International Association for the Fantastic in the Arts

There are still a few days left to nominate or self-nominate someone for two open IAFA board positions:

First Vice President

The IAFA requests nominations for individuals interested in becoming our First Vice President. Nominees must be members in good standing. Before nominating someone, please make sure they are a member and willing to stand for election. Self-nominations are welcome.

The First Vice President is a member of the Executive Board, elected by majority vote of the IAFA members who participate in the election, serves a three-year term unless otherwise stipulated, and may be re-elected.

The First Vice President coordinates the ICFA Program, overseeing the work of the Division Heads and scheduling paper sessions for the Annual Conference Program. The First Vice President also consults with the President and Second Vice President concerning appearances by special guests in panels, readings, and lectures, and with the Conference Director about physical arrangements such as AV equipment, room assignments, etc. The First Vice President substitutes for the President when necessary. The First Vice President also oversees the IAFA Graduate Student Award, including the following: advertising the award, organising the prize committee, and collecting and forwarding submissions to the committee for a blind reading process.

Nominations should be sent to Dale Knickerbocker, the IAFA Immediate Past President, at knickerbockerd@ecu.edu. Nominations will close on December 8, 2022.

Candidates will be contacted by the IAFA Immediate Past President and asked to submit their Candidate Statement by December 9, 2022. Voting begins in December and finishes in January. The person elected will take office at the end of the 2023 ICFA. Questions about the position should be directed to the current 1st VP, Valorie Ebert, at iafa.1vp@fantastic-arts.org.

Public Information Officer

The IAFA requests nominations for individuals interested in becoming our Public Information Officer (PIO). Nominees must be members in good standing. Before nominating someone, please make sure they are a member and willing to stand for election. Self-nominations are welcome.

The PIO is a member of the Executive Board, elected by majority vote of IAFA members who participate in the election, serves a three-year term unless otherwise stipulated, and may be re-elected.

The PIO edits and distributes promotional materials and forms publicity liaisons with other organizations, where appropriate. The PIO maintains and regularly updates the website and blog, creates and distributes information from the Board–such as Calls for Papers and election material–and contributes photos and promotional copy to the IAFA website. The PIO maintains and regularly updates social media feeds, responds to inquiries via social media, and monitors the IAFA’s public image on social media. The PIO takes Executive Board minutes, disseminates them, archives them, and makes them available for archival use. The PIO is the recorder of motions and amendments at official meetings. The PIO maintains the IAFA electronic archive.

Nominations should be sent to Dale Knickerbocker, the IAFA Immediate Past President, at knickerbockerd@ecu.edu. Nominations will close on December 8, 2022.

Candidates will be contacted by the IAFA Immediate Past President and asked to submit their Candidate Statement by December 9, 2022. Voting begins in December and finishes in January. The person elected will take office at the end of the 2023 ICFA. Questions about the position should be directed to the current PIO, Skye Cervone, at iafa.pio@fantastic-arts.org.

IAFA Executive Board

It is my pleasure to announce the results of the elections for the positions of Second Vice President and Public Information Officer of the IAFA.

But first, on behalf of the IAFA Executive Borad and Officers, I’d like to express our gratitude to the Election Committee for organizing them: Student Caucus Representative Wendy Wood, Registrar Karen Hellekson, and the committee Chair Immediate Past President Sherryl Vint. Our thanks also goes out to Chief Technology Officer Mike Smith for setting up the voting IT.

Most of all, thank you to all IAFA members who took time to vote in these important elections!

David M. Higgins was elected Second Vice President.

Skye Cervone was elected Public Information Officer.

Both positions are three-year terms.

Congratulations to both!

For those of you unaware of what these positions entail, see the following—and consider running in the future!

Second Vice President

The Second Vice President oversees and develops the programming track of creative guests, maintaining a current email list, contacting writers to solicit proposals, organizing sessions, and consulting the First Vice President to schedule the creative track. The Second Vice President also collects biographies and photos of the invited attending writers for publication in the program book and passes this information on to the Program Book Coordinator. The Second Vice President is elected by majority vote of the IAFA members who participate in the election.

Public Information Officer

The Public Information Officer edits and distributes promotional materials and forms publicity liaisons with other organizations where appropriate. The Public Information Officer maintains and regularly updates the website and blog, creates and distributes information from the Board such as the Call for Papers and election material, and contributes photos and promotional copy to the IAFA website. The Public Information Officer maintains and regularly updates the social media feeds, responds to inquiries via the social media feeds, and monitors the IAFA’s public image on social media. The Public Information Officer takes Executive Board minutes, disseminates them, archives them, and makes them available for archival use. The Public Information Officer is the recorder of motions and amendments at official meetings. The Public Information Officer maintains the IAFA electronic archive. The Public Information Officer is elected by majority vote of the IAFA members who participate in the election.

Dale Knickerbocker

IAFA Members,

Please check the email account associated with your membership for election information.

Call for Nominations by 30 October 2018: IAFA President and First Vice President

The International Association for the Fantastic in the Arts announces a call for nominations for the elected Executive Board positions of President and First Vice President. To be eligible for President, an IAFA member in good standing must have served either as a Division Head or as a member of the IAFA Executive Board. Any IAFA member in good standing may run for the position of First Vice President.

Those interested in running or in nominating someone for either position should send a nomination to both IAFA Immediate Past-President Sydney Duncan at and IAFA Chief Technical Officer Michael Smith at by 30 October 2018. The Election Committee will notify each nominee of her or his nomination and will provide each with the names of everyone else who has accepted nomination during that election cycle. Candidates declining nomination must notify the Election Committee immediately upon notification of their nomination.

Candidates eligible for the offices to which they have been nominated and willing to run for those offices will be asked to submit position statements by 20 November 2018. The Election Committee will distribute position statements and ballots to the membership on 10 December 2018, and ballots will be counted by the Election Committee after 10 January 2019. If no candidate receives a majority vote, a runoff election between the two candidates who have received the most votes will be conducted. The Election Committee will announce results of the election at the IAFA business meeting at ICFA 40 in March 2019, with additional announcements in appropriate IAFA venues thereafter.

For those elected, terms will begin immediately following the conclusion of ICFA 40 in March 2019 and will last for three years. Duties of each position are listed below. Please contact Sydney Duncan if you have any questions. We look forward to hearing from you!

President

The President is the chief executive officer, responsible for directing and coordinating all functions of the organization, including the annual conference, the quarterly journal, other sponsored publications, the Awards Program, and public relations of all kinds. The President sets the agenda for, and presides at, all meetings of the Executive Board and the annual business meeting at the ICFA. The President is also the chief planning officer, responsible for setting agenda in all Association projects. The President oversees the work of the other officers, recruits special guests, seeks institutional support, confirms non-elected Board members, etc. The President is elected by majority vote of the IAFA members who participate in the election.

First Vice President

The First Vice President coordinates the ICFA Program, overseeing the work of the Divisions Heads and scheduling paper sessions for the Annual Conference Program. The First Vice President also consults with the President and Second Vice President concerning appearances by special guests in panels, readings, and lectures, and with the Conference Chair about physical arrangements such as AV equipment, room assignments, etc. The First Vice President substitutes for the President when necessary. The First Vice President also oversees the IAFA David G. Hartwell Emerging Scholar Award, including the following: advertising the award, organizing the prize committee, and collecting and forwarding submissions to the committee for a blind reading process. The First Vice President is elected by majority vote of the IAFA members who participate in the election.

SCIAFA Representative Elections

As Sarah Fish and I come to the end of our terms as Student Caucus Representative and Vice-Representative, we would now like to welcome any (self) nominations for our replacements.

As Student Caucus Representative and Vice-Representative, you will serve a two-year term beginning in 1 August 2018 and ending in 31 July 2020. You must currently be a graduate student to run; however, if you are in your last year as a student and will be on the job market for the second half of the term, that is acceptable (for instance, Sarah Fish was a PhD candidate for the first year of her term but is now a professor).

Any and all graduate students will be welcome to vote on the nominations. Traditionally, the candidate with the most votes becomes Representative, and the runner-up becomes Vice-Representative.

The formal position descriptions are as follows:

Job Description: Student Caucus Representative

Formal titles: Representative of the Student Caucus of the International Conference for the Fantastic in the Arts (SCIAFA)/ SCIAFA Representative to the Executive Board of the International Conference of the Fantastic in the Arts (IAFA)

The SCIAFA Representative is elected by the student body of the IAFA. During the two-year term, the Representative is responsible for addressing and advocating for the needs of student members of IAFA. This responsibility includes representing student membership on the Executive Board of the IAFA (the SCIAFA Representative is serves on the Executive Board). The Representative must attend biannual board meetings during their term and participate in the Board’s online discussion list. At the conference, the Representative will run SCIAFA programming, including the a SCIAFA-sponsored panel and the SCIAFA Mentorship Program. The Representative is expected to attend all IAFA business meetings, as well as most Board-sponsored events. The SCIAFA Representative should remain visible and accessible for the duration of the conference both to assist and guide fellow students as well as to assist fellow Board members, organizers, and volunteers.

Job Description: Student Caucus Vice-Representative

Formal title: Vice-Representative of the Student Caucus of the International Conference for the Fantastic in the Arts (SCIAFA) (formerly the Shadow Representative)

The SCIAFA Vice-Representative is an elected position. The Vice-Representative runs for the full SCIAFA Representative position, and the Vice-Representative position is filled by the runner-up. The duty of the Vice-Representative is to assist the Representative, including stepping in for the Representative in the event of emergencies or scheduling conflicts. The Vice-Representative is expected to attend all SCIAFA and Board-Sponsored events at the annual conference, but does not attend the summer board meeting (though the Vice-Representative should be available to attend in the Representative’s place if needed). In recent iterations, the Vice-Representative has been responsible for coordinating the conference’s Newcomer Meet Up.

If you are interested in nominating yourself for the position of Student Caucus Representative, please email your name, school affiliation, a brief bio, an explanation of why you believe you would be a good fit for the position, and a picture to: iafa.studentcaucus@fantastic-arts.org

Nominations are due by 10 pm on Saturday, 31 March.

I will post all nominations to the SCIAFA Facebook Page, which can be found here: https://www.facebook.com/groups/833849033305627/

Voting will begin on 2 April and end on 15 April at midnight.

The winners’ term will begin on 1 August.

If you have any questions about the position(s), you can email me (rudd.am@gmail.com) or Sarah (sfish@collin.edu). I look forward to hearing from you.

Thank you,

Amanda Rudd

Student Caucus Representative, 2016-2018