I hope that this second edition of our 2019 newsletter finds you enjoying summer, with the events, holidays and family gatherings common at this time of year. Your Reliability Society leadership team has certainly not slowed down. We just held our mid-year combined ExCom and AdCom meetings in Burlingame, CA, just ahead of our flagship PHM conference (phmconf.org). The following week, I traveled to Atlanta, GA to represent our society at the IEEE TAB meeting. Many topics were discussed at both of these meetings which impact our society’s business.

However, sadly, in the midst of these events, on June 17th, our society lost a devoted colleague and friend to many, Alfred Stevens. As many of you know, Alfred was a key and experienced volunteer for our society, the PHM and RAMS conferences, and other related organizations in our profession. He was our current Treasurer, and our past-Treasurer, Bob Loomis, kindly stepped in to help our society continue to function without missing a beat, especially as our first-pass 2020 budget was due. It is in times like this that we are all reminded of the close-knit nature of our professional society, and of the life-long bonds that we forge along the journey of our careers and lives. If you would like to make a donation in Alfred’s name, be put in touch with his family, or help fill in one of the many roles Alfred was responsible for, please do not hesitate to let me know.

Volunteering is indeed the glue that binds our organization together and allows all of us to collectively impact our profession in its many dimensions. Most of us do not volunteer for formal recognition. We do it to practice or acquire skills, to create friendships, to serve our reliability-minded community, to lay foundations needed for our profession’s future, and many other selfless but highly rewarding reasons. Our society is unusually technically broad and active for its size. As such, each and every one of you has a place in our volunteer pool. If you would like to discuss your situation and help finding “your place”, please drop me a note at c.d.graas@ieee.org and I will personally follow up with you. .

In closing, I am excited to share with you our new society logo! It is now available for use by our leadership team and chapter officers, our conference organizing committees, publications staff, and any of you upon request to me. We hope that you enjoy seeing and using this updated and user-friendly design. By January of next year, the old design will no longer be permitted.

Have a productive summer, and please remember that your feedback and ideas are always welcome.

Kind Regards,
Carole

The society is proceeding with a successful year. Unfortunately, we recently had to say goodbye to a great leader and friend in the society - Alfred Stevens. He will be sorely missed. Please see his memorial herein. Also read about the many activities completed, underway or planned for the year. See the announcements section and the homepage for upcoming conferences. This issue also contains other exciting news and chapter activities of interest. Please enjoy reading about and participating in society and chapter activity.

Members and organizations have much knowledge and information to share. This sharing strengthens our disciplines, members and the society. Technical bulletins in our field of interest, committee announcements, Chapter activities, conference call for papers, etc. are needed for the newsletter. Inputs for future newsletter issues are due in the following months for input.

• Issue #1, inputs due February
• Issue #2, inputs due May
• Issue #3, inputs due August
• Issue #4, inputs due November

I look forward to communicating society information in our topics of interest with our membership. The Newsletter is only as good as the inputs provided, so please help bring our members an outstanding Newsletter. As always, feedback and suggestions for improvement are welcome.

Lon Chase
2019 Newsletter Editor-in-Chief
l.chase@ieee.org

Ruizhi Gao
Newsletter Associated Editor-in-Chief
youtianzui.nju@gmail.com