Candidates for APA President
How are you going to recruit, retain and involve individuals primarily engaged in scientific research?
APA needs to maintain its relevance and the importance of its endeavors in the lives of psychologists who are primarily involved in scientific research by surveying their needs (using APA's rapid survey capabilities and other procedures) and then actively addressing their most urgent concerns. I strongly suspect that some of the issues that I will need to address as president will include increased advocacy for federal research funding, encouraging the development of new venues for rapid dissemination of research findings and facilitating new policies to better protect scientific endeavors from political encroachments and unnecessary Institutional Review Board problems.
Approximately one-third of APA members work in educational settings (across all levels of education). What would you do as APA president to address their issues of concern?
In addition to increasing efforts to actively survey educators at the grassroots level to find out "What can APA do for you?" and then address their identified concerns, I would strongly support implementation of recommendations from prior and future Education Leadership Conferences and other Education Directorate initiatives. Those conferences provide a forum for a multitude of APA divisions, governance groups and education and training groups external to APA to address issues of mutual concern, promote a shared identity for education and training leaders and provide a vehicle for developing public policy statements impacting education.
