Even as American citizens took to the polls in this past fall's historic national presidential election, our own NASW members were casting ballots for our organization's new slate of officers and the members at large of the board of directors. To some people, the U.S. presidential election felt overdue. In NASW's case, the 2008 election really was overdue — and that flawed timing is something that we need your help to rectify in yet another membership vote; you'll be able to cast ballots electronically from mid-May to the end of June.
Even as American citizens took to the polls in this past fall's historic national presidential election, our own NASW members were casting ballots for our organization's new slate of officers and the members at large of the board of directors. To some people, the U.S. presidential election felt overdue. In NASW's case, the 2008 election really was overdue — and that flawed timing is something that we need your help to rectify in yet another membership vote; you'll be able to cast ballots electronically from mid-May to the end of June.
Let me explain.
Historically, NASW has held its elections every other year in the late fall, with final results announced in December. Each new set of officers and board members took office officially on Jan. 1. The elected board would meet in person for the first time at the annual meeting and workshops — in the past held in conjunction with the annual meeting of the American Association for the Advancement of Science, in the middle of February. That worked well with new board members meeting only a month and a half after they took office.
Now, however, NASW's workshops and annual membership meeting are held in late October; the election results coming in well afterward. As a result, the current sitting group of officers and board members, who took office this past Jan. 1, will not gather in person until this coming October — 10 months into their respective two-year terms. We could set another date to meet earlier, but — in addition to the difficulty of dragging people off their work desks more than once a year — doing so would involve extra travel costs for the board and NASW that most of us would prefer to avoid in these challenging economic times.
Instead, I would like to move the elections into the summer (beginning in 2010) so that the next board will take office in October and gather together in person for the first time the same month at that annual meeting. Yes, I realize that will shorten the current board's term by about two months, but it is a necessary one-time correction.
According to the NASW constitution, changing the election timing requires a simple majority vote of the entire membership. To fix this situation for the future, in other words, we'll need about two minutes of your time to fill out an electronic ballot. Soon we will send a notice over NASW-announce with a link to take you to a site where you can cast your vote to amend our constitution.
Following the dictates of NASW's constitution, I declared my intention to have a membership vote on this amendment during the annual membership meeting back in October 2008, as you may have read in the minutes (SW, Winter 2008-09), and gathered the requisite 20 signatures from those present to support the following amendment:
The executive board will set the timing of the biennial NASW elections within six months of the annual meeting, with timely notification of the members thereafter.
With this wording, the board, if it should ever again need to move the timing of the annual meeting in the future, can do so without having another member-wide vote. That way we do not have to impinge on your time with this sort of tedious administrative detail more than once!
So please take a few moments to vote "yes" when you get that NASW-Announce message. Let me know if you have questions or need further information. Many thanks for your help in smoothing our NASW operations.
Mariette DiChristina is executive editor of Scientific American and Scientific American Mind. Reach her at mdichristina@sciam.com.
(NASW members can read the rest of the Spring 2009 ScienceWriters by logging into the members area.)
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