Hello All!

New board & UT ASA 2014-2015 plans

With June nearly upon us, I figured this would be a good time to introduce myself and the new board of ASA officers. I’m Ashley Hicks, and I’ll be acting as chair of the student chapter for the 2014-2015 term. Anthony Bonomo will be continuing his position as vice-chair. Nicole Stanley from the audiology program in the Department of Communication Sciences and Disorders will be acting as secretary, and Casey Farmer will be acting as treasurer to the student chapter.

I will be sending out a separate email to members of the board and the faculty advisor to arrange a chance to speak with each of them individually before the new semester starts. I feel this will help ASA begin on the right foot and head in the right direction. What direction is that? I have several things I would like to see ASA do, but I will leave a majority of the direction up to the board and the members at large. An organization is, after all, what its members make of it.

Personally, I would like to see ASA become more active in outreach and science communication. We participated in two highly successful outreach events last semester, and we had the opportunity for a few more. These science communication opportunities help the organization gain recognition, its members gain experience, and most importantly they help others gain passion for science and acoustics. :-) Additionally, Craig Dolder and I agreed that we would like to see the mini-lecture idea (which we dry ran in April) continue through the term. More details on this to come!

I look forward to working with all of you in the coming year to make the Austin ASA student chapter productive, interesting, fun, and informative to all its members. I welcome any feedback or suggestions now and hope to see you all at the first meeting of the semester in August/September.

Best,
--Ashley Hicks