March 2020

Guilty. That’s me. I’m the one responsible for the tardiness of this newsletter. In my defense, the decision about whether to cancel the 2020 Conference with the 75^th anniversary celebration was looming, the decision required preparation and consultation, and it was hard to focus on anything else. I could not write about a decision that had not yet been made, but that decision crowded out everything else.

Check out these uplifting 75th Anniversary tributes from me and the AAPOR community. They show that no matter where the annual conference is held, this will always be the same: People of AAPOR Make Us Strong. I look forward to working with the Council on the next steps, and continue collaborating with the incredible volunteers on the 2020 Conference Committee, AAPOR History Committee and 75^th Anniversary Planning Subcommittee, and my partner Kristen Olson. Let #AAPOR75 be a platform for your voice – reimagined!

A big thank you to Ashley Amaya for her service as Survey Practice Editor-in-Chief. Ashley made a number of incredible changes to the journal over the past 3 years including:

1. Moving to a blog format that allowed articles to be published on an as-ready basis (rather than an issues).
2. Migrating the journal to a more user-friendly and mobile-compatible platform.
3. Assigning DOIs to all articles.
4. Implemented a more rigorous review process to improve article quality.
5. Diversified content by re-introducing ‘Ask the Expert’ and introducing ‘Research Notes’.

AAPOR’s online journal, Survey Practice, is looking to expand its editorial board.  
 
The mission of Survey Practice is to provide current information on issues in survey research and public opinion that is useful to survey and public opinion practitioners, new survey researchers, and those interested in survey and polling methods.  

​The American Association for Public Opinion Research, the American Statistical Association, and publisher Oxford University Press invite applications for the position of Co-Editor-in-Chief for survey methodology of the Journal of Survey Statistics and Methodology (JSSAM).

2020 SurveyFest was held on Saturday January 25th, at Stanford University. This one-day conference was aimed at encouraging undergraduate and graduate students from diverse social and demographic characteristics (e.g., sex, gender identity, age, race, religion, ethnic background, nationality, or disability status) to consider graduate studies and careers in the fields of public opinion and survey research.

The American Association for Public Opinion Research (AAPOR), congratulates The Center for Opinion Research on becoming a Member of the AAPOR Transparency Initiative (TI). By joining the TI, their organization is supporting our mutual goal of more effective disclosure of research methods by all organizations.

Ineke Stoop is a fairly new member of AAPOR, but a long-standing part of the European survey community. Until her retirement in May 2019, she was Head of Methodology at the Netherlands Institute for Social Research/SCP and was the Deputy Director Methodological for the European Social Survey (ESS). She also was Chair of the European Statistical Advisory Committee (ESAC), and an advisory member of Eurostat. She taught classes and published works on survey design, nonresponse, and comparative surveys. And she is sharing that wealth of experience with AAPOR, as a part of the AAPOR/WAPOR Task Force on Quality of Comparative Surveys.

Focusing on student and professional researchers in the Western region of the United States, PAPOR held several in-person and virtual events in 2019. Monitor AAPOR-net for more information on our two premier in-person events of 2020 – the June mini-conference in the Bay Area (where we highlight presentations from the National AAPOR conference) and the PAPOR Annual Conference December 10^th and 11^th in San Francisco.

PANJAAPOR is celebrating another great year of events. Our annual spring event took place last May, hosted by Drexel University. Dr. Jana Hirsch (Drexel University School of Public Health) presented information on her research to measure gentrification in Philadelphia and to understand how residents think about and perceive neighborhood change and its effect on their health and well-being.

Friends and colleagues are saddened to learn of the passing of Pearl R. Zinner in June of this past year, at the age of 99.  A New Yorker born and bred, Pearl Zinner joined NORC in 1951, first working out of the New York office as an interviewer at an hourly wage of 50 cents, moving through the survey department ranks, and becoming its director from 1963 until it closed operations in early 1985.  Pearl worked under Directors Clyde Hart, Peter Rossi, Norman Bradburn (3 or 4 times), Jim Davis, Ken Prewitt, and Robert Michael, and Presidents Phil DePoy and Craig Coelen. She eventually served as Special Assistant to the President, where her experience, good nature, and attention to detail were particularly valuable.
Read more about Pearl