Section Officer FAQs

How do I report the newly elected Section Officers to APSA to make sure the section's information on the APSA website is up-to-date? APSA maintains webpages with information on all of the Organized Sections, including the purpose/mission statement of the Section, the Section's independently maintained website and URL, current Section Officers and Council Members, as well as Section Awards, Awards Committees and submission deadlines. Go online to your Section's webpage and look at the existing information posted there, then please email any changes or updates to the Organized Sections Liaison (at sections@apsanet.org) by the due date (usually by the end of September). APSA is currently looking into creating an online or downloadable form for the Section Officers to fill out in future years.

How do we obtain a current Section membership list with contact information? APSA maintains membership lists in "real time" for all Organized Sections, which include both mail and email contact information. The membership lists are provided via email in Excel format to Section Chairs and other designated Section Officers as often as they are requested. Lists are also sent to Section Chairs automatically once every quarter.

How are the dues for Organized Sections processed? APSA collects all dues directly from members, who indicate which sections they would like to join when renewing their membership or joining APSA for the first time. APSA then deposits the dues into the appropriate section accounts once every quarter, after retaining $3.00 per member for administrative expenses.

How can we publicize our Section's awards and journals? Sections who wish to have their book and dissertation awards publicized by APSA must send in their Awards Committee Information to the Organized Sections Liaison by mid-October, in order to be included in the annual mailing. APSA sends out the Dissertation Awards' Committee Information to all U.S. Ph.D.-granting Departments (around 130) and the Book Awards' Committee Information to around 150 publishers, both Academic and major Commercial Presses.

If the Section wishes to have their award winners published in PS: Political Science, Section Chairs must send the information to the Organized Section Liaison (at sections@apsanet.org) before the submission deadline for the next issue. For more specific information about due dates for submission to PS: Political Science, please reference the PS: Political Science section of this website. 

When sending Award Winner information to the Liaison, please include the award name, the type of award, the winner's name, publication title, and year (if applicable). APSA normally recognizes all Section awards in the January edition of PS: Political Science, as well as on the Organized Sections Awards area of the website.

I understand that other Sections have been able to rent out the use of their membership lists to publishers and raise additional revenue. How does this work? APSA has an exclusive relationship with Infocus Marketing, which serves as the exclusive manager for all mailing lists derived from APSA membership records-including Section membership lists. If you have received inquiries from vendors or other interested parties regarding the use of your Section membership mailing lists, please refer them to Infocus Marketing at: 1-800-708-LIST x3248, (703) 834-0110 (fax), or http://www.infocusnet.com/, for more information. APSA shares with the Sections any revenue generated by Section membership list rentals. APSA automatically deposits the Sections' portion of the revenue into the Section bank account, on an annual basis. For more information, please reference Section VIII of the Organized Section Handbook.

How are Annual Meeting panels allocated and is there any way to increase the number allocated to my Section? The panel allocation process begins with one unchanging number from which every other number is directly or indirectly derived - the 455 panels organized by the program committee in 1990. According to Council guidelines, the total official program size in a particular year is based on the number of program committee panels organized at the 1990 Annual Meeting adjusted by the percent increase or decrease since 1990 in APSA's professional individual membership. In addition, in 2000 the Annual Meeting Committee recommended a cap in the total annual meeting size of 736 panels.

The other factors that determine the overall annual meeting size and subsequently the total allocation include the availability of meeting rooms, and the demand for Related Group panels. The number of panels available to related groups, according to Council guidelines, may equal no more than 20% of the total official program.

Panels are distributed by using an allocation formula which rewards panel attendance in the previous year's annual meeting. Attendance counts are collected by APSA. The raw data are adjusted to take into account day of week and time of day so as not to penalize panels scheduled at what are perceived to be less desirable times or on less desirable days. Within a division, attendance is also adjusted by whether the session was a paper session or a roundtable, with greater weight going to panel sessions in which papers are presented. To this end, the count of roundtable attendance is capped at 70 people.

The association also collects data on the demand for panels and paper presentations to measure the division's or group's acceptance rate. This data is considered in the allocation formula for divisions whose acceptance rate drops below the overall average for that year.