IASNR Committee Updates for Early 2020 Keeping in Touch Issue
Rich Stedman, Council Member
Cornell University (2018 – 2020)
Updates from the Finance Committee
Rich Stedman from Cornell University is now chairing the Finance Committee given Steve Daniels’ taking the reins as Interim Executive Director. Steve Daniels and Courtney Flint, both from Utah State University, remain members of the Finance Committee.
As alluded to in the Note from the Treasurer below, our finances have taken a hit during the first quarter of 2020 (whose haven’t?), given market downturns and challenges associated with not holding an in-person ISSRM in Cairns. However, we are well-positioned to ride out these challenges and continue to plan long-term.
A Note from the Treasurer
As for many professional organizations, 2020 is going to be a financially challenging year. The cancellation of ISSRM 2020 will have an impact on the organization, but mostly due to the lower membership renewals as most people renew their membership with their ISSRM registration. That said, we were able to get a refund of our deposit with the conference hotel and didn’t lose significant conference funds. Our investments will ride the rollercoaster along with everyone else, but only a portion of our investments are in stocks (most is in a money market account) so I do not believe we are at very high risk in that area. We had a net positive year in 2019 and our general financial health is fine. I believe we can withstand a deficit year in 2020. I am anticipating that we will be about neutral looking back over the last 2 years by the start of 2021. My best efforts to establish and maintain a budget went out the window this spring, but I’m hopeful that we will be back on track for 2021.
Our revenue streams are typically membership dues, our contract with Taylor & Francis, a small portion of ISSRM registration fees, and donations. Our expenses include the ISSRM conference (in person or virtual), contracts for administrative and web-technical support, journal subscriptions, accounting for taxes, software and office expenses, editor stipends, insurance, and a few other miscellaneous items.
If you have questions about IASNR finances, please let me know.
Courtney Flint, Treasurer and Membership Committee Chair
Utah State University (2018-2020)
Election Committee Co-Chairs
Updates from the IASNR 2020 Elections
Carla Koons Trentelman, Council Member
Weber State University (2020 – 2022)
Susan Sidder, Student Representative-Elect
Oregon State University (2019 – 2021)
We want to thank our members for all the help in making a great election process this year! The Elections Committee was thrilled to see strong nominations for each of the executive council positions, and enough nominees for both professional and student positions to give the membership a choice (although a tough one, due to having such great candidates!). The election included one candidate for each of the three Executive Council positions, six candidates for the three open Professional Council positions, and two candidates for the Student Representative-Elect position. The results are in and through your participation we elected our newest council members. Congratulations to our newly elected leadership:
- Bill Stewart (University of Illinois, USA), Executive Director
- Becky Schewe (Syracuse University, USA), Treasurer
- Lee Cerveny (USDA Forest Service, USA), Secretary
- Jesse Abrams (University of Georgia, USA), Council Member
- Tasos Hovardas (University of Cypress, Cypress), Council Member
- Kate Sherren (Dalhousie University, Canada), Council Member
- Kindral De’Arman (University of Oregon, USA), Student Representative Elect
We also want to thank Candace May (South Dakota State University, USA), Allie McCreary (Western Kentucky University, USA). Shawn Olson Hazboun (The Evergreen State College, USA), and Dana Johnson (University of Illinois, USA) for accepting their election nominations although they were not elected this year. Thank you everyone for your willingness to serve our great organization, and thank you to our IASNR members for participating in the election, both with your nominations and with your votes.
Greetings from the IASNR Site Selection Committee! We are dedicated to fostering the development of new proposals to host ISSRM conferences. We solicit proposals for future meetings, assist with their development, review material, provide feedback to potential hosts, and contribute to pre-meeting and on-site conference activities, as needed. If you are thinking about hosting a meeting, please don’t hesitate to get in touch. We would be delighted to talk further about your ideas.
We look forward to seeing you at future conferences! The 2021 ISSRM will be held in the one-and-only Portland, Oregon from June 20-24 2021. Also keep an eye out for updates on our meeting in San Jose, Costa Rica, which is tentatively scheduled for June 27-30th 2022.
~The IASNR Site Selection Committee: Carena van Riper (co-chair), Azahara Mesa Jurado (co-chair), Courtney Flint, Erin Seekamp, Kate Sherren, and Gene Theodori.
Carena J. van Riper, Council Member
University of Illinois (2018- 2020)
Zhao Ma, Secretary
Purdue University (2018-2020)
Updates from the Communications Committee
Greetings from the Communications Committee!
We have been thinking about you a lot – our members, our colleagues and friends, our students, and our organization. It has been such a stressful time for so many of us. We have heard different stories from many of you—some are so encouraging and uplifting, and others are so heartbreaking and infuriating. Whatever you are going through, I hope you know that your IASNR colleagues are thinking of you and wishing you all the best. Please keep sending us notes if you feel like it. Knowing how you are doing and figuring out how we can help each other in these trying times is just so important. We love hearing from you!
For now, we are working on several tasks outlined in our 2020 Work Plan, as well as addressing ongoing and emerging communication needs of our organization. This includes redesigning our
Keeping-in-Touch newsletter, changing it from the PDF format we have used for many years to this e-newsletter format to make it more accessible to our members. Please let us know how you feel about this new design and your ideas for improving it further. We are also working on strengthening our social media presence with a focus on Twitter, a platform used by many professional organizations. Our current focus is on developing an actionable social media plan to allow us to push out consistent content on a more regular basis that highlights member achievements, journal articles authored by members, and news articles related to society and natural resources topics. We also want to make sure that our Twitter content not only accurately reflects but strongly promotes the international scope of our organization.
In addition to these two areas of work, we continue to coordinate with other IASNR committees to increase the effectiveness and efficiency of our communication efforts as an organization. With many of us carrying out research, teaching, management, and public outreach work virtually, we do not want to overwhelm your already jammed inbox or overburden your already very busy schedule. Therefore, our current communication effort focuses on highlighting the various professional development opportunities and benefits IASNR is providing to support you and continuing to build a sense of shared identity and unity for all of us who are dedicated to society and natural resources issues. If you have any suggestions or ideas about how IASNR can better communicate with you, please do not hesitate to let us know ([email protected]) or you can email me directly ([email protected]).
Last but not least, I want to say a big “thank you” to Kathy Halvorsen from Michigan Technological University for her service on the IASNR Communications Committee. I also want to welcome Carla Trentelman from Weber State University and Chloe Wardropper from the University of Idaho for joining the Communications Committee. There are also three “oldie but goodie” Communications Committee members: Jens Emborg from the University of Copenhagen (IASNR Council member), John Strauser from the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign (student member), and myself, Zhao Ma from Purdue University (IASNR Secretary). As always, please let us know if you want to share any ideas or suggestions and if you are interested in becoming a member of this committee as well! Take care and stay safe, everyone!
Updates from the Professional Development Committee
Hello friends!
The Professional Development committee has been going back to basics, revisiting our charter and looking at how we integrate with the other IASNR committees.
As some members cycle off and we face the disruption of Covid-19, it seems like a good time to check in with you to consider what professional development might mean in this brave new world.
The virus has pushed us to face some of the realities that a carbon-constrained future will bring – will this be the “new normal”? We don’t really know what’ coming next – so let’s take this opportunity to equip ourselves for ongoing disruption and change.
An upcoming membership survey will help us drill into your needs for career development and new skills or knowledge. We urge you to let us know what training or insights might help you span the specific technical or creative challenges that you face now, as educators, administrators, researchers and citizens.
Tanya Howard, Council Member
University of New England, Australia (2020 – 2022)
In the short term:
- We will be supporting the planning and implementation of the virtual conference.
- At the regional scale, we will be reaching out to members across different time zones to develop professional relationships that build IASNR’s community across the global north and south.
If you have ideas, comments, suggestions about shaping the professional development agenda for IASNR, shoot us an email. You can also check out existing PD resources and activities at the IASNR website: https://www5.iasnr.org/professional-development/ You can find teaching syllabi, recordings of research methods webinars, and other useful links.
Take care,
Tanya Howard (IASNR Council member, PD committee co-chair)
Mark Roleau (PD Committee co-chair)
Student Affairs Committee Co-Chairs
Brett Alan Miller, Student Representative
Utah State University (2018 – 2020)
Susan Sidder, Student Representative-Elect
Oregon State University (2019 – 2021)
Greetings student (and non-student) members of IASNR!
First, we would like to congratulate and welcome the newly elected Student Representative, Kindra J. De’Arman (University of Oregon, USA). Kindra will begin her term as Student Representative-Elect in Summer 2020, transitioning to the Student Representative Summer 2021.
We are happy to be a part of the planning and organization of the Virtual Conference planned for July 11th – 26th. We are currently organizing a Virtual Student Forum as part of this conference. Synchronous and asynchronous engagement will build connections among student members and hone professional skills through activities such as a science communication workshop, interaction with Society & Natural Resources editors, facilitated networking, and more. We hope to see you there!
In addition to hosting a virtual Student Forum, the Best Student Paper Competition will continue virtually this year. Click here for requirements and submission deadlines. Please note: Papers must be presented at the virtual conference to meet award requirements.
Also, in partnership with the Professional Development Committee, SAC is working to support a mentorship component of the Virtual Conference with plans to extend mentorship opportunities outside of the conference setting. Stay tuned for more details!
Finally, we regret that this year there will be no Quiz Bowl due to the cancelation of ISSRM 2020 in Cairns, Australia. However, we look forward to a lively and engaging Quiz Bowl at ISSRM 2021 in Portland, Oregon.
We are excited to interact with you all virtually soon and reconnect in person at ISSRM 2021!
Chloe Wardropper, Council Member
University of Idaho (2019 – 2021)
Updates from the Ethics Committee
Greetings, members of the Ethics committee are excited to support the IASNR by carrying out fair and timely investigation of matters related to violation of IASNR ethics code. We aim to foster a welcome environment where members can freely express and exchange ideas with mutual respect and trust.
The Committee urges all members (new and existing) to review and abide by the IASNR code of ethics (click here to view).
As always, the committee appreciates your respectful and ethical conduct in both formal and informal venues of the IASNR.
~ Chloe Wardropper (co-chair), Carena van Riper (co-chair) Azahara Mesa-Jurado (member), and Tobin N. Walton (member)
Updates from the Ad-hoc Membership Committee
A new ad hoc committee was established this spring to evaluate our membership services and ways to maximize our efforts to recruit, retain, and serve our members. We have had robust discussions leading to a fabulous list of new ideas that we are already working to implement! Ideas include the virtual conference to be held in July, opportunities for virtual networking (a virtual coffee & beer discussion was held on Earth Day), new communication ideas, and new ideas for how to recruit and retain members.
Membership Committee members include: Jesse Engebretson, Max Eriksson, Courtney Flint (chair), Jessica Hill, Tanya Howard, Paulus Mao, Milton Newberry, Erin Seekamp, Rich Stedman, and Carla Trentelman
We welcome your ideas and we welcome your continued membership!
Courtney Flint, Treasurer and Membership Committee Chair
Utah State University (2018-2020)