Bylaws

ASME Design Engineering Division

Revision effective November 27, 2013

Purpose

The purpose of the Technical Committee on Multibody Systems and Nonlinear Dynamics (TC-MSND) is to foster experimental, symbolic, computational, and analytical activities pertaining to multibody systems and nonlinear dynamics and related technical areas.

Membership and Terms of Service

  1. A full committee shall nominally consist of twenty-four voting members comprising three officers, the immediate past chair and twenty regular members.  Under special circumstances, the number of members can be expanded to more than twenty-four through voting of the TC-MSND.
  2. A member may serve no more than two consecutive three-year terms and is ineligible for membership within two years after expiration of the final term.
  3. If a member misses three consecutive TC-MSND meetings the membership is terminated unless extenuating circumstances are presented to the committee and the committee approves continuation of the membership by a majority vote.
  4. Officers shall serve a complete two-year term of office as voting members of the committee even if such service extends beyond the end of their normal term of committee membership. If a portion of the term, to which an officer was elected as a committee member, remains at the completion of the term of office, it shall be finished as a regular committee member.

Election of New Members

  1. By October 15 of every odd-numbered year, the committee chairperson shall appoint a Nominating Committee consisting of a chairperson and, at most, two other members. The Nominating Committee chairperson shall be a member of the TC-MSND; the other members need not be members of the TC-MSND, but must be members of the ASME.
  2. The Nominating Committee shall consider potential new members and present a list of nominees to the chairperson by December 15 of the same year. This list shall consist of at least as many nominees as the number of anticipated TC-MSND vacancies for the next two-year period.
  3. A balance among the membership between the technical areas of multibody system dynamics and nonlinear dynamics, as well as between academia and industry, shall be sought by ensuring a sufficiently diverse pool of nominations.  From time to time, the TC-MSND may vote to restrict the election of new members to anticipated vacancies to individuals from only one of the technical areas, in order to rebalance the membership.
  4. Election of new members shall be held by electronic ballot by February 15 of each even-numbered year. Each member of the TC-MSND, except the chairperson, shall have one vote for each anticipated membership vacancy.
  5. In descending order of number of votes and commensurate with the number of anticipated vacancies, nominees shall be considered elected and members of the TC-MSND effective July 1 of the same year or effective July 1 of the following year. The chairperson shall cast a tie-breaking vote, in case of any tie.

Officers

  1. The committee shall be governed by three officers: a chairperson, vice-chairperson, and recording secretary.
  2. The term of office for each officer shall be two years, extending from October 1 of an odd-numbered year until the end of September two years later.
  3. By October 15 of every even-numbered year, the chairperson shall appoint a Nominating Committee consisting of a chairperson and, at most, one other member, both of which shall be members of the TC-MSND.
  4. The Nominating Committee shall consider potential officers from among the committee members and present a list of nominees to the chairperson by December 15 of the same year. Election of officers shall be held by electronic ballot by February 15 of each odd-numbered year. Each member of the TC-MSND shall have one vote for each officer.
  5. Election shall be accomplished by plurality of the votes cast.
  6. If the TC-MSND chairperson cannot complete the term of office, then the vice-chairperson shall become chairperson. If the recording secretary cannot complete the term of office, the chairperson shall appoint a new recording secretary from the TC-MSND membership to serve the remainder of the term of office.
  7. A sitting recording secretary or vice-chairperson may stand for election to a higher office even if their current membership term has expired.

Subcommittees

  1. The chairperson of the TC-MSND has the authority to establish subcommittees, and shall appoint the chairperson of each such subcommittee.
  2. The members of the subcommittees need not be members of the TC-MSND. The chairperson of each subcommittee must be a member of the TC-MSND, except in such special cases where a majority of the members of the TC-MSND vote to accept a non-committee member as subcommittee chairperson.

Ratification and Amendments

  1. These rules become effective upon ratification.
  2. Amendments to these rules require a vote in favor by two thirds of all voting members of the TC-MSND.
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