With Labor Day, alas, now come and gone and thoughts of fall creeping in, here's a brief summary of nine AIBS activities that we have been working on and are now starting to hit their stride. This is not a complete list by any means...
1. 2006 AIBS Board elections are underway
2. 2006 AIBS evolution symposium at the NABT meetings, 14 October
3. 2007 AIBS annual meeting / 2007 Council meeting
4. NEON update
5. NESCent update
6. AIBS Education Committee initiatives
7. AIBS Public Policy Office adds staff
8. 2009 as the Year of Public Understanding of Science
9. Coalition on the Public Understanding of Science
DETAILS:
1.
The 2006 AIBS Board of Directors elections are underway. Please see the front page of the AIBS website & the online ballot at www.aibs.org/vote . A mass email will be going to all AIBS members this week. Paper ballots will be mailed soon, also. Polls close 27 October.
2.
The evolution symposium at the National Association of Biology Teachers annual meeting is on 14 October this year, in Albuquerque, NM co-sponsored with the Biological Sciences Curriculum Studies and the National Evolutionary Synthesis Center. The program and registration link are online here . AIBS Immediate Past-President Marvalee Wake is chairing this activity.
3.
Plans for the 2007 AIBS annual meeting (May 14 - 15), on the theme of Evolutionary Biology and Human Health, are advancing nicely & the website will soon be updated with new information. Online registration will open soon. AIBS President-Elect Douglas Futuyma has already lined up most of the plenary speakers. We are meeting jointly with the Natural Science Collections Alliance & immediately after the International Union of Biological Sciences general assembly, all in the same Washington DC hotel, the Capital Hilton.
The 2007 annual meeting will be followed (May 15 - 16) by the meeting of the AIBS Council of Member Societies and Organizations, also at the Capital Hilton.
4.
National Ecological Observatory Network (NEON). The latest draft of the NEON Integrated Science and Education Plan is available online for community comment at www.neoninc.org . In preparation for this release, Jim MacMahon, Chair of the NEON Board, sent a letter to the community on 1 Sept. Comments received by 7 September will be especially useful as NEON, Inc. and NSF will be working to make additional decisions about the design of NEON before 15 September.
Alan Knapp is the new PI on the current NEON grant. Alan is Professor of Biology and Senior Ecologist for the Graduate Degree Program in Ecology at Colorado State University; see the People section of the NEON website for his bio. Alan is also the PI on the next major NEON grant now being prepared for submission within a week from now.
NEON is in the process of interviewing for a Project Manager .
5.
National Evolutionary Synthesis Center (NESCent). The Evolution Education group met for the first time at NESCent last July (AIBS President-Elect Doug Futuyma and AIBS Education Committee Chair Gordon Uno were there, as were AIBS Education and Outreach Manager Susan Musante, NESCent Education and Outreach Manager Kristin Jenkins (an AIBS employee), and myself). NESCent Director Kathleen Smith has been following up with the attendees re next steps in developing activities under AIBS's subcontract with NESCent to help with education / outreach activities.
6.
The AIBS Education Committee, chaired by Gordon Uno, held an all-day meeting in Washington DC two weeks ago that by all accounts was extremely productive. The meeting focused on three main themes:
- Benchmarks for Introductory Courses and Four-year Programs in Biology (the AIBS SPARS division may become involved in managing these assessment procedures)
- Biology Education Summit (various funding proposals are being submitted)
- Evolution as the underlying Theme in all Biology Courses (a NESCent working group may be convened on this topic, and we've been talking with our friends at the Botanical Society of America about using the very nice online teaching / mentoring software they developed for their Planting Science program).
7.
Holly Menninger (Ph.D.) will be joining the AIBS Public Policy Office staff later this year. Also, Megan Kelhart (M.Sc.) has just started on the AIBS Public Policy Office staff. Holly and Megan are coming on board as Public Policy Associates, working with AIBS Public Policy Director Robert Gropp, to fill staff vacancies from earlier this year. Holly is finishing up her doctorate in the Behavior, Ecology, Evolution, and Systematics (BEES) program at the University of Maryland, with Margaret Palmer. She's a past recipient of the AIBS Emerging Public Policy Leader Award and has a number of years' experience in scientific outreach with a variety of audiences, including the media and Capitol Hill. Megan has recently received her Masters of Natural Resources from Virginia Tech (Bachelors in Political Science). She has previously worked on Capitol Hill for members of the Senate and the House of Representatives.
8.
Preparations continue to go public this fall with the implementation of last May's resolution from the AIBS Council that 2009 be established as the Year of Public Understanding of Science. The Council resolution reads:
- Whereas the AIBS Council believes that it is within our members' and society's interest to increase understanding and appreciation of how science works, we therefore advise the AIBS Board and staff to designate 2009 as the Year of Public Understanding of Science.
- The AIBS Council will promote this idea within its individual member societies and advises the AIBS Board and staff to seek alliances with others (National Research Council, American Chemical Society, American Physics Society, American Association for the Advancement of Science, Federation of American Societies for Experimental Biology, etc) to promote and further develop this idea.
So far, we've had some planning meetings with Jay Labov and Barbara Schaal re NAS/NRC involvement, and we have a meeting on 22 September with the folks at FASEB. The plan is to meet soon thereafter, in mid-October or so, with folks from the American Chemical Society, American Physics Society, American Institute of Physics, American Association for the Advancement of Science, etc. to form a core planning group for 2009 activities, PR, etc.
9.
Work continues on COPUS, the Coalition on the Public Understanding of Science, a coalition project in which I am participating as a member of the organizing committee along with:
Lee Allison, Director, Arizona Geological Survey
Jack Hehn, Director of Education, American Institute of Physics
Judy Kass, Senior Project Director, Public Understanding of Science, American Association for the Advancement of Science
Michael Mayhew, Principal, Synoptic, LLC (former NSF Program Officer in GEO)
Judy Scotchmoor, Assistant Director, University of California, Museum of Paleontology, Education and Public Programs
Richard Stucky, Curator, Denver Museum of Nature and Science
Planning for COPUS is supported by a grant from NSF to UC-Berkeley (Roy Caldwell and David Lindberg, PIs). The next COPUS organizational meeting is 12 - 14 September in Denver, hosted by Richard Stucky at the Denver Museum of Nature and Science. Later this year, COPUS plans to issue its initial call for individuals and organizations to join its network.
