Minutes from the Section F Business Meetings

December 16, 2005

Call to Order

The meeting was called to order at 6:05 PM by Section F Chair James Reinert.

Approximately 55 Section F members were present.

Chair Reinert opened the meeting by listing the current officers for Section F and Subsections Fa and Fb

Section F Officers:

            Chair:James A. Reinert – j-reinert@tamu.edu
            Vice-Chair: Jeffrey D. Hahn – hahnx002@umn.edu
            Secretary:Mark A. Boetel – mark.boetel@ndsu.edu
            Past-Chair:Bradford M. Kard – kard@okstate.edu
            Secretary-Elect:Mike Merchant – m-merchant@tamu.edu
            Governing Board Representative:Shripat T. Kamble – skamble@unlnotes.unl.edu

Subsection Fa Officers:

            Chair- Fikru J. Haile– fhaile@dow.com
            Vice Chair -: Assefa Gebre-Amlak – assefa@coop.ext.colostate.edu
            Secretary:Clinton D. Pilcher – clinton.d.pilcher@monsanto.com
            Past Chair:Thomas L. Clark – clarkth@missouri.edu

Subsection Fb Officers:

            Chair: Michael E. Scharf – mike_scharf@entm.purdue.edu 
            Vice-Chair: Brian J. Cabrera – bcabrera@ufl.edu
            Past-Chair:Jules Silverman – jules_silverman@ncsu.edu

            A correction was submitted from the floor to identify Gregg Henderson as 2006 Secretary,
            and was so noted:

Secretary:Gregg Henderson – grhenderson@agctr.lsu.edu

Reading & Approval of 2004 Business Meeting Minutes:

Minutes of the 2004 Preliminary and Final Section F business meetings had been posted on the ESA web site and were also e-mailed to all Section F members by 2004 Secretary Jeffrey Hahn before the 2005 National Meeting.  A suggestion was made to correct the spelling of Robert Davis’ name; however, the correction had already been incorporated.  Chair Reinert noted the pre-meeting distribution of the minutes and entertained a motion to accept the minutes as corrected.  Gene Reagan made a motion to accept the 2004 minutes, seconded by Michael Smith.  The motion was unanimously approved by voice vote.

The Chair announced the newly elected ESA Officers.  Frank Gilstrap is the current Vice President, and will serve as ESA President in 2006.  Scott Hutchins is Vice President-Elect for 2006, and will serve as ESA President in 2007.

Vice Chair Jeffrey Hahn announced the following award winners:

·          Larry P. Pedigo – ESA Fellow

ESA Professional Awards

·         Michael E. Merchant – Distinguished Achievement Award in Extension

·         Anthony M. Shelton – Recognition Award in Entomology

ESA Student Award

·         Thomas Eickhoff – Student Activity Award

Foundation Professional Awards

·         James F. Walgenbach – Award for Excellence in Integrated Pest Management

·         Eric P. Benson--Recognition Award in Urban Entomology

Foundation Student Awards

·         Donald Oswalt – Jeffrey P. LaFage Graduate Student Research Award

·         Thomas Eickhoff – Kenneth & Barbara Starks Plant Resistance to Insects Graduate Student Research Award

·         Mary M. Gardiner – Pioneer Hi-Bred International Graduate Student Fellowship

Vice Chair Hahn also acknowledged the Board Certified Entomologists Board of Directors:

·         Robert W. Davis – Director

·         Stuart E. Mitchell – Director-Elect

·         Jeffrey A. Weier – Past-Director

·         Henry W. Hogmire, Jr. – Eastern Branch

·         L. Von Kaster – N. Central Branch

·         Patrick W. Weddler – Pacific Branch

·         Shripat T. Kamble – Gov. Board Liaison 

The Chair reminded those planning on submitting written reports to send them to Secretary Mark Boetel.

Editorial Board Reports:

American Entomologist – Robert Wright:

General information was provided by AE Managing Editor Gene Kritsky.  Fifty-four manuscripts for AE were processed in 2005.  The rejection rate for submitted manuscripts in 2005 was about 20%, which was similar to the past two years.  All features of the publication are continuing except the “From the Past” section.  Such features were not meant to be long-term, but rather to serve as somewhat of a filler until a pipeline of accepted submissions could be built up.  There were two “Instant Symposia” in AE this year, including one from the NCB-ESA meetings.  Mike Gray stepped down as Editor of “Postmarked: Extension USA” section.  Ric Bessin and Phil Mulder have agreed to serve as Co-editors of that section, and their appointments have been approved by the Editorial Board.  Editor Gene Kritsky is interested in adding articles in the future that will report on websites of interest. Gene is open to ideas for articles and encourages submissions.

J. Economic Entomology – Gary Hein – 2008:

Gary reported that JEE is the most cited entomological journal in the world.  It is cited about 2000 times more than any other entomological journal.  The acceptance rate this year was between 50 and 55%.  Concerns have been raised regarding conflicts of interest.  A solution may be conflict-of-interest declarations.  A question was asked from the floor for clarification on what types of conflict-of-interest are in question.  Gary conveyed that an example of a conflict might be if an author was involved in a business venture with a product used in the manuscript.

Other information from the JEE Editorial Board: ESA considers its journal publishing company very 3-5 years, and will be doing so in the coming year.  Cadmus is the current company, but Blackwell publishing has submitted an unsolicited bid to ESA for the contract.  No decision has been made, but the Governing Board will be taking up the issue this year.  The Governing Board requests the ESA membership to provide comments to their representatives on the Board to help with consideration of this issue.  Gary pointed out some considerations: 1) there’s a need for open access as well as maintaining continuity and costs; 2) page charges may someday be eliminated, but library subscriptions could be twice what they are now. 

 Environmental Entomology – James Reinert – 2006:

The Cadmus system was discussed.  General commentary was that the system is working well.  The issue of potentially migrating to Blackwell Publishing was also discussed.  Concern was raised about a learning curve associated with Blackwell’s software, “SchlolarOne”; however, discussion indicated that it was not viewed as a major obstacle.  From Alan Kahan: Managing Editor Alan Cameron reports that 64% of manuscripts submitted for publication in EE were accepted, and that the authors on 2/3 of the papers sign up for the pdf format for reprints.

 J. Medical Entomology – Larry D. Godfrey – 2007:

The issue of switching publishing companies was also discussed in the JME Editorial Board meeting.  Several new subject editors have come on board in the last year.  All slots are full, and all is going well.  John Edman has stepped down as Editor-In-Chief, and Bruce Tabashnik has agreed to replace him.  The JME manuscript acceptance rate is about 72%, which is comparable to recent years.  Submissions were up by about 20% in 2005.  Online submission may be a factor.

 Arthropod Management Tests – Gary J. Brewer – 2007:

Gary Brewer had a conflict and could not attend the AMT Editorial Board Meeting.  This report is adapted from Denise Olson’s report to Section C.  

        The AMT editorial board met at 9:00 am on 16 December 2005 during the 53rd Annual Meeting of the Entomological Society of America in Ft. Lauderdale, Florida.  The following editorial board members were present: Jim Cilek, Section D. Rep.; Alan Kahan, ESA Director of Communications; Denise Olson, Section C. Rep.; and John Wise, Section C. AMT Editor.

The meeting was chaired by Alan Kahan.

A concern about low submission rates to AMT was discussed.  The consensus of the group was that, since AMT is not a peer-reviewed journal, there is less incentive for authors to publish in it.  It was suggested that the arthropod management research community be made aware that data reported in AMT can be combined with additional data for publication in a peer reviewed journal.

There was some discussion about what would be necessary for AMT to become a peer-reviewed journal.  Further discussion included concerns about data reported in AMT being combined with additional data for publication in a peer-reviewed journal.  Alan Kahan agreed to bring these issues before Journal of Economic Entomology Editorial Board and the Council of Entomology Department Administrators (CEDA), and will report back to the AMT editorial board.

Another concern was that posting of AMT reports on the web has been slow.  Those present were in agreement that AMT reports within sections could be posted as Sections are completed, rather than waiting for all sections to be ready.  It was felt that this would speed up this process.

 Certification Board -- Robert Davis:

Membership at end of November is about 97% of what it was at the same time in 2004.  “Associate Certified Entomologist” is a new category which is especially geared toward pest control professionals.  New applicants and those that have successfully passed the exam account for about 109 new members in the program, and several have also gone on and joined ESA.  The Certification Board encourages consideration of the BCE program from ESA members across all areas of entomology, and is also trying to reach out to students.  There is a BCE Intern program which is free to students to enter and the annual fee is quite low.  Also, this was the first year we had a student award winner for the BCE program. 

Mike Merchant commended Bob Davis for doing a great job in assuming the duties of Director for Greg Cronholm.

Governing Board Report -- Shripat Kamble, Section F Rep:        

Shripat mentioned that this report would entail essentially the same information as that given by Paula Lettuce at the Plenary session, and asked the group if they wanted to hear the presentation again.  The group agreed that a repeat would not be necessary.  He also reminded the group about the current proposal for restructuring ESA, and encouraged Section F members to share their opinions and ideas, and to let their voices be heard.  Mike Merchant asked for a brief summary of what the restructuring proposal entails.  Shripat deferred to Scott Hutchins, who explained that the key aims of the proposal are to: 1) empower sections with a functional voice in ESA; 2) restructure the Society to have 4 sections; and 3) improve representation for all groups via developing functional networks.  Scott added that the intent is not to fix something that is not broken, but rather to enable the society to handle its full agenda more effectively.

Steve Clement mentioned that an informational session on the International Congress of Entomology (ICE) was going to be held Saturday at 12 noon to 1:30 in room 207 of the Convention Center.  The meeting will involve a proposal for hosting the 2012 ICE meeting, and that all are welcome to attend.

Section F Committee Reports:

 Program – James Reinert and Jeff Hahn – 2005:

The Confex system worked well.  Regarding Section F contributions to the Program this year, we were allotted three Section Symposia but were awarded four.  A total of thirty-six symposium speakers gave presentations, and a total of 140 Section F papers were presented at the meeting.  This was significantly higher than the 2004 meeting (Salt Lake City) where we had about 90 papers.  Sixty-four posters were submitted, which was comparable to the 63 submitted in 2004.  A few student papers had been withdrawn after the meeting postponement due to Hurricane Wilma.  The sessions were managed by 18 regular session moderators, six student competition moderators, and ten paper competition judges, and 13 poster competition judges.  Chair Reinert urged the group to consider volunteering for moderating and judging duties for 2006.  Alan Kahan reported that registration at the meeting is only down by 10-15% despite the postponement due to Hurricane Wilma. 

 Ethics -- Joseph Kovach – 2007:

The Governing board asked the ethics committee to prepare a conflict-of-interest statement.  This Board request was made after the Common Names Committee (CNC) Chair expressed some concern to the Ethics committee that there was a disproportionate number (33%) of USDA Forest Service employees on the CNC.  The ethics committee is not alarmed about the issue at this time.  A draft conflict-of-interest will be provided to the membership for review and commentary.  Chair Reinert suggested that the Forest Service has several published lists of insect common names, so they probably have a strong interest in proper development of new common names, and may have several that will be coming under consideration.

Mike Merchant mentioned that “column wraps” are a feature of this year’s meeting.  They are basically posters displayed by being wrapped around columns at the Convention Center.  Wraps were developed for all Sections and all Branches.  Members are encouraged to take time to view them.

Old Business:

Appointed Positions – Boards and Committees:  Chair Reinert pointed out that each committee member’s year of duty termination was listed in the agenda.  He added that no positions would be open until after this meeting, and that filling all openings would be the opportunity of 2006 Chair Jeff Hahn.  Individuals interested in serving on a committee were urged to contact Jeff.

New Business:

Announcements:  Volunteers for the 2006 meeting are needed for the following: 1) judges in the student paper/poster competition; and 2) to moderate Section F sessions.  Those interested in volunteering are urged to contact Jeff Hahn or Jim Reinert.  Members were asked to submit proposals for Program and Section F symposia.  Section F will be allotted 3 Symposia.  Proposals were requested to be brought forward at the Section F Final Business Meeting.  Two moderators/organizers must be identified per symposium.  State whether program support for the proposed symposium will be needed.

Deadlines for 2006 meeting:

      17 Jan. 2006 – Deadline for submission of program symposium to Program Co-Chairs

      6 Mar. 2006 – Deadline for submission of Sec. F and all other symposia proposals.   

      1 Nov. 2006 – HOT TOPICS – Special symposium: late-breaking topics that arise after the deadlines.

      1 June 2006 – Tentative deadline for Papers, Posters, and Student Competition entries.

      2006 Annual Meeting site:  Indianapolis, IN on 10-14 December.

Grayson Brown mentioned that live presentations via internet/webcast may be possible for off-site/international speakers.  Symposium organizers may be able to include such speakers without having the expense of bringing them to Indianapolis.  Such proposals are welcome.

ZB Mayo pointed out that the Royal Entomological Society would be interested in meeting jointly with ESA in the future.  James Sargent commented that the Salt Lake City venue worked out well, and that he encouraged consideration of the site for a future meeting.  Shripat Kamble, Section F Governing Board Representative, said he would pass those comments on to the Governing Board.

The meeting was adjourned at 6:47 PM.
 

Respectfully submitted,

Mark A. Boetel
2005 Section F. Secretary