Next week I will be heading for the winter committee meetings of the Auto Glass Safety Council™ (AGSC). This year it will be held in Orlando, Fla., where the warm and sunny weather will be greatly appreciated. Although I rarely have time to get out and enjoy the climate, it is still nice to be away from frigid Wisconsin for a short while.

My duties in Orlando will be three fold: attending the Education Committee meeting, conducting the Standards Committee meeting and joining with other board members in discussing the issues of our industry.

I have been a member of the education/certification committees with first the National Glass Association, then the Independent Glass Association and now with the AGSC for a combined total of almost 30 years. The work that goes into these committees is rewarding but not easy. Our main function is to write and edit test questions. The rules seem simple but can be quite complicated to put into practice. The test questions must be:

• Multiple choice, with one correct answer and three plausible but “absolutely incorrect” distracters;
• Answers should not contain “all of the above” or “none of the above;”
• Written in “active” voice; and
• Written in a positive, not negative style. For example “Which is not the right answer?” would be a rejected test question.

Let’s say that you followed all of the above guidelines religiously and wrote several good questions. You spent hours finding, researching and cataloging references. Your questions are then put up on a screen and opened to comments from a panel of industry experts. Frequently the original question is almost unrecognizable when finished, and the writer better have thick skin and flawless facts.

However, the rewards of this process are that we get a better industry. When we have educated, trained and skilled technicians, we have an industry for which we can be proud. When you see an “AGSC Qualified or Certified Technician,” make sure you recognize their accomplishments and give them the kudos they deserve.

The Standards Committee, of which I am proud to be the chair, will be handling the important issue of Advanced Driver Assist Systems (ADAS). We will be hearing from our subcommittee on this issue and hopefully have enough information to come up with a guideline or directive that our industry can buy into.

This is an industry challenge that has been keeping many people up at night, including me. I get calls daily from clients and shop owners who ask what to do. Unfortunately, there is no easy answer. I trust that our committee, with all of the great minds that populate it, will come up with answers that we can all live with.

The board of directors for the AGSC finishes out the meetings with one of their own. We usually review our previously set goals and discuss the actions of the various committee meetings from the week. We will set an agenda for the upcoming year and offer suggestions for the seminars and speakers for this year’s Auto Glass Week™ in San Antonio this October 5-7.

Though this annual meeting is a lot of work, it is a chance to see friends, share ideas and make contacts that may not be possible any other way. Do you want to get involved? Just ask. All of our committees are openly asking for fresh faces and bright new ideas. So be a good industry citizen. It will pay off, for your business and for the industry.