Editorial

Congratulations to incoming officers. Our new president-elect is Catherine Cotten. As you may be aware, the president-elect is responsible for securing the keynote speaker at our annual meeting to deliver the Dodgen lecture. Catherine is responsible for securing the 1998 Dodgen lecturer. Maureen Corcoran joins the Board of Directors this year. The Board is responsible for setting Academy policy and for guiding the Academy through its various programs, the annual meeting, and the publication of this journal.

Soliciting a new category of paper. The Board of Directors meets quarterly to discuss the Academy business. The last meeting included a discussion of articles for the Journal. A suggestion was made to accept for publication a new category of article that would describe hands on activities in science education. Most of the discussion centered around articles that target high school science laboratory experiments, but college level laboratory exercises would also be solicited. The idea was greeted with enough enthusiasm for me to bring it to your attention with a special call for papers of this type.

Most of you that teach laboratory courses have developed exercises that work particularly well. Here is an opportunity for you to share that favorite exercise with your colleagues. I invite you to submit papers describing laboratory exercises in any of the science disciplines. I envision papers averaging three to four pages in length that include a rational for the exercise, a detailed description of the exercise including information about where to get any necessary supplies, and some comments about how the exercise is received by your students. You are probably also on the look out for a new exercise to replace the one that does not seem to work so well. If, after reading this, you are not convinced that your article would be worth doing, think again. Many science educators out there are looking for new ideas just as you are. They will appreciate hearing from you.

Call for papers--a double opportunity. Three to four hundred of you will respond to the call for papers to be presented at our annual meeting in February, 1997, in Biloxi. Some of you will be presenting preliminary information about your research, others will summarize a project that is complete. Some of you will be reporting on activities at your institution. All of you will have a message you want to tell your colleagues. While you are composing that abstract, why not consider embellishing it into a paper to publish in this journal? Many of the papers presented at the Academy meetings address local events, but in 15 minutes you can only give your colleagues a brief idea of what you have done or are doing. Many of them would like to know more and you can provide that depth of information by publishing an article. We are all looking for good ideas, most of us benefit professionally through publications, the journal needs quality articles to publish--you can make that happen.--Ken Curry