From the Executive’s Desk

The month of January traditionally sees the start of many initiatives as attention turns to the New Year. The MTA is no different. This past month saw the culmination of several initiatives that was in process and the start of some exciting new initiatives. Let me describe them for you.

On the completed side

• In Mid-January we held our Mid-Winter Retreat in Miami Beach, Florida. Over 125 seminar attendees, speakers, guests and staff were in attendance. By all accounts this retreat was certainly one of our very best. Over 10 well-known and highly regarded speakers provided a learning environment which allowed for the passing of ideas in a relaxed networking environment. Our Awards dinner continued our time-honored tradition of recognizing our exemplary performers. Please read about the Retreat in the following pages and don’t forget that our May Educational Seminar is right around the corner (May 18th-19th) in NYC. I hope to see you there.
• By the time you read this newsletter, the MTA headquarter staff will be set up in our new Headquarters facility at 61 Broadway, 5th floor, in NYC. We will slowly transfer phone lines, computers and library materials so we are ALWAYS in touch with our membership base. We will have an “Open House” at the facility in the beginning of March, 2007 and if you are in the town, we would hope you stop by. If not, however, when you are next in NYC, we would urge you to take a couple of minutes and visit us in our new location.
• Our Annual “Journal” was issued to the membership. Special thanks to our Journal Editor, Charles Kirkpatrick, CMT, for the selection of some of the finest articles in the industry today. We urge you to read through this publication. In addition, Charlie is taking completed articles all the time so if you have a piece that you wish to share, please pass it to Charlie at Kirkco@capecod.net.

This month, we “kicked-off” several initiatives

• Fred Meissner, CMT as our Volunteer Czar, has developed a process to match volunteers to MTA needs and to ensure this experience is rewarding for all parties. If you are interested in volunteering for certain MTA matters, and I urge you to do so, please contact Fred at Fred@MTA.org.
• We have commenced a process to capture, through in-depth interviews, some of the early leaders in technical analysis. We owe it to ourselves to capture this wealth of knowledge surrounding the formulation of our industry, and where it is going, from the early leaders of our practice. It is truly a worthwhile initiative in our opinion. It is being led by Messrs. Acampora and Meissner and will be coordinated by our MTA headquarter staff.

On the Horizon

• We have recently opened registration for the Spring CMT test. Our Window for the examination will be April 26th to May 5th, 2007. We urge you to register early for your exam to ensure the best time and location. You can register on-line or contact Marie Penza at Marie@mta.org for any questions you may have. For this examination, we are planning on providing:
  • A free internet web-cast, led by Chris Ruspi, CMT, on the overall test process, materials for study and best practices to the exam taking, to be held on Feb. 17.
  • A free internet web-cast on the MTA Ethics which is, of course, part of the examination process.

Be on the lookout for announcements on these sessions and please sign-up early.

• We will provide, as in the past, an internet based tutorial for all parts of the examination (Levels I-III) through our CMT Institute. Our experience in this format continues to grow and gain acceptance by the participants. In addition to the instructor led sessions, we will provide a free web-cast on the technology behind these sessions to ensure that the technology is familiar to you BEFORE the sessions start. See the announcement on the CMTi in this newsletter (see page 4) which includes some testimonials from previous participants.

Be on the lookout for announcements on these sessions as well and again, please sign-up early.

Sincerely,
Tom Silveri
MTA Executive Director