Newsletter – June 2016
PRESIDENT’S COLUMN
Listening to Our Members: Part 2
By Sarah Witham Bednarz
This is my last column as AAG president and it is perhaps the most important because I seek your input on a very significant matter for Council regarding our flagship journal, the Annals.
Last fall we conducted a membership survey; as I reported in the previous month’s column, the purpose of the survey was to, “… understand current member perceptions, to identify areas where AAG is successfully delivering value today, and to uncover opportunities to provide greater value and support to the members.”
We posed a number of questions to measure satisfaction with our journals and to explore interest in new publications. In this column I report briefly on the survey findings that then lead to the request for your feedback concerning the organization of the Annals.
Recent columns from the President
ANNUAL MEETING
Registration & Call for Papers Open Aug. 1
Join Us in Boston, April 5-9, 2017, for the AAG Annual Meeting
The AAG invites scholars, professionals, and students to attend and present their latest work in geography at the AAG Annual Meeting, which will be held in Boston from April 5 to April 9, 2017.
The conference will feature over 6,000 presentations, posters, workshops, and field trips. The call for papers and registration will open on August 1, 2016.
NEWS
AAG Enhancing Diversity Award Now Accepting Nominations
The AAG Enhancing Diversity Award honors those geographers who have pioneered efforts toward or actively participated in encouraging a more diverse discipline over the course of several years. A few examples of these demonstrated actions include noteworthy research on racial understanding; mentorship of students who are the first in their family to attend college; and inclusion and advocacy for faculty and student groups — in particular those with disabilities, women, LGBT and others.
To make nominations for the Enhancing Diversity Award, include the complete name and address of the nominee and a concise (500 words maximum) yet specific description of the accomplishments that warrant the nominee’s selection. Send nominations to grantsawards [at] aag [dot] org with AAG Enhancing Diversity Award as the subject line. Read more.
Inspired by Outstanding Teaching, Service, Research? AAG Seeks Your Nominations
AAG Honors, the highest awards offered by the American Association of Geographers, are offered annually to recognize outstanding accomplishments by members in research and scholarship, teaching, education, service to the discipline, public service outside academe and for lifetime achievement. Although the AAG and its specialty groups make other important awards (see Grants and Awards), AAG Honors remain among the most prestigious awards in American geography and have been awarded since 1951.
Individual AAG members, specialty groups, affinity groups, departments, and other interested parties are encouraged to nominate outstanding colleagues by June 30. Read More.
FUNDING & RESEARCH OPPORTUNITIES
AAG Seeks Observers To Attend United Nations Climate Change Conference
The American Association of Geographers has been granted Observer Organization status to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC). With this formal designation, the AAG is permitted to submit to the UNFCCC Secretariat its nominations for representatives to attend the United Nations Climate Change Conference that will take place from November 7-18, 2016 in Marrakesh, Morocco (COP-22/CMP12).
Prior to midnight Monday, July 25, 2016 persons interested in being nominated to attend by the AAG must be a current member of the AAG and provide their information via email to cmannozzi [at] aag [dot] org. Learn More.
MEMBER AND DEPARTMENT NEWS
Greg Elmes, Retired WVU geography Professor Receives Lifetime Achievement Award
Greg Elmes, professor emeritus in the Department of Geology and Geography at West Virginia University was recently honored with a Lifetime Achievement award by the West Virginia Association of Geospatial Professionals for his dedication to the study and promotion of geographic information systems (GIS).
Though Elmes retired from teaching courses at West Virginia University in 2015, he remains active in research in the geography department and with the West Virginia GIS Technical Center, housed in the department.
He has more than 30 years of experience in geographic information systems and the application of GIS techniques to societal issues such as public health, industrial geography, forensics, crime mapping, and public safety. Learn More.
IN MEMORIAM
PUBLICATIONS
May 2016 Issue of the ‘Annals of the AAG’ Now Available
After the AAG meetings in Hawaii in 1999, a new format for the Annals of the Association of American Geographers was introduced wherein four sections and four editors were put in place to represent the breadth of the academic discipline of geography. Four major areas – (i) Environmental Sciences, (ii) Methods, Models, and Geographic Information Sciences, (iii) Nature and Society, and (iv) People, Place, and Region – were introduced as sections in the Annals to offset long-standing concerns about the lack of representation of certain aspects of the discipline (especially physical geography) in one of its flagship journals. Further, concerns about perceived biases accruing to a single editor were allayed by establishing an editorial team, with each editor taking responsibility for one of the four major subject areas.
With an understanding that the discipline is ever changing and defining a core or establishing specific fundamental areas of endeavor is always contentious, the sections were never meant to be immutable or permanent. On the recommendation of the Publications Committee, AAG Council is considering removing the Annals section headings while maintaining the integrity of an editorial team that represents the breadth of the discipline. Read More.
NEW PUBLICATIONS
MORE
AAG Welcomes interns CJ Burka, Nina Feldman, and Maggie Busek for the summer semester.
IN THE NEWS
Popular stories from the AAG SmartBrief
EVENTS CALENDER
- Dynamic Mapping of Secondary Cities Symposium, Cambridge, MA, June 14-15
- Institute of Australian Geographers 2016 Conference, Adelaide, Australia, June 29-July 1
- 2016 Earth Educators’ Rendezvous, Madison, WI, July 18-22
- The Society for the Study of Social Problems Annual Meeting, Seattle, WA, August 19-21
- Urban Transitions Global Summit 2016, Shanghai, China, September 5-9
- Race Ethnicity and Place (REP) VIII Conference, Kent, OH, September 21-23
Submit News to the AAG Newsletter. To share your news, submit announcements to newsletter [at] aag [dot] org.
