[Air-L] AoIR Executive Committee Elections

[Kendall, Lori]

Dear all,

I am pleased to announce that AoIR is now seeking nominations for the new Executive Committee to take office in October of this year and serve until October 2017.

Below in this email, you will find: A. Time frame of the election. B. Description of the AoIR governance system and of the elected positions. C. Nominations and Elections Processes. And D. Questions for Candidates. Instructions on voting will come later.

A. Time Frame of the Election:

1. Call for Nominations: opens April 20, 2015.

2. Nominations close for all positions (4 officer positions and 3 open seats) May 5, 2015.

3. Candidates will be listed on aoir.org and further information will be made available on our membership system, where discussion forums will enable interaction with the candidates.

4. Voting begins May 21, 2015 at the balloting site. (Details for accessing this site will be sent in a later message through the membership system.)

5. Voting ends June 1, 2015.

Election results will be announced on air-l. The new committee is formally introduced and assumes its duties during the AoIR conference in Phoenix, 21-24 October 2015.

B. AoIR Governance and Description of Elected Positions:

The organizational structure of AoIR is simple. There are 5 officers (President, Vice President, Secretary, Treasurer, and Graduate Student representative). The 9-member Executive Committee consists of these officers, plus the Past President and 3 open seat representatives. Elected officials hold their positions for two years. After two years, the Vice President becomes President. In this election, nominations are invited for Vice President, Secretary, Treasurer, Graduate Student representative, and 3 open seats. You may nominate yourself or someone else you think would do a good job. Details on the nomination procedure follow below.

Here are brief descriptions of positions:

President: Acts as "CEO" and supervises the organization. The President’s duties include serving as part of the Conference Committee. This position is not directly elected, as the Vice President becomes President after two years.

Vice President: "Back up" for President, performing various duties as they arise; becomes President after 2 years. The Vice President also serves on the Conference Committee.

Secretary: With assistance from the Association Coordinator, the Secretary handles records and membership matters and participates in decision-making by the Executive Committee.

Treasurer: Takes care of financial and related administrative duties (e.g., annual report to membership and U.S. tax authorities), including close attention to the annual Internet Research (IR) conference budget. The Treasurer serves on the Conference Committee.

Graduate Student Representative: Responsible for running graduate student activities. Participates in decision-making of the Executive Committee. The Graduate Student Representative must be actively enrolled in a degree program at the time of nomination and election. All members can vote for the grad student representative.

Open Committee Seats: Three open Seats on the Executive Committee represent membership of AoIR, and contribute to decision-making.

Immediate Past President: Serves on the Executive Committee.

More information can be found in the AoIR Bylaws:

http://aoir.org/bylaws/

Candidates should familiarize themselves with the duties laid out in the Bylaws. I also encourage persons interested in running for a specific position to contact myself or any of the current office-holder(s) with any questions.


C. Nominations and Elections Processes.

Only a member of AoIR can run for a position, nominated by anyone. If nominated for more than one position a nominee must choose to run for one (and only one) position in this election. You may nominate yourself or another person (or people). If nominating someone else, it is best to confirm with that person that they are willing to run.

Self Nominations: Email AoIR Association Coordinator Anna Lauren Hoffmann at <ac at aoir dot org> and indicate the position for which you are nominating yourself. Please provide, in your nomination email a short candidate statement addressing the questions below.

Nominating Others: Email AoIR Association Coordinator Anna Lauren Hoffmann at <ac at aoir dot org> with the name of the person you want to nominate, the position for which you are nominating this person, contact information for that person, and an indication of whether you know if this person would accept this nomination. (If you don't know, we'll contact them and ask).

All candidates for election will be required to provide answers to the questions listed at the end of this email, have the answers posted to the AoIR election forum website, and participate in an online candidate forum.

In addition the Graduate Student candidates must confirm in their response that they comply with the by-laws: The Graduate Student Representative must be actively enrolled in a degree program at the time of nomination and election.

The voting system used by AoIR is one vote per member for each of the eight positions for election listed above. Votes will be tallied using a balloting software site. In the case of the four directly elected officers, the candidate with the highest number of votes shall be declared the winner; in the case of the open seats, the three candidates with the highest, second-highest and third highest votes shall be declared the winners of the open seats.

In the case of tied results for the officer positions, the winner shall be determined by the ballot counters, by drawing of lots, using a method that ensures each of the tying candidates has an equal chance of success and witnessed by at least 1 person independent of the association. In the case of tied results for the open seat positions, the drawing of lots shall be used only when there are more tied candidates than seats available.

D. Questions for Candidates:

1. What are your qualifications for this position (including prior experience and participation in AoIR)?

2. Please describe two or three short-term goals you would like to achieve through membership on the executive (including a rationale for each and how you would contribute to their achievement).

3. What is your long-term vision for AoIR?

4. What else should voters consider when deciding whether or not to vote for you?

In answering the questions, please be concise and give information specific to the position for which you are nominating and which will permit voters to assess your case for election to that position.

In closing - please consider contributing your time and energy to making AoIR even better in the upcoming years! Many thanks in advance to all who will consider running and serving AoIR in this way, and thanks also to those who vote!


Lori Kendall
President, AoIR