History of HAPS
The Formation of the Human Anatomy and Physiology Society (HAPS)
The concept of forming a national organization to serve those who teach human anatomy and physiology arose at the Anatomy and Physiology Workshop held June 1-5, 1987, at Triton College in River Grove, a western suburb of Chicago, Illinois. This workshop was sponsored by theIllinois Association of Community College Biologists (IACCB), the National Association of Biology Teachers (NABT), and the Triton College Conference Center; and was held in response to a perceived need for professional growth activities evidenced by a very successful one-day human anatomy and physiology conference held by IACCB in the spring of 1985.
The 1987 Anatomy and Physiology Workshop director was Robert Anthony who was assisted by Triton Workshop Coordinator Jay Omori. The agenda included two days of update seminars followed by two days of hands-on workshops. A fifth day was used for field trips to area institutions involved with some aspect of human anatomy and/or physiology. The cost was $150 for the full week or $75 for the seminar portion only. Approximately 150 people attended the seminars with 90 of those staying to participate in the workshops. Lodging was arranged at a nearby college for $25 a night (including breakfast!). Many participants expressed interest in having future workshops and possibly in forming a focus group within an existing organization (NABT and the American Physiological Society (APS) were discussed) or in forming a separate organization for those involved in human anatomy and physiology education. In response to the high level of interest it was decided to hold a second Anatomy and Physiology Workshop at Triton College in June of 1988.
The second Anatomy and Physiology Workshop was held at Triton College June 6-10, 1988. It followed the same format as the 1987 workshop and there were approximately 150 participants. About half of the participants completed a survey that assessed the interest in developing a professional organization for human anatomy and physiology educators. Results of the survey showed overwhelming support for forming a new professional organization, and a number of participants volunteered to help in the organizational process. Virginia Rivers of Truckee Meadows Community College in Reno, Nevada, offered to host a third Anatomy and Physiology Workshop in June of 1989. An advisory committee was formed consisting of;
Bob Anthony, Triton College, River Grove, IL
William Belzer, Clarion University, Oil City, PA
Paul Boehlke, Martin Luther King College, New Ulm, MN
Barb Bowen, Fox Valley Technical College, Appleton, WI
Ray Bruns, Mesa Community College, Mesa, AZ
Richard Crowell, Blackburn College, Carlinville, IL
Mary Guest, Clarke College, Dubuque, IA
Gary Johnson, Madison Area Technical College, Madison, WI
John Lutz, Beloit College, Beloit, WI
Lew Milner, North Central Technical College, Mansfield, OH
Lowell Neudeck, Northern Michigan University, Marquette, MI
Jim Nielsen, Western Illinois University, Macomb, IL
Henry Ruschin, Humber College, Rexdale, Ontario, Canada
Richard Steadman, Clark County Community College, Las Vegas, NV
Victoria Weisenberg, Oakton Community College, Des Plaines, IL
Arlene Wolff, Fox Valley Technical College, Appleton, WI
John Lutz volunteered to head the advisory committee and called a meeting for August 17, 1988, at Triton College. Members were asked to submit or bring ideas about an organizational name, organizing principles for a constitution or by-laws, membership, publications, and any other topics that warranted discussion. In attendance at the meeting were John Lutz, Lew Milner, Victoria Weisenberg, Bob Anthony, Richard Crowell, Richard Steadman, Gary Johnson, Paul Boehlke, Arlene Wolff, and Barb Bowen. Several ideas for an organizational name were proposed, and after some discussion it was decided to name the organization the Human Anatomy and Physiology Society (HAPS). Committee members provided constitutions from several biological societies to use as models, and a draft constitution for HAPS was developed primarily modeled on the constitution of the Colleges Biosciences Association of Canada which had been provided by Henry Ruschin. The draft constitution called for the affairs of the society to be managed by an Executive Committee made up of a President, a Past-President, a President-Elect, a Secretary-Treasurer, and three Members-at-Large. Each year an election would be held for the new President-Elect, the Secretary-Treasurer, and the three Members-at-Large. John Lutz, Richard Steadman and Lew Milner were chosen to serve as the nominal President, President-Elect and Secretary-Treasurer. Discussion took place about the publication of a newsletter and/or a professional journal. Paul Holmgren (Northern Arizona University, Flagstaff, AZ) had independently begun publishing and distributing The Anatomist/Physiologist, a national newsletter for instructors of human anatomy and physiology, in 1987 and volunteered to serve as the HAPS publications editor. Membership dues for HAPS were set at $20 per year, and the ten members of the advisory committee in attendance provided HAPS with its initial operating capital of $200.
In the spring of 1989 a special issue of The Anatomist/Physiologist was distributed that announced the formation of HAPS and included a copy of the proposed constitution and a letter (on official HAPS letterhead) from President-Elect Richard Steadman seeking membership in HAPS and attendees for the June, 1989, workshop in Reno, Nevada. The mailing list was a compilation of lists from the Triton workshops, The Anatomist/Physiologist, NABT, and Colin Wheatley of William C. Brown publishers.
The third Anatomy and Physiology Workshop was held at Truckee Meadows Community College in Reno, Nevada, from June 5-9, 1989; and was directed by Virginia Rivers. The initial HAPS constitution was presented at the first business meeting on June 6th, and with its adoption HAPS was officially formed. Richard Steadman and Lew Milner were formally elected to the offices of President and Secretary-Treasurer. Newly elected officers included President-Elect Richard Welton (Southern Oregon State College, Ashland, OR) and Members-at-Large Sandra Grabowski (Purdue University, West Lafayette, IN) and Virginia Rivers. At this time HAPS membership numbered about one hundred. By the fourth Anatomy and Physiology Workshop in 1990 in Madison, Wisconsin, membership had grown to over four hundred. By 1994, five years after the formation of HAPS, membership had grown to almost one thousand with members in 49 states (our first South Dakota member joined in 1996), Puerto Rico, and most of the Canadian provinces.
Largely through the efforts of Member-at-Large Larry Hibbert (Ricks College, Rexburg, ID) HAPS was incorporated in the state of Idaho as a non-profit corporation, Human Anatomy and Physiology Society, Inc., on March 11, 1991. The Internal Revenue Service granted tax-exempt status to the corporation on July 9, 1992.
HAPS Governance
Some minor changes in the make-up of the Executive Committee have been made over the years. The original three Members-at-Large were expanded to four Members-at Large in 1992 with two elected each year to serve two-year terms. In 1996 these offices became Regional Directors, each Regional Director coming from a specific geographical region of the United States and Canada. The name of the Executive Committee was also changed at this time to become the Board of Directors. In 1997 the office of Secretary-Treasurer was divided into two separate offices.
As HAPS grew over the years it became increasingly difficult to rely exclusively on volunteers to keep track of membership, conferences, and the many varied activities of HAPS. In addition, the lack of a central office created communication problems. For example, a HAPS toll-free number was established in 1992 with calls to this number directed to the HAPS President. Since he/she was most often not able to answer the call directly when it came in this meant listening to a message, frequently contacting a committee chair for information regarding the query (probably another message), and then getting back to the caller (probably another message) This was very inefficient and often resulted in delays in responding to inquiries from members or perspective members. In September of 1997 HAPS contracted with the Organization Services Group (OSG) of St. Louis, Missouri, to perform many of the day-to-day chores of HAPS operations. The primary contact person at OSG was Tonya Ferguson. This eased the burden that had been placed on the volunteer leadership and provided some additional stability and constancy to the organization. When OSG was sold in 2004 Tonya formed Ferguson Management, Inc. and continued to work with HAPS. This very successful relationship continued until Tonya’s retirement in 2007. At that point a search committee was formed that culminated in the selection of the current HAPS management firm, Association Services Group (ASG) of LaGrange, Georgia. In 2009 HAPS decided that there were sufficient funds to take the big step of hiring an Executive Director.
HAPS Communications
As stated previously the initial publication of HAPS was The Anatomist/Physiologist a newsletter that pre-dated HAPS and was personally funded, edited, and published by Paul Holmgren (Northern Arizona University, Flagstaff, AZ) beginning in 1987. This became HAPS News, the official quarterly publication of HAPS, in 1989. Sandra Grabowski (Purdue University, West Lafayette, IN) succeeded Paul as Editor in 1990 followed by Theresa Page (Texas Woman’s University, Denton, TX) in 1992. In 1996 the name of the publication was changed to the HAPS EDucator. Theresa was followed as editor by Caryl Tickner (Stark State College, Canton, OH) in 1998, Susan Baxley (Troy State University Montgomery. Montgomery, AL) in 2000, Marsha Sousa (University of Alaska Fairbanks, Fairbanks, AK) in 2008, and Jennelle Malcos (Pennsylvania State University, University Park, PA) and Sarah Cooper (Arcadia University, Glenside, PA) in 2012. HAPS EDucator began as a print publication but moved to an on-line format in 2009.
In 1992 Mildred Galliher (Cochise College, Douglas, AZ) offered to establish and maintain an electronic bulletin board for HAPS. In 1996 a “HomePage on the world wide web” was established by John Waters (Penn State University, University Park, PA) of the HAPS Technology Committee. The original site had a rather complicated URL at Penn State University, so in 1998 Jim Pendley (Imperial Valley College, Imperial, CA) of the Technology Committee registered the currently used domain, www.hapsweb.org, for use by HAPS. This initial bulletin board and website were relatively simple and unsophisticated, but at the time the internet was not very heavily used by HAPS members. In 2002 the Board of Directors met at the annual conference in Phoenix, Arizona, and decided it was time to develop a more professional website. Carl Shuster (Madison Area Technical College, Madison, WI) was asked to assemble a ‘wish list’ of capabilities that would be desirable for the HAPS website. Investigation showed that this could involve considerable expense, but HAPS was fortunate that Justin White, husband of HAPS member Donna White (Collin County Community College, Plano, TX), volunteered his services to revamp the website. Carl and Justin worked together to bring improvements to the website. In 2004 the Board of Directors decided to expand the web capabilities further, and the web design firm Affinscape was chosen for the task. Carl worked with Affinscape to transition from the old website to the new website which became operational in 2005. Since that time, HAPS has been a hosted site regularly updated by the HAPS Leadership.
In 1998 Jim Pendley established a HAPS Listserv (HAPS-L) to provide members with a forum for sharing expertise and experiences to promote excellence in the teaching of human anatomy and physiology. The HAPS Listserv facilitates group communication and discussion among its participants on an ongoing basis regarding various topics of Human Anatomy and Physiology. It is a resource where HAPS members can go for ideas or assistance. It can also be utilized to notify participants of training opportunities, educational opportunities, provide links to web sites with relevant content material and post job opportunities. All messages are archived in a google group and can be accessed on-line. The HAPS Listserv is open to HAPS members only.
HAPS Conferences
HAPS holds an Annual Conference each year patterned after the initial Anatomy and Physiology Workshop with two days of seminar presentations, two days of small group workshops, and a day for a local field trip. The Annual Business Meeting is held in conjunction with the seminar days, and an exhibition area for publishers and other companies that market products useful in anatomy and physiology education is provided. The location of the Annual Conference moves around the United States and Canada in an attempt to give members an opportunity to periodically have an Annual Conference relatively close to home. In addition to the Annual Conference, HAPS sponsors Regional Conferences throughout the year at various locations. These are usually weekend gatherings for members within a particular region. The first two Regional Conferences were held on October 26,1991 (Jack Marr, University of Southern Indiana) and January 17,1992 (Ann Smith and Lee Neary, Joliet Junior College).