Ladies and Gentlemen-- Chris Burda at the Science Museum has approached me, asking if our club would be interested in a grant opportunity with the Museum. The application and grant info are at www.smm.org/cbso Basically, they will give us $600 and three days of workshops to help us develop any kind of club project we are interested in. Two persons would need to each attend the three workshops (five hours per workshop), and the club can pay off the $200 earnest fee by volunteering 5 hours, but that volunteering can be in service to the club, I believe. Their point is to help develop science-type community organizations. Chris describes it as being wide open. If we want to develop a piece of expensive equipment, we could use this money for that--if we want to organize the grandest Teach a Friend Day in history, we could do that--they would help us develop our focus for the money we get and the time we put in. Dawn's mushroom club did this, and developed very cool membership-driving posters and events and purchased a slide projector for presentations. I think that it could be a great opportunity, but we would need to put in some time, and the three workshops are three weekday afternoons, so that might present a snag. But, the sky really is the limit for what they would help us develop toward the best interest of the club. The first workshop is on October 13, so if we're interested, then we should act NOW. The other workshop days are in November and (I believe) January. Our best bet would be to find one person who could attend the three weekday afternoon workshops, and make that person the leader, and then to have one other person at each workshop. Anyone may participate in the project, but they need two people and preferably the same two people at all three workshops. Check out the site, or e-mail me some questions. Chris Burda can be reached at 651.221.4719 or <cburda(a)smm.org> John