We are quickly approaching our May conference in Chicago. The final version of our program is being sent to the printer by the end of this week. As part of our "green" initiatives, the program will be available on flash drives. As this process is moving along, members of the Board of Directors and various committees are beginning to finalize their charges and prepare their reports. These reports, along with details about various accomplishments and business matters, will become part of our annual report, one of Sonia Livingstone’s presidential initiatives aimed toward increasing the transparency of our operations. Last year’s annual report is available under the "About ICA" button at the top of our website.
Over the last several months, I’ve gotten to know many current and potential ICA members through numerous e-mail messages and other exchanges. Sometimes I am asked about ways to network during our conferences and the histories of ICA and world regional involvements. At other times, I am asked about serving the association in different volunteer roles, including as President, and about the impact of globalization and technology on the development of ICA. I also have been asked about memorable experiences in travelling to particular locations and conferences throughout this year. And one question that I am often asked is how one can become more involved and learn the ropes as a scholar in our discipline. Actually, the question usually is about what it means to be and how one becomes a scholar in the field of communication.
In my last Presidential column, I talked about different commitments that we share as members of our discipline. For this column, I’d like to comment on how you can use your membership to its fullest. Our staff often answers questions about who is chairing what Division or Interest Group, how to find out about a Division's budget, what the charge of a particular committee or role of an officer is, who is a member and how to contact that member, and so on. They are happy to respond to inquiries.
However, almost every answer is available on our ICA website. Our bylaws and procedures indicate what officers do. Our search processes to locate a member anywhere in the world are very easy—you can check by region, keywords, country, name, institutional affiliation, and other designators. We invite you to examine our website and indicate to us what else we might do to make it even easier for you to optimize the value of your membership. Please feel free use our business meeting, the last hour of our Board of Directors meeting, as an opportunity to meet all the ICA officers and bring your suggestions!
