Positions on ASAB Council

Meetings secretary to begin in January 2025 (or earlier)

If you are interested in being nominated for this position, and contributing the work of ASAB, please send a 150-word statement outlining your motivation, experience and suitability for the role, to the current ASAB Secretary, Elisa Frasnelli (elisa.frasnelli@unitn.it) by September 30th 2024.

Your nomination should be supported by at least two members of the Association, also by email to elisa.frasnelli@unitn.it) by September 30th 2024.

Nominated candidates will be put forward for an online election by the membership. Council may nominate candidates and reserves the right to add nominations after the closing date in the event of a lack of suitable candidates. Council also reserves the right to generate a short-list of not less than three candidates per position for online elections.

Officers and ordinary members of ASAB Council will normally serve three calendar years, commencing 1st January. Reasonable expenses are reimbursed to support attendance at Council meetings and associated ASAB conferences, and a small annual research grant is provided for ASAB Council Officers in support of animal behaviour research activity.

Further information on the role is provided below. For more details or to discuss the roles, please contact the current Council Members (contact details provided below).

Best regards, Elisa Frasnelli (ASAB Secretary)


More information on the ASAB Meetings Secretary role

We are looking for a new ASAB Meetings Secretary. Joah Madden has held the role for the past 6 years and according to ASAB regulations, they should now step down. He has considered it a great opportunity and enjoyed it tremendously.   

We would like to encourage Animal Behaviour researchers to offer to take on this role. Without it, the three annual ASAB meetings and associated events cannot be organised and we lose an integral part of the Animal Behaviour community.

We strongly recommend that to take on the role:

  1.  The person be a tenured academic - this role requires time and personal investment and stability for the 3-6 years (minimum 3 years, standing for re-election for the following 3 if desired) of it's duration. We do not think it is fair to expect more junior researchers on precarious contracts to be expected to commit to this level.

  2. The person be based in the UK - the Spring and Winter meetings are held in the UK and there are logistical benefits (visiting sites, personal links to student schemes etc) for researchers already in the UK

  3. The person has a long a diverse set of contacts within AB. This should include researchers at multiple institutions and covering the broad spectrum of animal behaviour. Much of the role involves approaching people to host/help organise meetings and direct approaches to colleagues who are personally known are often the most productive.

Role Description:

The Meetings Secretary (MS) is responsible for organising and assisting in running ASAB meetings, both in person and virtually. Annual ASAB meetings include: Spring meeting - you need to find an institution and local team to host the event; Winter meeting - you need to find a venue (currently in Edinburgh), arrange catering etc and solicit a team to organise the science of the meeting around a central theme; Summer meeting - this is usually held in conjunction with ECBB or IEC in which case you will liaise with the organisers, support them in choice of plenaries and advise them on logistics. In some years the Summer meeting may not coincide with a European venue in which case you may organise a UK/EU based conference or an online meeting, soliciting a host institution and team and assisting with logistics. In addition to these regular meetings, you should initiate and/or support irregular meetings e.g. the ASAB/ABS Twitter meeting, ISABC meeting, more specialist workshops such as the animal welfare meeting, and online conferences to ensure broad accessibility. At each meeting, you should give a short talk in person on behalf of ASAB, introducing Council members present, promoting the journal and membership, advertising future ASAB meetings, providing moral and logistical support to the local organisers and generally flying the ASAB flag.

If you have any questions about the role or would like to discuss further, please do email Joah Madden (j.r.madden@exeter.ac.uk). The role is subject to election by ASAB members.