NEWSLETTER
  Animal Behavior Society

ABS Executive Committee Meeting Minutes

Monday June 12, 2017
Room IC318 University of Toronto Scarborough Campus

Reports from Executive Committee Members

President: William Searcy
Past Year

• At the 2016 EC meeting we discussed amending Article 4 of the ABS Constitution; this discussion focused attention on whether the existing wording of the constitution allowed electronic voting on amendments. I obtained an opinion on this question from a lawyer who advises ABS, who advised that existing wording only allowed voting by postal mail. We then proposed an amendment to Article 11 to allow electronic voting on amendments, which was approved unanimously by the 149 members returning ballots.
• We submitted to the members an amendment to Article 4, establishing two new officer positions, a Public Affairs Officer and a Graduate Student Representative, and changing the terms of office for Program Officer and Program Officer Elect from two years to one. In electronic voting, the amendment passed with 326 in favor, 1 against, and 39 abstentions.
• I was charged with forming an ad hoc committee to write a code of conduct for ABS meetings and asked Tamra Mendelson to chair this committee. Tamra and her committee formulated an ABS Meeting Code of Conduct; the code of conduct was approved by EC vote.
• Formation of a second ad hoc committee was prompted by a motion from the Applied Animal Behavior Committee, requesting that a subcommittee be formed to explore alternatives to the current requirement that Certified Applied Animal Behaviorists name the ABS as an additional insured party on their liability insurance. I chaired this ad hoc committee myself and recruited other committee members from both the EC and the applied animal behavior community. At the 2016 meeting the EC had discussed the possibility of dispensing with liability coverage for ABS and relying instead on disclaimers to protect the society; however, we found opinions from both our lawyer and our insurance company that the ABS needs to be covered by liability insurance. We looked into the possibility of the ABS obtaining an umbrella policy to cover the society for the liability of all the CAABs, but this alternative proved to be impractical. Given these and other findings, we recommend that ABS maintain present requirements with respect to liability insurance.
• I oversaw the election of new Fellows. We received nine nominations for eight candidates from EC members and existing Fellows. We elected six new Fellows: Verner Bingman, Jennifer Fewell, Todd Freeberg, Vladimir Pravosudov, Kerry Shaw, and James Traniello.
• We co-signed a letter from the American Institute of Biological Sciences to the incoming U.S. administration, urging support for biological sciences and attention to scientific advice. We also co-signed a letter from the American Association for the Advancement of Science to the U.S. Congress, advocating improved funding for science. The ABS partnered with the March for Science, and on April 22 ABS members participated in the main march in Washington, D.C. and in satellite marches around the world.
• I conducted the annual evaluation of SPLtrak by soliciting comments from EC members who rely extensively on SPLtrak’s services, including the Program Officers, the Members at Large, the Secretary, and the Treasurer. Responses from all were overwhelmingly positive.

First President Elect: Jeffrey Podos
Past Year

• Led the strategic plan committee to generate our final strategic report, which I will present at the Toronto meeting.  The report content is guided by last year’s member of survey and town-hall meeting in Missouri.
• Participated in committee to draft a Conference “Code of Conduct”.
• Chaired committee to run the Founder’s Poster award competition in Toronto. We no longer require 1-minute poster preview talks. Competitors have grown from 12 (2016) to 28 (2017).
• Presented a motion to update ABS policy language regarding the Allee award (Sections 9a4., 9a4, and 9i). Approved

Second President Elect John Swaddle
Past Year

• Solicited applications for the Allee competition, ranked the applications, and selected those to be invited to present their work in the 2017 Allee Symposium at the annual meeting. The incoming 2nd President-Elect, Jennifer Fewell, served on this committee. We received 23 applications for the 13 slots. Applicants submitted their materials through the ABS website and we could download all the files once the application window had closed. This process went smoothly. The committee rated the proposals and there was good agreement on those we selected to invite to the symposium. We will provide minor revisions to the wording of the Allee instructions and call for submissions, to help minimize confusion with the application process.

Past President: Emilia Martins
Past Year

• Coordinated nominations for the Career Awards including soliciting nominations from the membership. We received 6 nominations for "Distinguished Animal Behaviorist", 3 nominations for "Exemplar", 3 nominations for "Outstanding New Investigator", and 4 nominations for "Quest award". Arranged for a vote of the EC who chose the following winners: Distinguished Animal Behaviorist Michael J. Ryan, Exemplar David W. Stephens, Outstanding New Investigator Amy Toth, and Quest Daniel T. Blumstein.
• Identified and invited candidates to run for open officer positions
• Executive Editor: Shelley Adamo & Nancy Solomon
• Second-President-Elect: Esteban Fernandez-Juricic & Caitlin Gabor
• Member-At-Large: Doug Mock & Suzy Renn
• Public Affairs: Kaci Thompson & Danielle Whittaker
• For the new position of Graduate Student Representative, we developed the following nomination procedure: Post a call for self-nominations in the May Newsletter, via email to the membership, and on the ABS Facebook page. Any graduate student member of ABS and who is attending the 2017 annual meeting (present for a Question & Answer session at the Graduate Student Party) is eligible to become a nominee. Nominees are asked to: (1) briefly describe their experiences with ABS, and (2) state one issue that is especially important to graduate student members of the ABS. Responses will be made available. There will be a vote of all graduate students attending the ABS Business meeting. The two candidates who receive the most votes will be our candidates for ABS Graduate Student Representative. All current graduate student members of the Society will be eligible to vote on the two candidates as part of the usual ballot for future EC officers.
• Organized the President's Symposium on "Predicting Behavior".

Secretary: Sue Bertram
Past Year

• Published 4 issues of the Animal Behavior Society Newsletter. August 2016, November 2016, February 2017, and May 2017. SPLtrak does a great job of fact checking and putting everything online. They are wonderful to work with. There is typically a 4-7 day delay between me submitting a final version to them and them getting the newsletter out to our membership.
• Conducted ABS election 2016: A total of 366 validated ballots were cast in the election, representing approximately 20% of the membership (NOTE: last year 443 validated ballots were cast, representing approximately 25% of the membership). The newly elected officers are:

Second President-Elect: Jennifer Fewell
Member-at-Large: Chris Templeton
Secretary: Patricia Brennan
Program Officer: Alison Bell

• Maintained society correspondence including 1182 emails amongst EC members regarding Society matters (a drop from 2080 the previous year – about 43% - which was a tremendous and welcome decrease). 
• Conducted 14 votes at the 2016 Executive Committee meeting and via eVote on decisions not involving constitutional or bylaws changes, including:

Approval of the 2015 minutes from the EC meeting
Description of duties for Central Office
Editorial policy with respect to special issues in Animal Behaviour
Description of caregivers grant
Travel funds for EC members
Remove Requirement for Rapid Fire Presentation for Founders Award
Add Two Additional Editors to Animal Behaviour USA
Workshops and Symposia for 2017
Support AIBS letter to President-elect Trump
Updating ABS policy regarding Allee symposium
Changing ABS policy associated with 31f - Board of Professional Certification policy
Motion to increase ABS support of the Diversity Fund
March for Science support
ABS Meetings Code of Conduct Policy Vote

Treasurer: Gil Rosenthal
Past Year

• Completed transition into my role with major assistance from Molly Cummings and folks from SPLTrak.
• Completed post-Brexit profit-share transfer from Elsevier.
• Worked with committee chairs to manage allocations and expenditures.
• Worked with MALs to maximize the number of students benefiting from the LATA award.
• Worked with LAAC to support animal behavior conference in Argentina.
• Motion passed to increase Diversity Fund annual budget to $15,000.

Next Year

• Create a final budget when the fiscal year ends 31 Aug 2017.
• Continue to work with SPLTrak and Central Office to implement budget and track financial movements.
• Continue to facilitate communication
• Review policies pertaining to finances in light of new financial management.

Program Officers: Mark Hauber and Jonathan Pruitt
Past Year

• Recommended meeting venues: 2017-Toronto (Maydianne Andrade and Andrew Mason; in progress), 2018- University of Wisconsin- Milwaukee (Rafael Rodriguez, Peter Dunn, Gerlinde Hoebel, Linda Wittingham; to replace East Tennessee), 2019-University of Illinois at Chicago (joint meeting with IEC/Behaviour 2019; Prof. Mary Ashley UIC).
• Worked closely with ABS 2017 Toronto hosts (Andrade & Mason) and SPLtrak to organize the ABS2017 conference. Andrade and UofT Scarborough, took over most local logistics, and SPLtrak took over most registration and abstracting duties

Next Year

• Visit Milwaukee in fall 2017 to scope out the locality.
• Work with coordinating Chicago ABS2019 by Program Officer Jonathan Pruitt and PO Elect Alison Bell.
• Firm up options and cost sharing for ABS/IEC-Behaviour 2019 by Program Officer Elect Jonathan Pruitt.
  

Parliamentarian: Tamra Mendelson
Past Year

• Amended Articles 4 and 11 of the ABS Constitution (member vote).
• Amended Section 31f of the ABS Policy document (member vote).
• Developed a code of conduct for ABS meetings in accordance with several other professional societies’ codes.

Next Year

• Find sections of Bylaws and Policy that should be updated to reflect changes to Articles 4 and 11 of Constitution

Executive Journal Editor: Susan Foster
Past Year

• New submissions to Animal Behaviour were 426 in 2017, down very slightly from 430 in 2016. Acceptance rate was 26% for 2017. Turnaround time averaged 33.2 days in 2017 (submission to first decision) and 28.2 weeks (submission to online publication. These times are much better than the target deadlines that Elsevier suggests for a journal of our size
• Average copy editing time increased to 30.7 days in 2017 from 24.5 days in 2016 and 17 days in 2015. The increase is due to the rise in the number of manuscripts, the inclusion of ‘author time to revise’ (European and North American) and a general increase in workload (reduced staff in North American Office).
• Molly Morris and Janice Edgerly Rooks both completed editorial terms this year (14 August 2016 and 31 August 2016, respectively).  Replacement editors are Michal Polak and J. Chadwick Johnson.
• The US and UK Editorial Offices now have two permanent freelance editors (Amanda Harman and Gina Walker) to help with copyediting. Kris and Angela also edit manuscripts/proofs for each other, when their availability permits.
• The US office has sponsored two Special Issues in the past year “Social Networks and Animal Societies -- Linking Structure to Function” organized by Dan Rubenstein and “Breeding aggregations: Causes and Consequences” organized by Regina Macedo and Emily DuVal.
• Patti Loesche, the US Book Review Editor, had 3 books reviewed in 2016-2017 compared to 4 in 2015-2016. The European Office had 6 books reviewed, compared to 2 in 2015-2016.
• The Impact Factor for Animal Behaviour was 3.169 in 2015 (versus 3.34 in 2014) and the 5-year IF was 3.277 (versus 3.423 in 2014). Those of our major competitors, Behavioral Ecology, BES and Animal Cognition have seen a similar drop in IF from two years ago.

Next Year

Evise, the new editorial system, is now scheduled to be implemented in 2018.  This will increase workload for everyone until all are familiar with the system.
Appropriate TOP guidelines and checklists should be considered by the EC, the ASAB Council and the executive editors.
 

Members at Large: Elizabeth Jakob, Emily DuVal and Melissa Hughes
Past Year

• Coordinated and administered the Student Research Grant (SRG) competition, the Developing Nations Awards (DNA), and the Latin American Travel Awards (LATA), Student Travel Grant, and Caregiver Award
• We used the online grant submission and review system under the management of SPLtrak.
• Applicants submitted their proposals and materials
• Reviewers were found by emailing the Society membership and asking them to align with topics that the applicants use to self-categorize their proposals
• SPLtrak contacted each reviewer and gave them access to the relevant material.
• Every application received at least two reviews, most received three reviews
• Applications ranked by a numerical score assigned by the reviewers and funding decisions were largely based on those rankings
• Received 21 applications to the Developing Nations Award competition and funded 5 of those at $2000 each. Names of recipients are given in the appended award announcement
• Received 130 applications to the Student Research Grant competition and funded 51 of those (13 at $2000, 11 at $1500, and 22 at $1000). Within these, we awarded the George W. Barlow Award, the Edward O. Wilson Award and the David Tuber Award, each at $2000. We did not give the Amy R. Samuels Cetacean Behavior and Conservation Award this year as there was no qualified proposal above the funding line, and the treasurer reports that the account is very low.
• Received 27 applications for the LATA and funded 7 of those at amounts based on student-submitted budgets, with adjustments where the students clearly under- or over-estimated certain costs. One awardee declined the award after a separate funding source became available, and the funds from her award were given to the next-highest-ranked student. 
• Received 137 applications for the Graduate Student Travel Grant and funded 20 of those at $500 each for a total of $10,000 awarded.
• Received 4 applications for the Caregiver Award and funded all 4 at $500 each for a total of $2000 awarded. We chose not to include the names in an award announcement because we felt that this might possibly impinge on the privacy of the recipients.

Next Year

• The primary goal for the MALs is to administer the SRG, DNA, LATA, Student Travel Grant and Caregiver Award competitions. The grant competition ran smoothly this year, thanks to the efficiency of SPLtrak.
• We suggest increasing support to the GSTG, for which there seems to be high demand.
• We suggest having LATA applicants submit an estimated budget, listing expected expenses for airfare, visa, housing, registration, and food.   These budgets would then be used to make sure we award amount that fully cover reasonable costs, whenever possible. In the 2017 funding round, we contacted top-ranked LATA applicants for a budget estimate, and awarded funds in accordance with information received.
• We should consider strategies for advertising the caregiver award more broadly, as applications were low. Perhaps it could be highlighted on the conference website.

Reports from Committee Chairs

Animal Care Committee: Alexander Ophir
Past Year

• The ACC Chair/ Ethics Editor (ACC Chair from here on) received several manuscripts and requests for information or advice (detailed below); no manuscripts were sent for ACC review.
• Manuscripts not sent for review: The ACC Chair was assigned two (2) manuscripts to review. These manuscripts either did not violate the spirit or letter outlined in ASAB/ABS (2012) or supplementary information addressed problematic issues.
• Consultation and Solicited Opinions: The ACC Chair occasionally informally discussed manuscripts, abstracts, or issues.
• An ACC membership list was updated.

Next Year

• Attract 1-2 additional members with the aim of increasing the diversity of experience for the ACC and to maintain the committee size and distribution of members by term.
• Train a potential successor as Chair of the ACC
• In collaboration with ASAB counterpart (Domhnall Jennings) revise the ASAB/ABS Guidelines for the Use of Animals for publication in January 2018.

Conservation Committee: Misty McPhee
Past Year

• At the 2016 ABS meeting in Columbia, Missouri, we held a follow-up meeting to the 2015 Conservation Behavior workshop (Clucas, organizer) in Alaska.  Sixteen people attended this event.  We also held a committee meeting that attracted 21 people.  There was little overlap between the two meetings, so in total we had 26 people attend Conservation Behavior meetings.
• Preston Foerder and Cassandra Nunez contributed time planning and organizing this year’s Conservation Workshop to be hosted in Toronto.
• We updated several aspects of our web page and significantly strengthened our Facebook presence thanks to the efforts of Elizabeth Peterson.

Next Year

• We submitted a proposal for a third Conservation Behavior workshop to be held in Toronto on 12 June.   The request was approved with $3,000 provided to cover travel and lodging for three speakers.   The workshop currently has over 70 registrants. 
• We will hold our annual lunch meeting in Toronto.  This is a cost-free event unless the host charges for space.
• We are working with SPLtrack to update our web page.

Education Committee: Susan W. Margulis
The Education Committee is divided into five sub-committees, each with its own chair, and each with its own responsibilities.
Outreach (Emilie Snell-Rood, Chair)

• Outreach Fair 2016 University of Missouri with 14 labs (>30 scientists from 10 institutions) participating and ~100 members of the public attend, in addition to about 20 ABS members. The 2017 fair is being held at the Toronto Zoo with 12 labs (>40 scientists) participating
• Dale Broder proposed establishment of a small grant to support member’s outreach activities. Awardees will write a 2 page informal description of the program for the ABS website. Request funding $2500.

Penny Bernstein Distinguished Teaching Award (Stan Braude, Chair)

• Education Committee received five nominations for the Penny Bernstein Distinguished Teaching Award. Stan Braude solicited supporting documentation for all nominees. With the help of SPLTrak, we made the dossiers available online, and provided an electronic ballot for voting. Jenn Smith stood out and was voted the recipient of the 2017 ABS Penny Bernstein Distinguished Teaching Award. 

Genesis Award (Sarah Humfeld, Chair)

• 38 undergraduates participated in the 2016 session. Lauren Poon won and Timothy Boycott received honorable mention. For consistency we would like to establish fixed dollar amounts for these awards. We would like to award $300 to the winner(s) and $100 each to honorable mention recipients. This could mean awarding as little as $300 in any given year, or as much as $800.

Education Resources and Innovations (Susan Longest and Heather Zimbler-DeLorenzo)

• Subcommittee is broken into two parts: the teaching workshops/symposia and the animal behavior teaching resources collection in the EcoEd Digital Library
• Educational resources currently focus on reviewing and soliciting contributions for the Eco-Ed Digital Library. Shortly after the 2016 meeting, Longest and Margulis worked closely with Colleen McLinn to ensure familiarity with the review and approval process.
• Heather Zimbler-DeLorenzo heads the effort to develop workshops at the annual conference. In 2016, there was some confusion resulting in two education committee-initiated workshop proposals being accepted for the conference. To avoid competition between the two workshops, Zimbler-DeLorenzo and Laura Sirot (co-organizer) postponed their workshop until 2017
• Supported a pre-conference workshop organized by Stan Braude entitled Practicing Best Practices in Teaching Animal Behavior with 34 registered participants. Currently, we have 84 registered for our teaching workshop in Toronto. We plan on linking this year’s workshop on creating teaching modules to the ABS Collection on EcoEd website.

Children’s Book Award (Michelle Solensky, Chair)

• We sent a letter soliciting nominations for this ABS Book Award to 90 publishing companies—56 in the United States and 34 in Canada. We received 26 book submissions from 12 publishing companies.  We selected four finalist books: After a While Crocodile: Alexa’s Diary (Arbordale Publishing), Build, Beaver, Build! Life at the Longest Beaver Dam (Learner Books), Crow Smarts (Houghton Mifflin Books for Young Readers), and Fish Tricks (Early Light Books). We plan to compile student rankings by early June, after which we will announce the winner. 

Other Activities:

• At the 2016 ABS meeting, the Education Committee discussed submitting an article on the role of animal behavior in science fairs. Stan Braude, Sue Margulis, and Dale Broder co-authored an article that is currently in press in American Biology Teacher (The Study of Animal Behavior Provides Valuable Opportunities for Original Science Fair Projects: Recommendations from The Animal Behavior Society, Education Committee).
• Several members (Heather Zimbler-DeLorenzo, Laura Sirot) set up an ABS Education Facebook page (https://www.facebook.com/ABSEducation/?ref=aymt_homepage_panel). Although we do not yet have very much information on here, we hope to use this to provide content and links to appropriate material.

Film Committee: Barbara A. Clucas
Past Year

• The 2016 ABS Film Festival had ~75 attendees, popcorn and beverages were sold
• Created a Withoutabox (WAB) webpage for the 2017 ABS Film Festival soliciting films that depict animal behavior in an educational and scientific manner (with two categories: commercial and non-commercial). Received 104 film submissions that were ranked based on their accuracy, quality of narration, quality of videography, degree of anthropomorphism, and overall appeal. The top 2 films in each category (commercial and non-commercial) will be showcased at the ABS Film Festival in Toronto where the final ranking decision will be made.
• I will have to pay WAB $795 for use of the website before the end of the year. 

Next Year

• Continue to use WAB webpage to solicit films for 2018. WAB is where filmmakers go to see what festivals are occurring in a given year and allows for them to upload their films for consideration. 
• Work with the ABS meeting organizers to select a date and time that would allow for maximum participation in the festival as well as providing an option of concessions and beverages for festival attendees.

Applied Animal Behavior Committee: Robin L. Foster
Past Year

• Public day on animals helping in society
• Invited talks in Comparative Canine Behavior
• Applied animal behaviour talk & poster session (case studies)
• CAAB meet and greet
• AABC business meeting
• AABC and BPC increased certificate dues to $50 annually

Next Year

• Applied animal behavior talk & poster session
• CAAB meet and greet
• Outreach fair (in place of public day)

Public Affairs Committee: Patricia Brennan
Past Year

• Patty Brennan has been posting to FB but the Twitter account has been on hold
• We secured funding from the EC to conduct a Science Communication seminar and invited Dr. Katerina Thompson to give this workshop during the upcoming conference “Writing Compelling Grant Proposals: Science Education and Broader Impacts”
• We advertised for a new program called 3 Minute thesis that we will pilot at the upcoming ABS conference to encourage graduate students to present their work for a broader audience.  If there is enough interest, we will build the program further in future years and get donations for prizes.

Next Year

• We hope to able to work closely with the social media person to advertise events, and opportunities for outreach, as well as continue to grow our media presence. We suggest having a featured section where each time Animal Behavior is published, we highlight one or two papers that are likely to attract the attention of our followers, and post them in FB and Twitter.  We would also like to advertise news from our members that include press coverage, outreach awards and the like.
• We would like to continue our membership with AIBS and take advantage of a possible spot to participate in the congressional visits in Washington DC, by adding a fellowship for a grad student member to participate.  

Board of Professional Certification Subcommittee: Crista Coppola
Past Year

• Certification Program dues updated to an annual schedule of $50/year beginning Jan 2017 for new and recertification applications
• 14 CAABs/ACAABs presented at 2016 meeting
• AAB social attended by 35 people & meet and greet organized for 2017 meeting
• BPC received 2 new CAAB applications and 5 recertification’s; all but 1 were granted (1 withdrawn)
• Currently has 48 CAAB/ACAAB members
• Submitted proposal for 2018 symposium

Latin American Affairs Committee: Lilian Tonelli Manica
Past Year

• During the 2016 ABS meeting we organized the Latin American Luncheon ~40 members. We created and shared a list of emails, contacts and research interests of everyone present at that time.
• May 15th received a request of US$ 910 to fund travel to an Animal Behavior meeting in Argentina, “I Reunion de Biologia del Comportamiento del Cono Sur”, occurring in August 2017. This meeting is a fusion of two events organized by Argentina, (III Congreso Argentino de Biología del Comportamiento, COMPORTA), and Uruguay (VI Jornadas Uruguayas de Comportamiento Animal, JUCA. The request is for travel expenses for a plenary speaker, Regina Macedo, from Universidade de Brasília.

Next Year

• Latin American Lunch and Friends, scheduled for Toronto ABS meeting
• Workshop: “Broadening our impacts; establishing and nurturing research partnerships with U.S. minority-serving and Latin American institutions”. Organized in collaboration with the Diversity Committee, with an aim to foster collaborations with MSI communities and Latin America.

Diversity Committee: Daniel Howard
Past Year

• 2016 Charles Turner Undergraduate Program at the 53nd Annual Conference of the Animal Behavior Society at the University of Missouri, Columbia (all day pre-meeting workshop; Monday 12 June, 2016; 12 URM undergraduate students served
• 2016 Undergraduate Luncheon and Orientation Program ~50 UG students served
• Conducted selection process for the 2017 Diversity Travel Award. Selected 48 applicants via random lottery, $6,100 in registration waivers awarded. Identified 20 additional students qualified to receive the award, for a total of 68 Diversity Travel Awards (~$9,100).

Next Year

• Conduct the 2017 Charles Turner Undergraduate Program at the University of Toronto Scarborough (pre-meeting workshop). 12 minority-affiliated UG students invited
• Conduct the 2017 Undergraduate Luncheon and Orientation at the University of Toronto Scarborough; planning for ~70 Undergraduate students
• Conduct the 2017 Diversity Committee panel discussion: Affecting Broader Impacts Through Authentic Partnerships with Minority Serving Organizations. Includes eight invited faculty from MSI institutions. Including two representatives to speak on partnering with Latin American institutions
• 2017 Diversity Committee general meeting, working lunch; issues include: panel/workshop ideas for 2018 ABS meeting, new DC member nominations, 2018 Turner Program and Undergraduate Luncheon program facilitation, expiration of current DC chairperson term

By Law Votes  

Public Affairs Officer duties
Motion: Add to Bylaws: Section 10. Public Affairs Officer 

1. Chair the Public Affairs Committee
2. Take charge of the society’s efforts in media outreach, social media, and advocacy.
3. Oversee editing of the ABS newsletter.

Moved: Sue Bertram
Seconded: John Swaddle
Vote: In Favour: 12, Opposed: 0; Abstentions: 0; MOTION PASSED UNANIMOUSLY
 * Vote must now occur at the business meeting to change the By-Law

Graduate Student Officer duties
Motion: Add to Bylaws: Section 11. Graduate Student Representative

1. Represent graduate student views and interests in Executive Committee meetings
2. Serve on the Public Affairs Committee as Social Media Fellow.

Moved: John Swaddle
Seconded: Gil Rosenthal
Vote: In Favour: 12, Opposed: 0; Abstentions: 0; MOTION PASSED UNANIMOUSLY
 * Vote must now occur at the business meeting to change the By-Law

Policy Votes 

Procedure for Resolving Ties in Awards Elections
Motion: Ties shall be resolved by a runoff election in which the tied candidates are ranked as above and voters are given two days to return ballots. In case of a tie in the runoff, the award shall be given to all tied candidates. 
Moved: Emily DuVal
Seconded: Jeff Podos
Vote: In Favour: 12, Opposed: 0; Abstentions: 0; MOTION PASSED UNANIMOUSLY
 * Vote must now occur at the business meeting to change the By-Law

Drop Requirement for CAABs to Name ABS as an Additional Insured Party
Motion: Remove the requirement that Certified Applied Animal Behaviorists name the ABS as an additional insured party on their liability insurance.
Moved: Jonathan Pruitt
Seconded: Sue Bertram
Vote: In Favour: 0; Opposed: 12; Abstentions: 0; MOTION FAILED UNANIMOUSLY

Bonding Requirement for Treasurer
Motion: Remove the requirement that the treasurer be bonded
Moved: Gil Rosenthal
Seconded: Jeff Podos
Vote: In Favour: 10, Opposed: 1; Abstentions: 1; MOTION PASSED BY MAJORITY

Other Votes

NSF Protesting DDIG Cancellation from IOS and DB
Motion: ABS EC write a letter to NSF protesting the cancellation of the DDIG program from IOS and DB
Moved: Jeff Podos
Seconded: Emily DuVal
Vote: In Favour: 11, Opposed: 0; Abstentions: 1; MOTION PASSED UNANIMOUSLY BY THOSE VOTING

Help Administer DDIG Competition
Motion: Support a proposal that scientific societies such as ABS help administer DDIGs if NSF IOS and DB provide the funds
Moved: Bill Searcy
Seconded: Jonathan Pruitt
Vote: In Favour: 11, Opposed: 0; Abstentions: 1; MOTION PASSED UNANIMOUSLY BY THOSE VOTING

Candidates for Graduate Student Officer
Motion: Graduate students in attendance at the annual ABS meeting will nominate up to two graduate students to run in the election and will provide the names of these candidates to the nominations committee
Moved: Emilia Martins
Seconded: Mark Hauber
Vote: In Favour: 12, Opposed: 0; Abstentions: 0; MOTION PASSED UNANIMOUSLY

Budget
Motion: Approve the proposed budget for 2017-2018
Moved: Gil Rosenthal
Seconded: Jonathan Pruitt
Vote:  In Favor: 12, Opposed: 0; Abstentions: 0; MOTION PASSED UNANIMOUSLY

Strategic Plan
Motion: Approve the strategic plan
Moved: Jeff Podos
Seconded: Gil Rosenthal
Vote:  In Favor: 12, Opposed: 0; Abstentions: 0; MOTION PASSED UNANIMOUSLY

Transparency and Openness
Motion: ABS recommends implementing the following transparency and openness guidelines and writing an editorial letter about this in Animal Behaviour:
1.       Citation standards: level 3
2.       Data transparency: level 2
3.       Analytic Methods: level 1
4.       Research Material: level 1
5.       Design and analysis: level 1
6.       Pre-registration of studies: level 1
7.       Pre-registration of analysis plans: level 1
8.       Replication: level 1
Moved: Susan Foster
Seconded: Sue Bertram
Vote: 12, Opposed: 0; Abstentions: 0; MOTION PASSED UNANIMOUSLY

 TOP guidelines (Transparency and Openness)

• Citations

Level 1	Level 2	Level 3
Journal describes citation of data or other archived materials in guidelines to authors with clear rules and examples.	Article provides appropriate citation for data and materials used, consistent with journal's author guidelines.	Article is not published until appropriate citation for data and materials is provided that follows journal's author guidelines.

• 2. Data transparency

Level 1	Level 2	Level 3
Article states whether data are available and, if so, where to access them.	Data must be posted to a trusted repository. Exceptions must be identified at article submission.	Data must be posted to a trusted repository, and reported analyses will be reproduced independently before publication.

• 3. Analytic methods (code) transparency

Level 1	Level 2	Level 3
Article states whether code are available and, if so, where to access them.	Code must be posted to a trusted repository. Exceptions must be identified at article submission.	Code must be posted to a trusted repository, and reported analyses will be reproduced independently before publication.

• 4. Research materials transparency

Level 1	Level 2	Level 3
Article states whether materials are available and, if so, where to access them.	Materials must be posted to a trusted repository. Exceptions must be identified at article submission.	Materials must be posted to a trusted repository, and reported analyses will be reproduced independently before publication.

•  
• 5. Design and analysis transparency

Level 1	Level 2	Level 3
Journal articulates design transparency standards.	Journal requires adherence to design transparency standards for review and publication.	Journal requires and enforces adherence to design transparency standards for review and publication.

• 6. Pre-registration of studies

Level 1	Level 2	Level 3
Journal encourages preregistration of studies and provides link in article to preregistration if it exists.	Journal encourages reregistration of studies and provides link in article and certification of meeting preregistration badge requirements.	Journal requires preregistration of studies and provides link and badge in article to meeting requirements.

• 7. Pre-registration of analysis plans

Level 1	Level 2	Level 3
Journal encourages pre-analysis plans and provides link in article to registered analysis plan if it exists.	Journal encourages pre-analysis plans and provides link in article and certification of meeting registered analysis plan badge requirements.	Journal requires preregistration of studies with analysis plans and provides link and badge in article to meeting requirements.

• 8. Replication

Level 1	Level 2	Level 3
Journal encourages submission of replication studies.	Journal encourages submission of replication studies and conducts blind review of results.	Journal uses Registered Reports as a submission option for replication studies with peer review before observing the study outcomes.

ACTION ITEMS:

• Revise policy pertaining to EC positions to refer to SPLtrak and not Central Office and to make policy less USA-centric (All EC members; SPLtrak)
• Create an ad hoc committee to discuss including a code of conduct statement for meetings (President)
• Collect demographic data on members (including ethnicity, veteran status, and disability status) while including statements about privacy and the value of the information to the society (President, SPLtrak)
• Promote partnerships with minority serving institutions and mentorship of minority junior faculty (Diversity Committee)
• Submit proposed constitutional changes to membership vote (President, Secretary, SPLtrak)
• Update websites to ensure we have a user-interface responsive site (SPLtrak with committee chairs)
• Promote data archiving at Animal Behaviour (Executive Editor)
• Create an adhoc committee to examine liability issues relating to the Certified Applied Animal Behavior program (President)

 

ABS Annual Business Meeting - Minutes
Thursday, June 15, 2017
University of Toronto Scarborough- AC223

 

President Bill Searcy introduced the 2016/2017 Executive Committee members: First President-elect Jeff Podos, Second President-elect John Swaddle, Past President Emília Martins, Treasurer Gil Rosenthal, Secretary Sue Bertram, Program Officer Mark Hauber, Program Officer-Elect Jonathan Pruitt, Parliamentarian Tamra Mendelson, Executive Editor Susan Foster, Members at Large Beth Jakob, Emily DuVal, and Melissa Hughes and Historian Zuleyma Tang-Martinez.
Bill then introduced incoming members for the 2017/2018 Executive Committee: 2nd President Elect Jennifer Fewell, Secretary Patricia Brennan, Member at Large Chris Templeton, and Program Officer-Elect Alison Bell.
Bill announced that in addition to supporting the annual meeting, journal, research grants, student travel awards, diversity, meeting-related & career awards, the Executive Committee also elected six new ABS Fellows, amended the ABS constitution to allow electronic voting, and added six new ABS Fellows and two new officer positions: Public Affairs Officer and Graduate Student Representative.
Bill then introduced the slate of candidates for the 2017/18 Executive Committee Election:
Second-President-Elect
Esteban Fernandez-Juricic (Purdue U)
Caitlin Gabor (Texas State U)
Executive Editor
Shelley Adamo (Dalhousie U)
Nancy Solomon (Miami U)
Member-At-Large
Doug Mock (U Oklahoma)
Suzy Renn (Reed College)
Public Affairs Officer
Kaci Thompson (U Maryland, College Park)
Danielle Whittaker (Michigan State U)

Bill announced that Graduate Students will be asked in this meeting to select, via vote, two Graduate Student Representative candidates for inclusion in the society-wide ballot. Bill continued with the Executive Committee highlights for the year, by recapping the partnership with March for Science, as well as writing and signing letters advocating support for science to the U.S. administration, Congress, and National Science Foundation. The Executive Committee has also agreed to a Meeting Code of Conduct that is available online and an ABS Strategic Plan that Jeff Podos will introduce.

In place of Susan Foster, Bill reported on the Animal Behaviour journal status. Overall the Journal is doing well. Our submissions were up 1.8% to 392 research articles. The UK office received 623, up 3.5%, and the acceptance rate was 25.8% - below the notional goal of 40%. Time to first decision is 34.8 days and is better than that at related journals (and less than 40 days Elsevier suggests). Submission to online publication is 25.2 weeks. The impact factor is 3.169 as of last year (no new value yet). Profit share from the publisher is strong and is a big reason for our fiscal soundness.

President- elect, Jeff Podos then introduced the ABS Strategic Plan. Aside from Jeff Podos the strategic planning committee also included: Sarah Bengston, Ximena Bernal, Johana Goyes, Tamra Mendelson, Jonathan Pruitt, Bill Searcy, John Swaddle, and Zuleyma Tang-Martinez. Jeff began by summarizing the ABS core values, which center around (1) research, (2) teaching, outreach, and mentorship, and (3) diversity, equality, and inclusion. Jeff went on to list the challenges and goals of the society: 1) Recruit and retain a diverse membership 2) Advocate more strongly for animal behavior science 3) Enhance outreach and teaching efforts, and 4) Support ABS members. Jeff emphasized that it is important for society members to make their ideas heard, and to participate and give feed-back so that ABS can represent its membership properly. Two new positions have been created to diversify representation on the EC and to enhance public outreach: a Public Affairs Officer and a Graduate Student Representative. Jeff noted that these additions are a big deal as the EC has remained the same in size and representation for a long time.

Next, Sue Bertram filled in for Tamra Mendelson to deliver the Parliamentarian report. Sue discussed the policy changes that were modified or enacted during 2016/17 and the proposed changes to the Bylaws necessitated by the amendments to Articles 4 and 11 of the ABS Constitution that were passed last year: 

Changes to Constitution
Article 4: Officers
Section 1. The officers of this Society are: President, First President-Elect, Second President-Elect, Past-President, Program officer, Program Officer-Elect, Treasurer, Parliamentarian, Executive Editor, Secretary, Public Affairs Officer, and Graduate Student Representative.

Section 3. Term of Office: The term of office shall be one year for President, First President-Elect, Second President Elect, Past-President, Program Officer, and Program Officer-Elect. The term of office shall be two years for the Graduate Student Representative. The term of office shall be three years for Secretary, Treasurer, Parliamentarian, Executive Editor, and Public Affairs Officer.

Article 11: Amendments to the Constitution… Proposed amendments to the Constitution must be submitted to the membership by mail or electronic ballot and confirmed by a two-thirds vote of those members voting.

Proposed Bylaws Changes
Article II. Duties of the Officers (additions)
Section 10. Public Affairs Officer
Chair the Public Affairs Committee
Take charge of the society’s efforts in media outreach, social media, and advocacy.
Oversee editing of the ABS newsletter.

Article II. Duties of the Officers (additions)
Section 11. Graduate Student Representative
Represent graduate student views and interests in Executive Committee meetings
Serve on the Public Affairs Committee as Social Media Fellow.

Article II. Duties of the Officers (deletions)
Section 5. Secretary
c. Be responsible for reporting changes in the roster of officers to all affiliated societies and to the press, especially Animal Behaviour, Science, and Bioscience.
d. Serve as Editor of the Newsletter

A voice vote was held and the proposed Bylaws changes passed by unanimous vote.

Next, Sue announced that the graduate students would vote for the 2 candidates for the Graduate Student Representative Position. She first described the position:  Graduate Student Representative is a 2 year term and starts Summer 2018. Their key role is to represent graduate student views and interests in Executive Committee meetings and to serve on the Public Affairs Committee as Social Media Fellow. Graduate students were asked to self-nominate in an email sent to all meeting participants. Those who self-nominated were then asked to speak at the student party earlier in the meeting. There were 4 Candidates that completed both of those activities. Here is a brief synopsis on each of their platforms, derived from what they included in their self nomination.

Elana Varner (MSc @ Simon Fraser U), Experience: 1st meeting; Platform: Workshop on exploring applied/conservation applications in AB; advise & excite others
Patrick Green (PhD @ Duke U), Experience: 4th meeting; moderator 2x; Platform: Workshops: next level: postdocs, other career opportunities, transferrable skills
Katherine Crocker (PhD @ U Michigan), Experience: 4th meeting; Diversity committee: Turner, undergrad; Platform: Increase mentorship, inclusion, funding: research & travel
Cameron Jones (PhD @ U California Davis), Experience: 2nd meeting; Platform: Funding opportunities for independent research

Sue asked for a show of hands of Grad students to ensure that we had a quorum to hold the vote for GSR finalist. We need at least 25 hands to hold the vote and almost 50 hands were raised. Because quorum was met, we held the vote during the meeting for the two finalists that will be on the ballot which will be distributed in the fall by email.

The nominee’s names were posted on the screen along with a link for graduate students to cast their votes electronically (phone, laptop, tablet, etc.). 49 votes came in, and the two people with the highest votes were Patrick Green and Katherine Crocker. Both finalists received 23 of 49 votes. Sue asked the society to watch for an upcoming email to vote for the Graduate Student Representative and the other officer positions, in the society-wide election. Be sure to vote!

Next, Beth Jakob reported on the Members at Large affairs. Beth announced that the Members at Large have the most fun position as they get to give away money! This year, the MALs funded 51 of 130 applications for Student Research Grants, 5 of 21 applications for Developing Nations Awards, 7 of 27 applications for Latin American Travel Awards, 20 of 137 applications for Graduate student travel grants, and 4 of 4 applications for Caregiver awards. Beth encouraged more people to apply for Caregiver awards, which are intended help with care for children or other dependents during the annual ABS conference, either at home or at the conference site. If you applied for any of the above awards this year and did not receive funding, please try again next year, when the money allocated for the various awards will be increased.

Jonathan Pruitt gave the Treasurer’s report in lieu of Gil Rosenthal who could not attend the conference. Jonathan began by saying that the society finished this year with an estimated surplus of $54,597 excluding investment income. Jonathan emphasized that this is just an estimate and members should not become enchanted with this number. The bulk of the society’s income comes from the journal profit share and membership dues. Primary income has fluctuated partly due to the recent volatility of the British pound. The projection for 2017-2018 income is $406,772, down from last year’s $457,271.

ABS experienced the best year yet for investment returns at $147,819+ (11%), making our ending investment balance just over ~$1.4 million. When bad times come we have reassurance! That said, the long term plan is to be fiscally conservatives and continue adding budget surpluses to the investment fund. The goal is to have a large endowment to cover our activities if journal revenue falls.

The key points in projected expenditures for next year: funding for graduate student research and for graduate student travel were both increased by approximately 20%. The allocation for the Diversity Award was increased 100% from what was allocated in the previous year’s original budget.  The proportion of the budget devoted to increasing diversity increased from 26% to 31%.

Next year’s balance estimate excluding the investment income is $-4,206.62. Given last year’s surplus and excellent investment performance, we feel comfortable operating at a slight projected deficit.

Mark Hauber presented the Program Officer’s report. At this year’s 54th ABS Meeting we had 328 Talks and 266 posters. We have a total of 776 Attendees representing 20 countries including: Australia, Argentina, Brazil, Canada, Columbia, Costa Rica, Finland, France, Germany, India, Japan, Mexico, Netherlands, New Zealand, South Korea, Sweden, Thailand, United States, United Kingdom, Uruguay.

This is Zuleyma Tang-Martinez’s 41st Year of continuous attendance at ABS meeting. Last year we celebrated by awarding her with a certificate and a bottle of champagne. Congratulations, Zuleyma!

Mark then presented Jonathan Pruitt as Program Officer for 2017/2018 and Program Officer-Elect Alison Bell.

Sue Bertram then came up to thank Maydianne Andrade and Andrew Mason, our local meetings hosts. Sue also thanked the many co-organizers, graduate students, and SPLtrak for their work on the conference.

Sue then addressed members to offer different ways members can be active in the Society. ABS offers many ways to help such as: gifting memberships, contributing to outreach, bringing someone to the ABS meetings, liking ABS on FB & twitter (@AnimBehSociety), and telling your local newspaper & congressional representatives about your research. One member added that if Grad Students publish a paper they should send an email to their university and get them to write a press release for you. Sue also suggested subscribing to ABS News, reading the Newsletter, and volunteering to serve on any of the following ABS committees.

• Advancement & Investment
• Animal Care
• Applied Animal Behavior
• Board of Professional Certification
• Conservation
• Diversity 
• Education
• Film
• Latin American Affairs
• Public Affairs

ABS Strategic Plan 2017
After the town Hall meeting held at the 2016 ABS conference to discuss the formulation of a strategic plan for the society, the strategic plan was developed by a committee with Sarah Bengston, Ximena Bernal, Johana Goyes, Tamra Mendelson, Jeff Podos, Jonathan Pruitt, Bill Searcy, John Swaddle, and Zuleyma Tang-Martinez.
ABS Strategic Plan 2017