lives. Retirement has become a time for renew-al, not retreat. But how many of us know how we are going to spend the Indian sum-mer of our Hves?

The 2000 ACS study of mature career chemists revealed that a whopping 40% of ACS full members, including retirees, are over the age of 50 (C&EN, June 5, 2000, page 42). Slightly more than 30% of respondents ages 60 to 64 reported that they were retired, and nearly 60% of those ages 65 to 69 said they were re-tired. These figures are expected to grow as the first wave of America's 76 million baby boomers turns 65 in 2011. Even as the society works to attract younger and more diverse members, it can't afford to ignore this growing segment of the ACS membership.

In 1999, a task force was convened to determine whether the society was meet-ing the needs of its senior and retired mem-bers. Last August, they reported that,

through existing committees and offices, the society had sufficient programs in place to address the major issues and concerns of this group. The task force de-cided against forming a na-tional committee and sug-gested instead that an ACS staff person be appointed to answer questions and that in-formation for senior and re-tired chemists be more acces-sible and prominent on ACS websites.

I believe we need to take a more proactive approach. I don't know of a single local section or division chair who has called to complain about too many volunteers and not enough for them to do. The majority of respondents to the 2000 study of mature career chemists reported that they had not participated in any ACS-sponsored activities re-cently As of 2001, just 22 of the society's 189 local sections had retired or senior chemist committees.

Part of the problem is how we think about older people. Older does not mean out-of-order. According to the Amer-ican Association of Retired Persons (AARP), about 80% of Americans 65 and older are active and fully capable of con-tributing to society Eight in 10 baby boomers report that they plan to work during retirement, though not nec-essarily in the same job or full time. AARP's research also says that older people want to spend more time volunteering, and, for example, many of them want to work with children. ACS must have a Washington, D.C.-based, dedicated program that ad-vises and guides local section and division efforts to keep senior members profes-sionally active.

As a membership organization, ACS

We have a wonderful opportunity to harness the expertise and enthusiasm of our growing number of senior members before they lose interest in ACS activities and let their mem-berships lapse.

benefits greatly from the service of its member-volunteers. ACS programs that we take for grantedfrom national meet-ings to National Chemistry Weeksim-ply would not be possible without the ded-icated time and efforts of local section and division volunteers. A national program would help local sections and divisions bet-ter organize these individuals for our soci-ety and for society in general.

In the next decade or so, we have a won- derful opportunity to harness g the expertise and enthusiasm 2j of our growing number of senior members before they o lose interest in ACS activities | and let their memberships

lapse. Local sections have told us that retired and senior chemists like to do demon-strations and act as "chem-istry ambassadors." Perhaps local senior chemist groups could par tner with other groups such as Big Broth-er/Big Sister (as AARP has done) and share their wonder for chemistry with young people. These members can also become more involved in public policy issues with-out leaving their homes by participating in the Legisla-tive Action Network (http:// congress.nw.dc.us/chemical/ home/), which requires only a personal computer and Web access. They can become ac-tivists, helping to improve lo-cal science and math pro-grams and meeting with community leaders to sup-port these areas.

Unhampered by the de-mands of young families or budding careers, senior

members often have the one thing that seems increasingly elusive in American life: t ime. After all, as W. Somerset Maugham wrote: "When I was young, I was amazed at Plutarch's statement that the elder Cato began at the age of 80 to learn Greek. I am amazed no longer. Old age is ready to undertake tasks that youth shirked because they would take too long."

ACS should establish a "Silver Circle" of senior members to mine these riches.

Views expressed on this page are those of the author and not necessarily those of the ACS Board.

H T T P : / / W W W . C E N - O N L I N E . O R G C&EN / MARCH 24, 2003 39

http://http://congress.nw.dc.us/chemical/http://www.cen-online.org

ACS NEWSCOMMENTFORGING A 'SILVER CIRCLE' OF SENIOR MEMBERS