December 2018

I am no statistician (though I play one professionally!), but I see very positive trends for AAPOR. Recent data from our membership survey and membership data find that we now have over 2,400 members. This compares to about 2,000 a decade ago, a steady increase of twenty percent. More so, while perhaps not statistically significant, satisfaction with AAPOR is up four percent in recent years, a difficult feat due to the natural ceiling effect of high satisfaction to begin with. So too, consideration of AAPOR being the “home” conference of its professionals is at an all-time high. AAPOR as well has seen consistently improved financial standing, with healthy “rainy day” reserves, a balanced budget streak for most of the past five years, and a fantastic base of support by its membership organizations and individuals. AAPOR as well has made so many great strides in recent years, for example in considering and ensuring diversity and transparency. 

Registration for the 2019 Annual Conference in Toronto, Ontario, Canada will open in January.
As a reminder, Canadian law requires that all persons entering Canada carry both proof of citizenship and proof of identity. A valid U.S. passport, passport card, or NEXUS card satisfies these requirements for U.S. citizens.
If you have questions, please don’t hesitate to reach out to me at [email protected].

Submit your nominations today!

The AAPOR Education Committee is now accepting abstract submissions for the second annual AAPOR’s Got Talent (AGT) competition! 

AAPOR is currently offering the opportunity to purchase all of the webinars for the year as one package. This package will give you access to both the live and recorded versions of each webinar this year.

The AAPOR Education Committee successfully hosted its inaugural SurveyFest at UIC on November 3rd. This one-day conference was aimed at encouraging undergraduate and graduate students from diverse social and demographic characteristics (e.g., sex, gender, gender identity, age, race, religion, ethnic background, nationality, sexual orientation, or disability status) to consider graduate studies and careers in the fields of public opinion and survey research.

AAPOR is piloting a new initiative that seeks to recruit student-faculty “pairs” interested in becoming our AAPOR colleagues. The initiative provides Diversity Pipeline Awards that target members of historically underrepresented racial-ethnic groups interested in the study of public opinion, survey research methodology, and/or statistics. The award provides waived conference registrations and annual membership fees for both the student and faculty, and one $800 cash awarded to the pair to support travel expenses.

AAPOR Education Chair Kyley McGeeney presented on behalf of the AAPOR Education committee at a recent Google News Initiative event for journalists. Click here to check out the presentation.

MAPOR recently convened its 43rd annual conference, our largest ever at 240 attendees!! The conference featured a keynote speech by Jennifer Agiesta, Director of Polling and Election Analytics at CNN. We also had a pedagogy hour presented by Colm O’Muircheartaigh of the Harris School of Public Policy Research and NORC, as well as a short course by Stephanie Eckman of RTI.  The conference also featured three different panels, a working group, and submissions from 46 different institutions. We were very pleased to introduce John Loft of RTI as our newest MAPOR fellow this year, in addition to new student-focused activities.

PAPOR has had a busy, productive, and fun year! We just wrapped up our annual conference in San Francisco on December 6-7. It was a great event with a fantastic plenary with Scott Clement of the Washington Post and Katie Orr from KQED sharing their insights on the twists and turns of the 2018 midterms. There were two engaging short courses on sampling and reaching teens as well as conference panel sessions covering timely, important topics such as politics in the western states, voter subgroups, data quality considerations, and international public opinion research. Our annual conference also marks the transition to the new 2019 PAPOR council. We’re lucky to have many returning council members as well as a few fresh faces.

​The TICC is very thankful for the hard work of EdChoice, a nonprofit, nonpartisan organization that conducts and commissions research on choice-based reforms and issues in K-12 education with the goal to better inform policymakers and other stakeholders at the state and local levels around the country, as well as in Washington D.C.