The Publishing Paradox or How the Publishing Model May be Broken
Among the familiar litany of New Year’s resolutions, many of you may have promised yourselves that 2020 would be the year to finally finish that book or write that article. In other words: to PUBLISH. Publishing is a huge part of academic life, the coin of the realm. There may have been some mythical past…
Going Local or How the AAG Can Help Enhance its Regional Divisions
The region is one of geography’s main concepts and, true to these roots, regional divisions—mostly within the United States but many including Canadian provinces—developed as an intrinsic part of the American Association of Geographers. The Pacific Coast Division was formed in 1938 and the other regional divisions were established in the 1940s and 1950s. Preston…
Finding your Parachute or The PhD is Not Just for Academics
Graduate students are haunted by the specter of future job uncertainty. Many Master’s students wonder what they will do with their degree. For PhD students, the period between becoming ABD and completing the dissertation elicits a queasy feeling. What will the academic job market be like? Will I land a job in my specialization, will…
A Golden Opportunity for Geography or How Can We Harness the Growth in AP Human Geography?
I am from a generation when high school classes (at least in my urban public school) were not terribly challenging. This was through no fault of the teachers, who had to contend with a broad range of students and overcrowded classrooms, but it meant that many of us coasted through high school, only to be…
Call for chapter proposals: New AAG Book on Rocky Mountain West
One of the most anticipated items when I began attending AAG meetings was the annual edited book that came in our packet. This would be a special volume dedicated to the city and region where the meeting was held. Within it would be chapters detailing all kinds of interesting aspects of the region, written by…
The Mental Health Challenge or Relieving Anxiety and Depression for Students and Faculty
About 18 years ago, one of my Masters students calmly mentioned that she had been undergoing a tremendous amount of anxiety, and had seen a doctor about it. I was floored! This particular student exemplified “no drama.” She was motoring through her Master’s thesis research and writing while effectively assisting me on one of my…
Changes in our Annual Meeting: Fees, Structure and an Unfortunate Oversight
In this brief letter, I describe some changes to our registration fees and meeting structure. I would also like to address the unfortunate overlap of our spring meeting with Passover and Good Friday. Fees: Many members have complained to me and others about registration fees for the annual meeting. Setting registration costs is always a…
Introducing the Themes for the 2020 AAG Annual Conference
Each year the AAG president helps to identify a few themes for the AAG Annual Conference. While any topic is accepted for presentation at the annual meeting and participants are encouraged to develop their own special sessions, themes encompass a few specific points of interest for our Annual Conference and are used to organize a…
Who’s sorting who? Or the explosion of metrics and how we can take back control
For those of us still working with paper student evaluations, we receive our spring semester results during the summer. It is a time of mixed emotions for many of us. While I heard one lucky young professor describe opening up her student evaluations as tantamount to Christmas, I am probably not alone in likening it…
Welcome to our new Executive Director
I have said before that as an organization, the AAG punches well above its weight. It is among the healthiest of the academic membership associations and it has done wonders in reflecting and guiding geography. Much of the credit goes to the quality of the AAG staff, incredible people who churn out helpful materials, engage…
Should we be worried? Or how to maintain and expand the number of geographers in our schools.
As geographers, we all know the value of geography. Right? It is a field that provides a unique perspective, an appreciation for particularity, an opportunity to synthesize. But as much as we affirm geography’s value to each other, we also need to look at how geography is perceived outside of our community. In this regard,…
Postcard from Mesoamerica
As Geography research begins in the field and ends in the field, so does my Presidential Column. I had the good fortune to be able to compose most of my first column (July 2018) during my fieldwork in Belize and Guatemala in Central America. Now I am filing my final column as your AAG President…