Thank you for volunteering to serve as either a Session Chair or Discussant for the 2004 USASBE Conference at the Westin Galleria in Dallas. Below is the information containing the title and time of your session and the list of presenters and their presentation topics. This information is also available on the USASBE web site also, www.usasbe.org. Please contact the presenters in your session to obtain a copy of their papers so you are familiar with them if you did not already receive them as an attachment from us.

The format for the sessions this year is similar to what you may have experienced in the past. Mike Hennessy, President of The Coleman Foundation, has challenged us to address our presentations from the perspective that he likes to call the "So what?" question. That is, as a Session Chair and Discussant, challenge your presenters and listeners to wrestle with the implications and impact, direct and indirect, of our research, teaching, and service for the field of small, entrepreneurial, and/or family business.

As a Session Chair, please welcome everyone to your session, serve as the timekeeper and moderator, and facilitate and coordinate the questions and discussions. If there is session evaluations (please check the registration desk before your session), distribute and collect these at the end and return them to the registration desk.

As a Discussant, please contact the presenters in your session to make sure that they all have copies of each other's papers. You will want to read the papers yourself and to provide guidance to the presenters as to which aspects of their papers are strong, need improvement, etc. You may want to highlight those issues that you believe to be (1) the most interesting and/or (2) interrelated to each other. While most papers are related, due to scheduling needs, some papers in your session may not have as strong a link as others.

Each session is one hour and fifteen minutes so adjust your time according to the number of papers you have in your particular session. Please instruct the presenters in your session to keep their individual presentation within the timeframe, in order to allow maximum discussion from all participants. We hope that you will elicit questions and comments from all attendees. You may choose to make this session interactive, rather than to have each presenter talk in turn.

Please let the presenters know that the rooms are only equipped with an overhead projector and a screen. They are welcome to bring any other equipment with them. We will not be able to provide any other equipment at the conference.

Please do not hesitate to contact me at dwelsh@jcu.edu, or Shawn Carraher (regarding manuscripts) at Shawn_Carraher@tamu-commerce.edu, or Elisabeth Teal (regarding workshops) at ejteal@ngcsu.edu, if you have any questions or concerns.

Thank you for contributing to the success of this conference. I look forward to seeing you at the Westin Galleria in North Dallas for "Deep in the Heart of Entrepreneurship Texas '04"!