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Section Annual Report for Environmental Sociology

This annual report covers the period of section activity from September 2017 to August 2018 and a fiscal year from January 2018 to December 2018. The report is typically completed by the immediate past chair of each section as it covers the period this person served as chair. However, it is often completed in consultation with other officers and it may be submitted by anyone on the section council. Sections that do not file an Annual Report will have their budget allocation withheld until a complete report is received. Please submit the report by November 15. Section Governance Provide details of your section’s governance activity during the period between September 2017 and August 2018.

Business Meeting Copy and paste below (or attach separately) the agenda and approved meeting minutes from the section business meeting which include a count of members present and summary of decisions made at this meeting.

2018 Environment & Technology Section of the American Sociological Association Business Meeting Agenda August 11, 2019 9:30am-10:10 am Philadelphia Marriott Downtown, Salon G, Level 5

1. Chair’s report Tammy Lewis 2. Chair-Elect’s report Kari Norgaard 3. Past-Chair’s report Andrew Jorgenson 4. Secretary’s report Brian Mayer 5. Treasurer’s report Lori Hunter 6. Nomination’s Committee report Brian Gareau 7. Policy and Research Committee report Alissa Cordner 8. Membership Committee report Kerry Ard 9. Publications Committee report Stefano Longo 10. Newsletter Editor’s report Lazarus Adua 11. Teaching and Outreach Committee report Erica Morrell 12. Council Member At-Large report Kishi Animashuan Ducre 13. Graduate Student Representative report Jordan Besek 14. Committee on Diversity Report Michael Mascarenhas 15. Other Business 16. Announcements

We do not traditionally approve minutes from the prior year’s meeting nor do we count members. We can do this moving forward. There were approximately 100 members present. No major decisions were made at the meeting. The meeting was primarily used for reporting out from the council.

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Council Meeting Copy and paste below (or attach separately) the agenda and approved meeting minutes of all Council Meetings conducted between August 2017 and September 2018. Minutes must include a list of council members present and a summary of decisions made. Minutes are not a transcript of proceedings but a listing of what discussions took place and official actions taken.

ES Council Meeting Minutes 8-11-18 ASA Annual Meeting, Philadelphia Philadelphia Convention Center, 7am Attending Council Members: Tammy Lewis, Kari Noorgard, Brian Mayer, Brian Gareau, Alissa Cordner, Stefano Longo, Kishi Ducre, Jordan Besek Absent Council Members: Andrew Jorgenson, Lori Hunter, Erica Morrell, Lazarus Adua Additional Attendees: Tracy Perkins, Jill Harrison, Joshua Sbicca, Hannah Holleman, John Zinda, Albert Fu, Apollonya Porcelli, Emily Kennedy, Michael Mascarenhas 2018 Section on Environmental Sociology convenes at 7:05am

1. Welcome from Chair, Tammy Lewis a. Introductions b. Reminder for outgoing council members to connect with incoming members, share

dropbox and materials 1. Note to send email invitations to dropbox 2. Reminder to save and store council related documents

c. Chair’s Report i. The past year has been quiet while council has allowed revisions to bylaws in

2017 take effect ii. Past issues with sexual harassment have been addressed in the previous year and

will continue to be monitored and a priority topic to address for the section iii. We have formalized our mentor/mentee interactions at ASA

1. Jordan Besek took the lead in making this an ES-sponsored event 2. Issue should be on our radar, let’s make this a healthy section where

everyone is respected iv. Recognize Michael Mascarenhas and committee’s work on Committee on Racial

Equity 1. Our section is working on being more open and inclusive to everyone 2. Mentor / mentee is an important mechanism for invitation and inclusion

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2. Chair-Elect’s Report from Kari Norgaard i. Acknowledge the location of our conference on indigenous Lenape lands ii. Recognition of Committee on Racial Equity’s mini conference on 8/10/18

1. Discussion of next steps following the mini conference. 2. Future efforts to make new connections as a section.

3. Secretary’s Report from Brian Mayer

i. No changes to ES bylaws in 2018 ii. Changes made in 2017 seem to be in place and working well

4. Treasurer’s Report from Lori Hunter, as reported by Kishi Ducre

i. Tammy recognizes Lori’s effort to obtain an off-site location for ES reception and appropriate menu options

ii. Kishi Ducre reads for Lori: 1. See ES business meeting notes for details 2. Overall evaluation is that the Section is in healthy financial status

5. Nomination Committee’s Report from Brian Gareau

i. 9 positions filled in 2018 ii. See notes from business meeting for individual positions and nominees

6. Policy and Research Committee’s Report from Alissa Cordner

i. Organized the section awards 1. 12 nominees for Olson Student Paper Award 2. 11 books for Schnaiberg Award 3. See business meeting notes for winners

7. Membership Committee’s Report from Kerry Ard

i. Membership has remained steady ii. 479 – just shy of 600 mark for 4 sections in 2019 iii. We have the average number of student members, slightly lower low-income

members iv. Recruitment efforts through email notices near ASA meeting deadlines, reached

out to recent dropouts 1. 14 replies from dropouts – did prompt renewals, but also a few identified

issues related to changed interests, culture within section (too niche) v. Note from Tammy – SSSP Environment Sections are occurring today, on the same

day as all the ES sections 1. Tammy will contact both ASA and SSSP Presidents

vi. Note from Josh – can we gift memberships as a potential recruitment tool for graduate students

8. Publications Committee Report from Stefano Longo i. Continue to publish the newsletter ii. Need for a conversation with Environmental Sociology journal iii. Note from Tammy – need to refocus on our digital media presence with new

committee members, Justin and Nathan

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1. Suggestion of #EnvSocASA twitter feed

9. Teaching out Outreach Committee’s Report from Erica Morrell, reported by Albert Fu i. Fall 2017 solicitation for committee members, one team for collection of syllabi

and another for selecting Teaching and Mentorship award: awardee is Michael Bell

ii. Award selection process – achieving consistency for award decisions and procedures

1. Note from Brian – we have focused the outreach award on project-based applications, not career

2. Note from Tammy – when the teaching award was originally created, it was focused on non-R1 teachers

3. Additional conversations should take place to develop procedures iii. Number of submissions was limited iv. We should have ideas for next year, such as expanding the syllabi archive

1. Suggestion from Tracy Perkins – lightning round approach to teaching sharing opportunities at the roundtables 2018

10. Council Member-At-Large Report from Kishi Animashuan Ducre i. Nothing to report

11. Graduate Student Representative’s Report from Jordan Besek

i. Solicited feedback on graduate student social media, but no response ii. Mentorship program, growth from 20 to 38 pairs

1. Mentorship dinner this year – includes council members iii. Note from Tracy Perkins – thank you to Jordan and request for guidelines for

proper mentoring 1. Jordan’s response – have council review pairs

b. Committee on Racial Equity from Michael Mascarenhas i. Report on 2018 meeting

1. Support from NSF workshop grant 2. Sponsored travel for graduate students and paid 3 speakers 3. Support from University of Oregon for citizen groups 4. 110 registrations 5. Moving forward, approached journals for a special edition

ii. Potential ideas for future – whiteness iii. A conversation is needed on the relationship between the current committee

and the official ES Section 1. Clarification from Tammy – this is currently an ad hoc committee

iv. There remain concerns within section membership on race and needs to be addressed as we move forward as a section

12. Open discussion i. Kerry Ard – Proposal that ES council should we move forward with formalizing a

Committee on Racial Equity ii. Kari Norgaard– ASA is moving forward with addressing sexual harassment, ES is

paying attention to this issue, but we’ve been paying less attention to issues of race and ethnicity among recent section leadership

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1. Michael Mascarenhas – Supporting proposal to formalize a Committee on Racial Equity

2. Tammy Lewis – Proposal to begin the process of drafting bylaw amendments to create a Committee on Racial Equity

3. Kishi Ducre – Proposal of an alternate idea to have all the committees we have now to form a statement of racial equity for their committee

4. Tammy Lewis - Support for this proposal, suggestion that the topic be discussed by Council in 2018.

iii. Tammy Lewis - Reminder of ES roundtables and business meeting following conclusion of council meeting.

Meeting adjourns at 8:15am

The Previous Year Describe section activities during the period between September 2017 and August 2018.

• Membership recruitment and retention – What efforts did the section make to retain members and reach out to new members? What were the results of the efforts? For summary, see business meeting minutes #7 Membership Committee Report. See also report at end of document.

• Communications – How does the section communicate with its members? Did it begin using any new technologies or strategies? If so, were they effective? Include links to the section website, newsletters, and any other electronic media used. For summary, see business meeting minutes #8 Publications Committee Report. In addition to the formal ASA list serv, we have our own listserv and we have our own website that includes our electronic newsletters at http://envirosoc.org. We also have two twitter accounts – one for the section (@EnviroSocASA) and one for the grad students (@envirograds). See also report at end of document.

• Mentoring – What, if any, mentoring opportunities does the section offer to students, early career faculty, nonfaculty, etc.? We have a formal mentoring program. For summary, see business meeting minutes #11 Graduate Student Representative Report. See also report at end of document.

• Programming – Provide an overview of the section’s programming at the annual meeting, scholarly/ professional development activities outside of the annual meeting, development of substantive resources, partnerships with other sections or groups, etc. We held a mini-conference at Temple University “Bridging the Gap: Race and the Environment” organized by the Environmental Sociology Section’s Committee on Racial Equity (https://raceandenvironment.wordpress.com). The conference was funded by the National Science Foundation’s Sociology Program, the University of Oregon, and the section.

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Our session panels focused on: 1) Emotional Politics of Environmental Threats, 2) Indigenous Peoples, Colonialism and Environmental Sociology, and 3) Public Environmental Sociology. We also participated in Regular Environmental Sociology Sessions on: 4) Governance and Climate Policy and 5) Environmental Justice, and special sessions on 6) Sociology and the Anthropocene, and 7) Feeling Climate Change: The U.S. Experience in Racial, Ethnic, and Gender Perspective. We co-hosted our reception with the Section on Animals. See also report at end of document.

Plans for the Coming Year Describe section plans for the period between September 2018 and August 2019. These plans should align with the 2018 budget and proposed 2019 budget below.

• Membership recruitment and retention – What efforts will the section make to retain members and reach out to new members? What are the goals of the efforts? Continue efforts outlined above.

• Communications – How does the section plan to communicate with its members? Does the section plan on using any new technologies or strategies? If so, how? Continue efforts outlined above.

• Mentoring – What efforts will the section make to mentor students, early career faculty, nonfaculty, etc.? Continue efforts outline above.

• Programming – Provide an overview of the section’s upcoming plans for programming at the annual meeting, scholarly/ professional development activities outside of the annual meeting, development of substantive resources, partnerships with other sections or groups, etc. In addition to regular programming, we are discussing how to follow-up the mini-conference. We will again co-host our reception with the Section on Animals.

2018 Finances Provide a narrative on how the 2018 budget matched with actual expenses and income from 2018. Please account for any substantive differences.

The section expenses totaled $3249 in 2018 (YTD Sept 30) with the primary expense being the annual meeting reception ($2505). Additional expenses were for awards and support for a mini-conference. The section’s income was $2969 including primarily the section budget allocation ($2066) plus dues income. The Section’s overall assets decreased by $280, with an ending balance of $1937.

Budget for 2019

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Creating a budget will help the section plan its activities for the year. Your 2019 budget should reflect the narrative in the “Plans for the Coming Year” section. The following table will help you organize and calculate a budget. Expected 2019 Expenditures

Expense Category Budgeted Amount Details (use the cells in this column to provide information on each expense)

Annual Meeting

Reception $2500 This is consistent with last year’s expense, as we will again share our reception with the Section on Animals & Society

Other Meeting Expenses $ Enter amount Use this space to provide details

Awards

Student Awards $ 200 Marvin E. Olsen award amount

Award Plaques $ 200 Typical expense

Other $ Enter amount Use this space to provide details

Communications

Website $ 0 Is paid through next year

Newsletter $ 0 online

Other $ Enter amount Use this space to provide details

Miscellaneous

Membership $ Enter amount Use this space to provide details

Other $ Enter amount Use this space to provide details

Total 2019 Budgeted Expenditures

$ 2900 Sum estimated expenses

Estimated 2019 Income

Income Category Estimated Amount Details

Section Allocation – Base $ 1000 ASA Office will provide figure mid-October. See note 1 on how this figure is calculated.

Section Allocation – Per Member $ 998 ASA Office will provide figure mid-October. See note 2 on how this figure is calculated.

Premium Dues $ 1204 ASA Office will provide an estimated figure. See note 3 on how this figure is calculated.

Contributions $ Enter amount

Misc $ Enter amount

Total 2019 Estimated Income $ 3202 Sum estimated income

Budget Summary

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Estimated Remaining Balance at end of December 2018 $ 1937

Accounting for all estimated costs for the remainder of the year, estimate the remaining balance.

Total 2019 Estimated Income +$ 3202 Fill in from the Estimated Income table above

Total 2019 Budgeted Expenditures

- $ 2900 Fill in from the Budgeted Expenditures table above

Total = $ 2239 To calculate net amount, sum Lines 1 and 2, then subtract Line 3.

Notes The following explains how income is calculated. By October 20, the ASA Office will provide the following information, so sections do not have to calculate estimates themselves.

1 Section Allocation – Base Based off of this year’s final membership count as of September 30, sections receive a base allocation as follows:

• Sections with 300 or more members receive a base allocation of $1,000

• Sections with fewer than 300 members and more than 200 members receive: [# of section members - 100] x $5

• Sections with fewer than 199 members receive a base allocation of $500 2 Section Allocation – Per Member Based off of this year’s final membership count as of September 30, sections receive two dollars for each member. 3 Premium Dues The base rate is $10 for regular members, $5 for students and $10 for associate, low income, and high school teacher members. Any dues raised by the sections in excess of the base rate go directly to the section throughout the year based on actual membership numbers. Subscription Fees for Section Journals are not added here.

To see current and historical membership counts, please visit www.asanet.org/SectionMembership. Please note that membership year ends on September 30.

Miscellaneous Is there any additional information about the section or the area of study you would like to share with the Committee on Sections? Is there any feedback you would like to provide to the Committee on Sections?

Below please find the report that we have traditionally sent to ASA prior to this new template being created. It consists of brief reports from each council member.

1. Chairs Report, Tammy Lewis My main tasks as Chair were to support the council in their tasks throughout the year, especially the work of the Committee on Racial Diversity to organize the mini-conference on Race and the Environment. I also worked with the incoming chair to help form the panels for this year’s conference. I worked with the past chair and others to address past issues of sexual harassment in the section. This has been a high priority. I contributed to the section’s newsletters. I also organized the Council meeting and Business meeting.

2. Chair-Elect’s Report, Kari Norgaard

My main task as Chair-Elect was organizing our sessions for 2018. I solicited potential themes via word of

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mouth and our section listserv. Using these ideas together with my own I organized 14 roundtables and three thematic sessions (UO doctoral students JM Bacon and Allison Ford assisted especially in the process of organizing the roundtable submissions into coherent themes). The thematic sessions were: Emotional Politics of Environmental Threats, Indigenous Peoples, Colonialism and Environmental Sociology, and Public Environmental Sociology. I have also been doing various activities in support of the visibility of Indigenous peoples and countering colonialism within ASA. This has included working with other Native and non-Native sociologists to think about useful steps (e.g. including acknowledgement of indigenous territoriality at our meetings), communicating with ASA President Eduardo Bonilla-Silva regarding these suggestions, and writing a piece for Footnotes on indigenous sociology. The Chair-Elect is also in charge of the Bogulslaw Award, however this is given in alternate (odd) years so we had no awardees this year. Lastly, I have slightly updated the Chair-Elect notebook and shared that with our incoming Chair-Elect Jill Harrison.

3. Past-Chair’s Report, Andrew Jorgenson

As Past-Chair during the 2017-18 year, I helped facilitate the leadership transition to the new Chair, Tammy Lewis, and Chair-Elect, Kari Norgaard, and continued to participate in discussions as to how the section should respond to issues of diversity, inclusion and sexual harassment. As Past-Chair, I prepared the report for the ASA covering the activities of the Section during my time as Chair. The ASA report included updates from all Section Council members, a summary of membership, budgeting, and activities of the Section. I also oversaw the selection of the winner of the section’s Fred Buttel Distinguished Contribution Award. This year’s recipient was Kenneth Gould, Professor of Sociology at City University of New York - Brooklyn College. He was unanimously selected by the Section Council for recognition, based on his lifetime scholarly achievements and the impressive nomination packet that was prepared on his behalf.

4. Secretary’s Report, Brian Mayer

As Secretary, the 2017-2018 year has been comparatively quiet. With multiple changes to the Bylaws in 2016-2017, the Council has been working to fill the new positions and to ensure that these changes are effective. After a year of observation, we have successfully filled the positions and operations for the ES Section have been smooth.

5. Treasurer’s Report, Lori Hunter

As of May 31, 2018, the section had a balance of $3,491. This includes $458 in annual membership revenue received year-to-date and a section budget allocation of $2,066. The year to date total income for the section was $2,524. One expense - $1250 toward 2017 meeting reception expenses is the only expense recorded thus far on the May 31 2018 YTD report, leading to total net assets of $3,491. Reception expense for the 2017 annual meeting was $2817.00. In addition, during 2017, $152 was deducted for newsletter expenses (website) and $372 in award expenses. The award expenses included $200 for the Marvin E. Olsen Student Paper Award plus reimbursement to Secretary Brian Mayer for plaque and certificate expenses. No requests have been made as yet for 2018 awards.

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Revenue In 2018, income through May 31st from membership dues was $458. These numbers do not include membership dues for the remainder of the year, which typically show additional income (based on previous years’ projections). Total year to date income in 2018 is $2,524, which includes membership dues and our budget allocation.

EXPENDITURES Expenses pending (as of May 31 2018)

• Reception at ASA: The cost for our 2018 Reception, held at Maggiano’s Little Italy, will be $2400. The restaurant has a “sales minimum” of $2500 plus a 20% service fee, for a total of $3000. Our reception is shared with Animals & Society who will contribute $600 based on an estimate of attendance at 20 percent (to our 80 percent). From our section, a $1250 deposit has been made and our remaining $1150 was requested June 29, 2018.

• Awards: No requests have been received at this date.

• Award certificates, frames, & plaque: No requests have been received yet.

END OF YEAR BALANCE AT A GLANCE

Year to date ending amount: $3,491.00 (based on 31 May 2018 financial report) Projected Expenses: The reception expenses for August 2018 will be $2400 total, with $1150 payment still to be made. There will also be the cost of additional the Marvin Olsen Student Paper award ($200), certificates, and plaques. The website domain is paid through 2021 (documentation in section dropbox). We have agreed to support the Race & Enviroment mini-conference with $350 toward coffee breaks. End of Year balance for ETS: $1,591* *This amount does not include projected increase in membership dues in the 3rd and 4th quarter (typically reported in the December financial report). Financial report for December 31, 2017 shows total dues income for 2017 was $1,316, of which $692 was received in Q3 and Q4.

6. Nomination Committee’s Report, Brian Gareau

This year, the committee was charged to fill a slate for the following positions:

• Chair-elect

current balance 3491

-- reception 1150 outstanding expenses

-- awards 400

-- mini-conference 350

1591

* does not include income from dues or other expenses

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• Secretary

• Policy and Research Committee Chair

• Nominations Committee Chair

• Publications Committee Chair

• Council Member at Large

• Student Member

• Digital Communications Committee Chair (2 positions) Nominations were solicited at the section’s annual business meeting and via the section listserv. The nominations solicited at the business meeting were anonymous, while the nominations submitted by email were not. The Committee worked with the Chair to create a short-list of candidates for each position. The Committee was mindful of gender, race/ethnicity, and former service to the Council when selecting candidates and strived for broad representation on the slate. The short lists were derived from nominees submitted to the Committee. Each of the nominees was contacted by email and/or phone by a member of the Committee. The nominees were provided an overview of the position for which they were nominated and were informed regarding the term of service. Candidates’ names were submitted to Justin Lini (and ultimately incoming ASA contact Mark Fernando) at the ASA office in December 2017. ASA’s main office solicited biographical statements from the candidates. The election results were received by the Chair mid-June 2018. The Chair sent an email to the Environmental Sociology listserv to announce the results of the election. Afterwards, all of the candidates were contacted by the Nominations Chair. The newly elected section officers are:

• Chair-elect JILL HARRISON

• Treasurer HANNAH HOLLEMAN • Policy and Research Committee Chair JOHN ZINDA

• Nominations Committee Chair TRACY PERKINS

• Publications Committee Chair JOSHUA SBICCA

• Council Member at Large EMILY HUDDART KENNEDY

• Student Member APPOLLANYA MARIA PORCELLI

• Digital Communications Committee Co-Chairs NATHAN LINDSTEDT and JUSTIN SEAN MYERS

At this year’s meeting (Philadelphia, 2018), we will begin soliciting nominations to fill a slate for the following positions: Chair-Elect; Teaching, Training and Practice Committee Chair; Membership Committee Chair

7. Policy and Research Committee report, Alissa Cordner

As Chair of the Policy and Research Committee, my main task was to coordinate the section awards. I organized committees for two section awards: the Marvin E. Olsen Student Paper Award, and the Allan Schnaiberg Outstanding Publication Award. I solicited nominations for committee members through the EnviroSoc email list, and received sufficient self-nominations to form two

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committees with four or five people. I shared the call for award nominations on the EnviroSoc and official ASA listservs, and also posted in the newsletter. Because my book was nominated for the Schnaiberg Award, I recused myself from the committee and worked with Chair Tammy Lewis to identify a replacement Committee Chair, Angela Mertig. I wrote a memo outlining award processes for Dr. Mertig. For the Olsen Award, I organized the committee so that papers were read and evaluated by late May, and we held a conference call to decide on a winner. These awards will be presented at the 2018 American Sociological Annual Meeting in Philadelphia. I do not know how the Schnaiberg Committee organized themselves, but I share the results below. Olsen Paper Award: The committee included Eric Bonds, Feng Hao, Anna C. McCreery, Julia A. Flagg, and myself as Chair. Twelve eligible papers were nominated (several nominated papers were written with faculty co-authors or were not presented going to be presented at the 2018 ASA, and thus were not forwarded to the committee). • Erik Kojola is the winner of the 2018 Olsen Award for his paper “Who Speaks for the Place? Identity and Nostalgia in Conflicts over Resource Extraction and Conservation.” This paper examines “put it in my backyard” (PIMBY) community responses to copper mining projects in Northern Minnesota. Drawing on an impressive dataset, including over 100 interviews, ethnographic observations, and analysis of media and organizational documents, Kojola finds that proposed mines have become contested because of how they resonate, or conflict, with people’s sense of place. This topic is politically timely and compelling for the discipline. The paper is strong methodologically and theoretically, integrating work from environmental sociology with sociological work on identity and sense of place. Kojola does an outstanding job of situating his research in environmental sociology literatures, and this paper has the potential to make a lasting contribution.

• Camila H. Alvarez and Kathryn G. Norton-Smith will be recognized with an Honorable Mention for their paper “Environmental Inequality in Latino Destinations: Estimated Cancer Risk from Air Toxics in Latino traditional and emerging destinations.” This paper examines estimated cancer risk from air toxics among established, emerging, and nondestination locations for Latino immigrants. Their quantitative models find that counties with significant Latino population growth since 1990 have significantly higher estimated cancer risk from air toxics than established destinations and nondestinations. They bring together areas of theory from environmental sociology as well as race and migration studies in this thoughtful and important paper.

Schnaiberg Paper Award: The committee included Tarique Niazi, Emily Huddart Kennedy, John Aloysius Zinda, Norah MacKendrick, and Angela Mertig as Chair. Eleven books were nominated. Since I did not serve on this committee, I am unable to describe the committee’s process.

• Alissa Cordner’s book Toxic Safety was chosen as the winner of the Schnaiberg Award.

• Justin Farrell’s book The Battle for Yellowstone was chosen as an Honorable Mention.

Unfortunately I did not write any columns for the section newsletter this year. I regret not contributing more to the newsletter and will discuss ideas with the incoming Committee Chair. I updated the Policy and Research Committee Notebook, and saved it to the “ASA-ETS” Dropbox folder.

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8. Membership Committee’s Report, Kerry Ard

Membership in the Environment and Technology section of ASA has remained slightly under the 600 mark. Reaching 600 members would allow us 4 sessions. Given that the overall section membership of ASA is down from last year, we did well.

August 2011: 456 members August 2012: 475 members August 2013: 494 members August 2014: 493 members August 2015: 459 members August 2016: 489 members August 2017: 508 members July 2018: 466 members Usually there is a slight increase after ASA so we will continue to recruit throughout the annual meeting. As chair of the membership committee, I used various strategies to recruit members throughout the year. • In Summer 2018, I sent a reminder via listserv about membership renewal.

• I also sent emails to people who did not renew their membership (30 people) and asked them to fill out an anonymous Qualtrics survey consisting of 6 questions as to why they did not renew. As of 7/17/2018 14 have replied to the request. The results were that 2 people stated the reason they did not renew was cost, 4 their interests have changed, 5 because of the culture within the section with only one specifying the “special sessions were niche” and “increasingly lean toward politicized pet projects of session administrators.” Also the section “did not speak to core concerns of empirical environmental sociology” “and overlapped with central themes of other sections.” The remaining reasons were cited as “other” and one specifying they lost their position in academia. This email prompted 3 people to renew their membership as they were unaware they did not renew.

• I also searched the ASA annual meeting program for presentations that were not hosted by the environmental sociology section but were on topics that would be interesting to our group (e.g. the environmental movement, issues around agriculture, etc.) and sent an individual email to the authors to join our sections (about 25 people).

9. Publication Committee’s Report, Stefano Longo

Continued publication of quarterly newsletter. Added new section that highlights "Transitions." Lazarus Adua will stay on as the editor of the ETS newsletter for 2018-2019.

10. Teaching and Outreach Committee report, Erica Morrell

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Committee: Erica Morrell, Chair, Middlebury Josh Sbicca, Colorado State Albert Fu, Humboldt Anthony Silvaggio, Kutztown Rachael Shwom, Rutgers Kent Henderson, graduate student, Stonybrook Activities: • August 2017: Solicited Members for the Committee.

• September 2017: Committee members chosen: Josh Sbicca, Al(bert) Fu, Tony Silvaggio, Rachael Shwom, Kent Henderson. We’ve broken into two teams, Erica Morrell, Josh Sbicca, Al(bert) Fu, and Tony Silvaggio will do awards, Rachael Shwom and Kent Henderson will spearhead syllabi collection. Erica Morrell will also manage social media stuff.

• September 2017: Invited David Pellow, winner of the Practice and Outreach Award, to write an article for the Fall newsletter and he agrees.

• September 2017: Sent an email soliciting syllabi from Section Members.

• October 2017: Last minute, David Pellow had to back out of contributing to the newsletter. Invited him to contribute at another time.

• October 2017: ETS Newsletter published re-iterating our call for syllabi from Section Members.

• October 2017: Kent and Rachael begin categorizing received syllabi to archive on our section website.

• October 2017: Erica partners with Alissa Cordner to begin collecting fellowship and grant information of use to section members, in response to a request for help on this task from Tammy Lewis, section Chair.

• November 2017: Erica and Alissa solicit fellowship and grant information from section members, add call to Winter newsletter to be released in the new year.

• December 2017: Kent and Rachael finish categorizing received syllabi to archive on our section website and contact Nathan to begin this archiving process. By the end of the month, all syllabi are archived on the website. o *Will need to update these regularly in the future

• January 2018: Sent out first call for Teaching and Mentorship Award nominations. Text:

“The Teaching and Mentorship Award honors faculty members who have provided especially dedicated service to the teaching of environmental sociology and the mentorship of students at the undergraduate and/or graduate level. Section members are encouraged to nominate colleagues, but all members, especially those in smaller institutions, are encouraged to self‐nominate. Nomination packets should be scanned into a single PDF and submitted by email to Erica Morrell at erica.c.morrell@gmail.com by March 15, 2018. Nomination packets should include the following: 1. Letter of Nomination, not to exceed 2 pages. 2. Personal statement on teaching philosophy, not to exceed 3 pages. 3. CV with the following relevant components highlighted: teaching/mentoring awards and

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activities; publications or presentations co‐authored with students (underline the names of student co‐authors and indicate whether undergraduate, master’s, or doctoral student). 4. Maximum of 5 letters of student support (any mix of present or past undergraduate and/or graduate students) 5. Maximum of 2 additional letters of support from colleagues who are not former students 6. Maximum of 3 syllabi of relevant coursework (with no more than 2 graduate syllabi), all from within the previous 5 years 7. Summary of teaching evaluations for the courses in #6 Please let me know if you have any questions. Thank you, and I look forward to receiving nominations with the rest of the Teaching and Outreach Committee.”

• February 2018: Sent out second call for Teaching and Mentorship Award nominations.

• March 2018: Sent out final call for Teaching and Mentorship Award nominations. Received three nomination packets in total.

• April 2018. Decided on winner of Teaching and Mentorship Award: Michael Bell.

• April 2018: Discussed need to amend the Teaching and Mentorship Award call. Why do we emphasize smaller institutions? Are we actually going to give them preference in our considerations? How else can we get better nomination packets (in terms of clearer criteria)—maybe have half of the nomination letters speak to teaching explicitly and half to mentorship explicitly? What are we trying to signal with our award winners? What are our criteria for deciding awardees?

• April 2018: We realized there is no institutional memory for alerting awardee and section members of the recipient. Among Teaching and Outreach Committee members and section chair Tammy Lewis, we decide to notify members about Michael Bell being chosen by first emailing him directly and the other nominees to let them know they had not been chosen. We will announce Michael Bell’s award publicly first at the annual ASA meeting in August; we will also announce this in the following section newsletter. • June 2018: Submit end of year report to section chair.

• Ongoing: Managed social media sites.

Recommendations for Improving the Committee’s Activities: • May want to amend the Teaching and Mentorship Award call. Why do we emphasize smaller institutions? Are we actually going to give them preference in our considerations? How else can we get better nomination packets (in terms of clearer criteria)—maybe have half of the nomination letters speak to teaching explicitly and half to mentorship explicitly? What are we trying to signal with our award winners? What are our criteria for deciding awardees?

Planned activities: • Invite winner of Teaching and Mentorship award to write something for the ETS Newsletter after the award is made public.

• Keep syllabi archived on the website updated.

• Because we focused on syllabi archiving this year as an added contribution to the section, next year we will strategize and implement something to enhance outreach.

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11. Council Member-At-Large Report, Kishi Animashuan Ducre N/A

12. Graduate Student Representative Report, Jordan Besek

In this report I will 1) briefly touch on social media activity, then 2) discuss the ASA mentorship program in depth and also provide a blueprint for future Graduate Student reps to continue the program. Relevant files can be in the council Dropbox folder “Mentor Program templates and info”. 1: Both during and shortly after the 2017 ASA annual meeting in Montreal I solicited comments, questions, and other information from graduate students interested in continuing the graduate student social media accounts and listserv. I received very little feedback. What feedback I did receive can be largely categorized as indifference. I did not receive a single request to post or continue with these accounts. As such, my recommendation is that we terminate them. 2: This is the third year of the ASA ESS mentorship program, and as of this writing (one and a half months before ASA) it is already going to be the largest program yet organized. In the first two years we had around 20 mentors and 20 mentees. This year we already have 37 mentors and 33 mentees. (If this imbalance continues I will ask some mentors who are currently post-docs or asst. profs if they want to become mentees). I should note that the format for the program changed this year compared to last year. We reverted back to the format used two years ago in Seattle in that all faculty members (tenured or not) will be mentors and graduate students will be mentees. The reason is that the three categories used in Montreal created too much imbalance between those who wished to be mentees and those who wished to be mentors, and the simpler two category system seemed to run a little bit better. As always, however, if there are folks outside academia who are attending and want to take part I was happy to deal with them on an individual basis and cater the program to their needs. I recommend that future programs retain this simpler dual format, and just adjust the program according to the needs of assistant professors or post-docs were strongly want to become mentees and/or ask assistant professors or post-docs if they want to be a mentor if there is an imbalance. Alternatively, if there is an imbalance in the other direction (i.e. too many mentees) some mentors have in the past agreed to meet with two mentees. A second change that happened this year is the mentorship dinner. It is taking place the night after the reception at a brewery within walking distance of the convention center. As this is my last year running this program, I will below detail the process of running the program and mentorship dinner. I will also upload the materials I used to run this program to the Dropbox folder I began soliciting participation in the program over the ESS listserv in April. This gives people plenty of time to decide whether or not they want to take part. I have used a similar template to solicit participation (see “2018 ETS ASA Mentorship program template” in the Dropbox folder), adjusting it to the needs of the year. After an explanation of the program and a description of

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changes, I ask participants to provide me with contact information and information regarding their interests. I also ask them to use a specific subject line. I then create a folder within Outlook that collects any emails received with that subject line so that all relevant emails are filtered to a specific place. When I received an email, I quickly replied with any answers to questions (no, mentees cannot request specific mentors), and also letting them know I will be back in touch in July with pairings. I then copy and paste their information into a master excel file (see “ASA ETS MENTOR 2017 Organizer” in Dropbox for an example). I create one tab for mentees, one for mentors, and then one for pairings. I solicit over the listserv a couple of more times before the deadline, and make sure that a solicitation is placed in the ESS newsletter. Once the deadline has passed, I create another excel file for final pairings (see “ASA 2017 Final Mentor pairs” in Dropbox for an example). This is a sometime difficult process, as I make sure no pairings repeat from previous years and also because some pairings are ultimately ill-suited. This is an inevitability, however, and I make a note when I send out pairings that I did the best I could. Before I send out the final email with pairings, I give council 24-48 hours to comment on any changes. This is because there are sometimes personal relationships that the grad rep is unaware of that might render pairings a bit different if they knew about them. After that timeline has passed, I send out a mass email with all pairings in an attached excel file (see “Final pairings email template” in Dropbox). During this whole process, the grad rep is also responsible for organizing a mentorship dinner. The dinner should take place the evening before or after the section reception. Those taking part in the mentorship program (or those who offered to take part) and council are the only people invited to this dinner. It is important to find a place that is within walking distance to the conference, is reasonably priced, has vegetarian options, and can handle a group of 60 or more. This year I simply called around bigger restaurants and pubs and stumbled across a barrel house open to hosting. Last year, however, the dinner was held at a pizza restaurant. I.e. there is no formula for finding the right place to hold the dinner. I strongly recommend that future grad reps make reservations so as to guarantee space. This year I had to give the restaurant $200 to hold the space, guaranteeing that people would spend over $1200. In the future I recommend that council use its funds for this purpose if the need arises. Please see “mentorship dinner template” in Dropbox for more. If anyone needs more information or advice moving forward, please do not hesitate to contact me (jfbesek@buffalo.edu). It was an absolute privilege to serve on the ESS council these past three years, and I have full confidence in Apple as she takes over the position. 12. Committee on Racial Equity Report

13. Announcements and Other Business

a. Ken Gould – ASA is issuing statement opposing suppression of federal datasets b. Job opening at CSU c. Job opening at Boston College d. ASA TRAILS Teaching Resource database e. Job openings at University of Oregon

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