IPMS/USA Members,
As I write this, we are about halfway through the 60th year of IPMS/USA, and there are several ways we are celebrating.
- Have you taken advantage of the 60th anniversary special membership option? This is a chance to get 3 years of membership for the price of 2. If you haven’t done so yet, you only have up until the day before the upcoming Nationals in Hampton, VA. Once the show starts the option will no longer be available.
- Have you won one of the 60th Anniversary prizes? Several companies have donated kits and books to our drawings. All you have to be is a current IPMS/USA member and you are in. We have given away several awesome prizes and there are still more so watch your email and if you see one from John, our 1st VP. Maybe you can be a winner too.
We had some other nice accomplishments in 2024.
- Thanks to the generosity of the Forehand family, we awarded the first two IPMS/USA scholarships at the Nationals in Madison. This year the Ralph Forehand Scholarship will award up to three $500 education scholarships to IPMS/USA members or their children. Please visit Ralph Forehand IPMS/USA Scholarship Fund for more information.
- If you didn’t make it to Madison for the 2024 Nationals you missed a fantastic show. Jeff Herne and company picked an awesome venue and did a great job running the show. 1012 Members attended, and 2667 models were entered in the contest.
- We also had over 600 models on display in the new Tiger Meet. This gave opportunities for our Special Interest Groups (SIGs), Chapters and others to display and talk about their models. The Tiger Meet will continue for at least the next two National Conventions.
- The Convention featured the first use of a computerized Model Registration System. The system registered every model electronically and created the framework for the slide show used for the Awards Presentation. This system streamlined contest registration, record keeping and slide show production. In the future this database can be used to study contest results.
- IPMS built a National Convention webpage, which is being used for the first time for the 2025 convention in Hampton. No longer is each Host required to create their own website which will save both time and money.
- The 2025 National Contest will include a new Class, with 8 new Gundam and Mecha categories.
- John Figueroa decided to step down as the DLC since he is the Chairman for the 2026 IPMS Nationals, which will be held in Fort Wayne, IN. John did a fantastic job as the DLC and he will be greatly missed. Bob Delaney has volunteered to fill in for John for the rest of the term. Welcome to the team Bob.
- Joe Terry took over the Secretary role after Jessica Ivancso had to step down after taking a new job.
- More volunteers have joined our publication team, with Bob Lomassaro taking on the Editor role working with Ro and several others to get the magazine back on schedule. The Journal received a new name, the IUJ, which is just an abbreviation of IPMS USA Journal. It also has a new look including a thicker cover. Feedback has been largely positive.
- You may have seen some of the surveys we have sent out, especially if you attended last year’s Nationals. To help us work through the information we received, and to help us analyze that information, we recently appointed Nathan Pollock for the newly created position of IPMS/USA Data Manager.
- 2025 is an election year for IPMS/USA, and you will be seeing the ballot in the March/April issue of the IUJ. This will also be sent out to the membership. While several of the positions only have one candidate there are others that will be contested. I urge all of you to cast your vote for who you want to see lead the Society for the next 2 years.
Look for more surveys this year so that we may learn as much as possible about where you, our members, want us to focus our attention in 2025 and beyond. We expect 2025 to be another exciting time for IPMS/USA.
Thank you for being a member.
Phil Peterson
President
IPMS/USA
#8739
IPMSPresident@ipmsusa.org