ASLE is a nonprofit professional association with a dynamic membership and one part-time professional staff member. ASLE thrives because of the commitment of its members to carrying out our work; therefore we invite our members to sustain this vital work and to shape our future by considering serving as an officer or coordinator.
This fall, ASLE will hold elections for:
- Vice President
- Executive Council: Regional Collaboratories Seat
- Graduate Student Liaison (junior)
If you would like to nominate yourself or another ASLE member for one of these positions, please contact us at info@asle.org.
Online voting will be conducted from mid-November to mid-December. Candidate statements for elected office (maximum of 500 words) are due by November 14, 2024.
Please send all candidate statements via email, as PDF or Word attachments, to info@asle.org. Feel free to inquire if you have any questions about the offices, duties or statements; full position descriptions are posted below.
Vice President
(Term: 2025-2027)
The Vice President will serve for two years in that role; they will also serve on the voting executive of the Association for a third year as Immediate Past Vice President.
The Vice President is expected to participate in the annual officers’ meeting (held virtually in recent years) in non-conference years, and attend the officers’ meeting in-person during biennial conference years.
Responsibilities
- Act as President pro tem whenever the President is absent, has resigned, or is otherwise unable to perform the duties of that office
- Organize the off-year EC annual meeting, and assist with moving agenda items forward from the conference-year EC meeting.
- Assist the President(s) with organizing the Executive Council meeting at the biennial conference.
- At least once per year, work with the President(s) to assess, prioritize, and assign or take on various organizational goals set forth in the ASLE Strategic Plan.
- Serve as a member of the Budget Committee (2-year budget cycle)
- Chair the Nominating Committee for fall elections
- Serve as member of the Biennial Performance Review Committee for the Managing Director, chaired by the ASLE Executive Secretary
- Serve as a member of the conference committee, and take on specific duties in consultation with Conference Chair and conference committee members.
The IPVP will serve as a mentor and liaison to the incoming VP, and continue to support the Association’s mission and to advance the Strategic Plan in consultation with the President(s) and VP. The IPVP may be called upon to initiate special projects, and serve on ad-hoc committees. The IPVP retains full voting rights on the EC.
Executive Council: Regional Collaboratories Seat
(Term: 2025-2027)
The Executive Council (EC) is the primary policy-making body of the Association. The EC reviews programming, procedures, and policies of the Association regularly and revises them as needed to meet the Association’s mission most effectively. EC members are expected to participate in the annual officers’ meeting (held virtually in recent years) in non-conference years, and attend the officers’ meeting in-person during biennial conference years. Between formal meetings, EC members will be consulted and vote electronically as necessary. EC members are elected for three-year terms.
In the 2021 Strategic Plan, ASLE officers decided to designate several EC positions to carry out particular core functions of the organization. One of these new designations in our revised bylaws is the Regional Collaboratories Officer*.
Responsibilities
- Identify possible regions, understanding participants’ interest in engaging with both place of primary residence and region of work.
- Issue a call to members to identify those interested in forming a regional network.
- Identify/tap regional liaison(s)who will coordinate the network and get a preliminary sense of what is needed, and what might work, in given regions.
- Work with the Treasurer and Managing Director to determine seed funding amounts and designate/distribute funds.
- Work with the newly designated EC member, the Conference Chair, to create space and time for regional collabs to meet and strategize at the next biennial conference, and to feature the work of the seeded collab in a workshop or sponsored panel at the conference.
- Manage communication between the regional liaison(s) and the ASLE EC and Managing Director.
- Assist with training and onboarding new participants in any collaboratories that are formed.
- Encourage regional collaboratories to partner with public writing and digital strategies groups to generate content featuring scholarly and pedagogical experts in the region.
- Review the ASLE Strategic Plan, and work with officers to prioritize and implement the goals and action items of the Association.
* The Strategic Plan defines Regional Collaboratories as follows:
“We propose that ASLE actively foster self-organizing regional collaboratories and seed these as needed/desired. Because of their smaller size and regional anchoring, regional co-labs present numerous opportunities and advantages for ASLE members. These include: gathering together people from multiple disciplines, diverse kinds of academic institutions (CCs, HBCUs, HSIs, liberal arts colleges, public regionals, R1s, etc.), cultural sector entities, community organizations and collectives; encouraging cost-effective and carbon footprint-lowering, multi-institutional visiting lecture series; bolstering education in the environmental humanities at institutions with limited resources; building and strengthening relations of reciprocity among academics, grassroots networks, and local and regional nonprofits to build more just environmental futures.”
Graduate Student Liaison – junior
(Term: 2025-2026)
The two Graduate Student Liaisons (GSLs) represent the interests, needs, and concerns of ASLE’s graduate student members. One GSL will be elected for a two-year term each year, serving as non-voting junior GSL in the first year, and voting Senior GSL in the second year of their term. In conference years, the senior GSL will serve in an advisory capacity through the next biennial conference cycle to provide continuity, mentoring, and guidance.
GSLs work with the ASLE Mentoring Coordinators and other ASLE Officers and Program Coordinators to develop and implement policies, initiatives, and programs that support the well-being and development of graduate students and graduate studies. The GSLs are expected to participate in the annual officers’ meeting (held virtually in recent years) in non-conference years, and attend the officers’ meeting in-person during biennial conference years.
Responsibilities:
- Work with the Mentoring Coordinator, ASLE officers and coordinators, and ASLE members to organize panels, workshops, and other professionalization/ mentoring/social events for graduate students and junior academics at the ASLE Biennial Conference
- Develop material pertinent to graduate students and graduate study for the ASLE website
- Work on initiatives for undergraduate students, as appropriate
- Manage the ASLE Graduate Student Facebook page and other student-related social media outlets
- Provide virtual and physical forums for discussion between GSLs and ASLE graduate student members, including the Graduate Student Interest Group Meeting at the ASLE Biennial Conference
- Stay up-to-date on professionalization, graduate studies, and graduate student trends, challenges, and opportunities beyond ASLE to better serve our member community
