ATRA Should Get Students Involved

It seems to me that one key to building ATRA's membership is to seek greater involvement by students with the organization. This post is directed to both ATRA leaders and RT students everywhere.

First, ATRA needs to hold the Annual Conference in mid to late September, rather than early in September. Having the Annual Conference early in September does not allow universities to organize students to attend the conference. With universities just getting started in late August or early September, faculty just do not have time to get students involved in what is perhaps ATRA's major event of the year.

Then, a well designed student program needs to be developed for the Annual Conference. ATRA's Student Committee has generally done a solid job of organizing conference events for students -- but there is always room for improvement.

Here are some program ideas taken from the 2007Association for Psychological Science Annual Convention:

Hold a conference kickoff and student social where students can meet one another and have Board members introduce themselves while all enjoy complimentary food and drink. Perhaps several universities could sponsor the event.

Conduct several "The Naked Truth" sessions. Topics for the APS convention included: "The Naked Truth: Getting Into Graduate School: Strategies for Survival and Success;" "The Naked Truth: Life After the Ph.D.: Finding and Getting the Job of Your Dreams;" and "The Naked Truth: How to Get Published: Guidance from Journal Editors."

"Champions of Psychology" was another APS session directed at students. In this session students had the unique opportunity to sit down with major psychological figures in small groups to discuss scientific and professional issues.

APS's "Student Research Award Addresses" was a final program that ATRA might replicate. Here the winners of a peer-reviewed research paper competition were honored and presented their research.

The upcoming Annual Conference provides a great opportunity to consider some of the APS program ideas so they may be implemented during the 2008 Annual Conference. Hopefully ATRA students and faculty will also push the idea of holding future Annuals in mid or late September in order to allow greater involvement by today's students -- who will be tomorrow's professional members of ATRA.