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President's Column

April 2021

It is hard to believe we are already so far into 2021, and we are preparing for another Annual Meeting, having some uncertainty and hard decisions to make about how to best serve our membership.  We continue to gather data from you all and are narrowing down to a few alternatives and plans for the 2021 meetings.  We heard from over 700 members, 230 selected paper authors and 118 poster presenters, and it is almost evenly split in terms of those AAEA members’ plans and intentions to participate in meetings.  So, we will make a final Board decision in the next 2 weeks, but it is very likely some in-person sessions and activities will be held, and now we must get to work figuring out the details.

As stated in the email accompanying the survey on meeting plans:

  1. Regardless of our final decision, a significant set of our sessions will be offered virtually so there is an ability for the widest set of our members, speakers and awardees to participate.  Please do understand we will have the program finalized later than usual because of these unique planning challenges.
    1. We will stream all the plenary sessions from the ballroom, including the Gordon Rausser Keynote, AAEA Business Meeting, Presidential Address, Galbraith Lecture, Fellows Address and a 40th anniversary celebration of CWAE and COSBAE
    2. On Sunday, we will share our plenary room (with streaming options) with the Western Agricultural Economics Association who is joining us this year and allow them to host and stream their own Keynote, Presidential address and Invited paper series
    3. On Sunday and Monday evenings, we will stream the Awards and Fellows Ceremonies
    4. We hope to feature a set of track sessions and organized symposia as synchronous sessions as well, but final details on those will be made in late May.
  2. Texas is open for business, but our hotel is willing to offer great flexibility in assuring safety measures, more spacing in the rooms where we present, and many options for social events (we may have a seated reception for instance). Masks are also mandatory inside the JW Marriott hotel and will be required for any in-person meeting.
  3. We do expect to have more limited social opportunities in the formal meeting facility, so that we can honor any remaining advice on distancing and limiting the size of informal gatherings (where we cannot control occupancy by the number of chairs provided, for instance). 

On another note, you all received a ballot recently, and I urge you to consider this great slate of nominees, read their biographies and vote on who you want to lead the association going forward.  In addition to these ballot nominees, my successor, Dr. Madhu Khanna will be making calls this spring for volunteers to fill out our important committee assignments, and I urge you to consider putting your name into the pool for volunteers (see https://www.aaea.org/about-aaea/aaea-committees/president-elect-seeks-volunteers-for-aaea-committees for more information) and/or accepting her call to serve if she reaches out to you. This organization remains strong because of the volunteer leaders who choose to serve, and we on the Board notice your professionalism and contributions.

So, know that you will continue to get active communications about the Annual Meeting over the next 6 weeks, please respond when you are asked to confirm your participation, and please grant us some grace and patience as we finalize the program, knowing we are having to explore models and delivery options that complicate an already challenging “exercise” in coordinating a program with so many elements.

Dawn Thilmany
AAEA President