Environmental Communication Interest Group

The Environmental Communication Interest Group had a fantastic first year and is moving forward to introduce by-laws and hold elections for vice-chair and secretary in 2012. According to current membership records, the group has around 150 members, up from 80 a year ago. The group has expanded its web site and formed a discussion list (Forum) on the ICA main site. With a successful preconference (that we hope generates a guest-edited journal issue) and extended session in Phoenix, the group wants to provide a pre-conference and extended session again for the London conference, in fact proposals are already in the works. If you have not already, please join the Environmental Communication Interest Group and enjoy a diverse set of people, ideas, and research on all manner of environmental communication. If you are already a member, remember to vote on the by-laws and our first elected officers this fall.

Instructional and Developmental Communication

Division The Instructional and Developmental Communication Division of ICA would like to welcome the first three graduate students to be competitively selected to participate in the Junior Officer Shadowing Program. QuingHua Yang (Columbia U), Jan Lauren Boyles (American U), and Michelle Epstein Garland (U of Tennessee) will be working with the IDD officer team throughout the year to learn more about ICA, IDD, and conference planning for London 2013. Congratulations!

Organizational Communication Division

Please be sure to vote in the forthcoming ICA officer elections. Our division will be electing a secretary as well as voting on a number of changes to bylaws. We have worked hard to ensure that the bylaws reflect our current, preferred practices, and we need a two-thirds majority to approve changes. Your vote counts! Also, as you renew your association membership (reminders will come from ICA over the next couple months), you will notice a new option for Organizational Communication Division Members called the Student Travel Aid Resource (STAR) Fund. With our conferences held in many parts of the world, the financial challenge for students wishing to attend our annual meeting is often immense. Yet, it is these students who represent the future of our field and who often benefit the most from conference attendance. The STAR Fund will help us address this need. All the money donated to the STAR fund goes directly to student travel awards to assist these division members in attending doctoral consortia, division panels/preconferences, and the various other scholarly and social events at our annual meeting. Please consider adding any amount you can—whether it is $5 or $500—to STAR to support our student members. For more information on the fund or to find out how you can give even if you’ve already renewed, please contact division vice-chair Craig Scott (crscott@rutgers.edu).