Drawing up plans for the future Past attempts to restructure the ASPS Board of Directors haven’t been successful, but as the Society’s size and influence grows – at local, national and global levels – more people want their voices heard. Now there’s an effort to restructure governance and make it increasingly efficient and representative for membership.
By Paul Snyder
December 2021
T
he PSF past President Nicholas Vedder, MD, can still recall the excitement he felt while attending his first ASPS/PSF Board of Directors (BOD) meeting 12 years ago. “I remember sitting there and thinking that I would be involved in the future direction of the Society,” he says. “And I sat there and listened the whole time. I don’t think we voted on anything other than to approve the minutes. It was eye-opening to me – and discouraging. It really wasn’t until I got elected to a position on the Executive Committee (EC) when I was Board Vice President of Academic Affairs that I realized that everything really happens at the EC level.” That fact, Dr. Vedder says, highlights a structural problem with ASPS. Although there are representatives from some membership groups, a few subspecialty societies and the public on the 29-member BOD, it typically meets just twice a year. Those meetings, Dr. Vedder says, mostly consist of rubber-stamping decisions already made by the EC – a smaller body composed of the ASPS/PSF presidential line and board vice presidents – which often meets monthly to tackle issues facing the specialty and Society.
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