Fall must be here already since football games and classes are both underway. Hope everyone can draw on some restfulness from the summer amidst the fast pace of fall.
Welcome to my first version of ISP Update – I opted for simple and straightforward in tribute to Bob Schneider, our founder, rather than fancy with graphics. I wanted to get information out to you all in a timely manner so that you will be well-informed through this transitional phase of ISP.
Progress on Organizational Structure – I have emailed some suggestions for organizational structure (elected board with officers and committees related to tasks/activities) to the long range planning group. Once I have all their feedback and suggestions, I will be emailing the entire membership list with our proposed organization structure for your review. If you have ideas about our future structure, please let me know. The more creative ideas the better. To engage as many members as possible in the development of our new structure, I want you to have time to review and comment on the proposal prior to our annual meeting at CSWE (November 1, 5:00 to 6:00 pm in Room 306 of the Philadelphia Marriott Downtown).
ISP Annual Meeting – Please plan to attend our annual meeting at CSWE on Saturday, November 1, 5:00 to 6:00 pm in Room 306 of the Philadelphia Marriott Downtown. We will review and vote on our proposed organizational structure as noted above, and we will be honoring our BSW, MSW, and Ph.D. contest winners for this year. I am sure that we will also have some informal discussions about how our students have been involved in electoral politics as well as other policy practice activities in the last days before this historic election.
ISP Ongoing Activities with Volunteer Leadership Noted or Needed
Website (www.statepolicy.org) – Sally Brocksen (brocksensm@appstate.edu) has taken over management and updating of the website. She and I will be conducting a needs assessment, including your ideas about enhancements for the website, later this fall. We know the Liaison list on the web is terribly out of date and are not sure we are going to try to maintain it, given all the shifts and changes that occur among faculty each year. Let Sally or me know any ideas that you have about the website.
ISP Update – After this October edition, Dianne Holliman (dhollim@valdosta.edu) will provide you with updated information about once a month. Please send her news about what you and your students are doing to influence social policy in your states. For the November issue, she would be very interested in hearing how you have fostered discussions about the importance of elections in the policy process in your classes as well as hearing about how your students have been engaged in this election.
State House Visits – Ruth White (ruthw@seattleu.edu) will be helping us total up our state house visits in the spring. So if you do visit your state house this fall with students, keep track of those numbers to let Ruth know in the spring. Last year, in our transition, we lost track a little so I am not sure we have an accurate count.
Contests – Our contests at both the BSW and MSW level continue to illustrate the exciting projects that our students do to advocate at the state level. This coming year, Julie Miller-Cribbs (jmcribbs@ou.edu) will chair the BSW contest and Donna McIntosh (MCINTOSH@siena.edu) will chair the MSW contest. The due date for entries this year will be May 7, 2009. See the website for more information. Jane Hoyt-Oliver (jholiver@malone.edu) will chair the Ph.D. Contest this year. If you are interested in being a judge or working with any of the contest chairs, please let them or me know so we will have the assistance that we need to judge entries.
Conference of interest: Christine McKenna alerts us to this upcoming conference. Some may have research to submit and others may be interested in attending.
Ninth Annual Conference on State Politics and Policy
Dates: May 22-23, 2009
Location: Chapel Hill, North Carolina
Website: www.unc.edu/depts/polisci/statepol/conferences/2009/2009main.htm
States in Transition: Politics and Policy in the post-Bush Era
Sponsored by the Political Science Department at the University of North Carolina – Chapel Hill, the Political Science Department at Duke University, the State Politics Section of APSA, and State Politics and Policy Quarterly
Conference Hosts
Tom Carsey, UNC (primary contact person: carsey@unc.edu)
Virginia Gray, UNC
Kerry L. Haynie, Duke
Overview
Our theme, “States in Transition: Politics and Policy in the Post-Bush Era” will bring together a broad range of scholars doing research in all areas of state politics and policy. We invite scholars to consider how states have evolved and adapted in the 21st century with an eye toward what may lay ahead. The Bush presidency began with an unprecedented struggle in Florida. Events like 9/11, Hurricane Katrina, and the Iraq War, and policy debates in the areas of health care, the environment, immigration, and the No Child Left Behind Act have forced states to adapt to new local and national political realities. Finally, the 2008 Presidential context will be fought out in the states. Because all aspects of state politics and policy have been affected by these events, we feel our theme is broadly inclusive. The tentative due date for paper proposals is Friday, January 16th, 2009.
Our budget should permit us to provide stipends for about 50-60 papers as well as panel discussants. We plan a series of traditional panels, a graduate student poster session, and maybe a special topics roundtable or two. We also plan to give an award to the best graduate student poster presented at the conference.
Location Information
The conference will be headquartered in Chapel Hill at the Courtyard Marriott Hotel and William and Ida Friday Conference Center. We plan to have at least one special event on the main UNC campus, and dinner Friday night will be held at Duke. Both universities and the triangle area in general offer an exciting range of activities and sights to see.
Your Input Needed: When the outline for a structure and the needs assessment come out, please respond with your ideas about how we move the organization forward with projects that need to be done. Volunteering to help is always good as well. J
Please let me know other sorts of information that you would like to see included in the Update and how ISP can continue to assist you in teaching students how to influence state level policy making processes.
Kathy