ASTM International in New York City

Board Engages Stakeholders and Promotes Greater Awareness

On Oct. 23-26, 2011, the ASTM International board of directors gathered in New York, N.Y., for the second of its semi-annual meetings of the year. In addition to conducting its policy meetings, the board and senior staff connected with various constituent groups in the local area through outreach events.

A hub of global commerce, the Big Apple was an excellent gathering site for the 25-member leadership team. "Meeting in New York City allowed ASTM's leadership to engage many of the industries that rely on ASTM standards headquartered in or near the New York metropolitan area," said ASTM International President James A. Thomas. "ASTM standards are recognized by buyers and sellers around the world as the technical foundations of product quality and safety."

New York City joins other world-class cities as a destination for the ASTM board to hold meetings and conduct outreach. Past meeting locations were:

  • Mexico City, Mexico (2002)
  • Berlin, Germany (2004)
  • Toronto, Canada (2005)
  • Beijing, China (2006)
  • Stockholm, Sweden (2008)
  • Washington, D.C. (2009)
  • Tokyo, Japan (2010)

For details of the board's deliberations at this meeting, see ReCap.

Outreach Day

One full day of the New York stay was dedicated to outreach, where teams of ASTM board members and staff visited more than 50 corporations, trade associations, regulatory bodies, universities and other organizations in areas such as construction, chemicals, consumer safety, energy, global commerce, metals and more. The organizations visited were:

Corporations/Firms:

  • Alcoa
  • Alston & Bird
  • American Standards Testing Bureau
  • ATC Associates Inc.
  • Berry Plastics Corp.
  • BlackRock
  • BRISEA Group
  • Colgate-Palmolive Co.
  • Covanta Energy
  • GAF
  • Intertek
  • Isolatek International
  • Lafarge
  • Mueser Rutledge Consulting Engineers
  • Sears Corp.
  • Showa Denko America Inc.
  • Sika Sarnafil
  • Skidmore, Owings & Merrill LLP
  • Solutia Inc.
  • Turner Construction Co.
  • URS Corp.
  • U.S. Steel Corp.
  • Zamperla USA

Regulatory Offices:

  • New York City Department of Buildings
  • New York City Department of Design and Construction
  • New York City Mayor's Office on Long Term Planning and Sustainability
  • New York City Office of Environmental Remediation
  • Port Authority of New York and New Jersey

Professional and Trade Associations:

  • American Institute of Chemical Engineers
  • Concrete Industry Board
  • Copper Development Association
  • Illuminating Engineering Society of North America
  • International Association of Plumbing and Mechanical Officials
  • Toy Industry Association

Consumer and Environmental Protection:

  • Environmental Defense Fund
  • Good Housekeeping Research Institute
  • Innovation Center for Energy and Transportation
  • National Advertising Division of the Council of Better Business Bureaus

Business Councils and Related Groups:

  • American Council on Germany
  • German American Chamber of Commerce

Standardization, Code and Research Organizations:

  • American National Standards Institute
  • American Society of Mechanical Engineers
  • International Code Council
  • New York Academy of Sciences
  • PCI Security Standards Council

Universities and Other Institutions:

  • City University of New York, Energy Institute
  • Columbia University, Department of Biomedical Engineering
  • Hospital for Special Surgery
  • New York University, College of Dentistry

ASTM Member Workshop

To connect with constituents locally, a Members' Workshop was held Oct. 23 at the Grand Hyatt Hotel in New York City. ASTM members as well as students from the surrounding area were in attendance at two separate sessions.

ASTM staff covered topics from advances in ASTM electronic tools to upcoming value-added content and tools such as videos in standards, writeable data sheets and report-writing tools. The audience also heard from a member of the ASTM board of directors, Dennis Rounds, a consultant with expertise in environmental and business risk management. Rounds discussed leadership opportunities for ASTM members based on his experiences as a technical committee member and officer and as an ASTM board member.

Dennis Rounds, a member of the ASTM board of directors, presents at the ASTM members' workshop in New York City on Oct. 23, 2011.

The presence of a student contingent served as a reminder of the importance of standards awareness at the university level. In attendance at the member workshop session were students from the class of Angelo Lampousis, Ph.D., adjunct assistant professor in the Department of Earth and Atmospheric Sciences at the City College of New York. Lampousis teaches courses on environmental site assessment, and ASTM standards are a required course component, particularly E1527, Practice for Environmental Site Assessments: Phase I Environmental Site Assessment Process, from Committee E50 on Environmental Assessment, Risk Management and Corrective Action. These CCNY courses directly address the needs of future environmental professionals. (For more on the role of standards in advanced education, see the new column, NextGen.)

Students from the City College of New York attend the members' workshop. Posing with students are: Dennis Rounds (far left), ASTM board of directors and workshop presenter; Angelo Lampousis (back row, middle), Ph.D., who teaches an environmental site assessment course using ASTM standards; and Kevin Shanahan (far right, front), ASTM staff manager, who led the workshop.


Issue Month
January/February
Issue Year
2012
Committees