2009 Annual Report - American Association of Petroleum Geologists

The subcommittee held numerous
direct and virtual meetings during
2006–2007. The material prepared for
support of the Membership Committee’s
work was summarized and is available
on the AAPG Web site. Specific
PowerPoint presentations are:
• 2007 Overview (pdf of slides) from
Long Beach
• 2007 Leadership Report (pdf of
slides) from Tulsa Leadership
Conference
• Career Services: Member Registry (pdf
of slides) from Clint Moore at Long
Beach
• Membership Categories (pdf of slides)
from Jeff Lund at Long Beach
• Young Professionals (pdf of slides)
from Natalie Uschner at Long Beach
The most significant proposal from
Membership Planning in the past year
has been preparation of a
recommendation concerning
membership classification to simplify and
align the membership categories. The
concept is to have the Active Member
category and Associate category more
clearly defined by “career track.”
Members qualified to become full Active
members but who do not have
sufficient experience to qualify would
come under a new category called
“Provisional Active.”
Geoscientists qualified to be Active, or
who will become so qualified after
reaching defined experience
requirements, will never be in the
Associate category.
This proposal will be made to the
AAPG Executive Committee at the 2007
Leadership Conference in August 2007.
Jeffrey W. Lund, Chair
Committee members:
Mohammad Omar Al-Amoudi,
Martha Lou Broussard, Robert D. Cowdery,
Edward D. Dolly, John L. Forman,
David Harold Hawk, John Francis Karlo,
Jeffrey William Lund (chair),
Nosa Omorodion, and
Andrea Adams Reynolds.
Member Survey
The function of the committee is to
prepare, conduct and report tri-annually,
an All-Member Comprehensive Survey
of member attitudes, to assist and guide
AAPG leadership and management in
planning and implementing future AAPG
programs, products and services. The
primary purpose and focus of this
committee is the preparation,
distribution, compilation, and reporting
of this All-Member Comprehensive
1754 Annual Report
Survey, every three years, with the next
two editions due mid-2006 and 2009
respectively. The committee shall
consider its future survey development
on the format developed in the 2003
All-Member Comprehensive Survey, but
may add or consolidate topic areas as
necessary. A secondary role for the
committee is also to assist other AAPG
entities in performing targeted member
surveys, as requested by those entities,
or as directed by the President and/or
Executive Committee.
The member survey was submitted to
the membership in September 2006.
This is the first member survey that
could be completed online, and the
100% increase in overall participation
and the large increase in participation
from outside the United States over the
2003 survey indicate the effectiveness of
using the Internet for future surveys.
I have included the highlights of the
2006 survey as I view them as part of
this report. The full report can be viewed
on the AAPG Web site.
The next survey will be in 2009 if
approved by the Executive Committee.
Questions relating to AAPG’s publications
were essentially repeated from the 2003
survey to track any changes in attitude
toward the various publications. Since
there appear to be no appreciable
changes from the last survey, I suggest
these questions be eliminated or
shortened on the next survey. The entire
survey needs to be streamlined to make
it more efficient without detracting from
its usefulness.
I would like to acknowledge and thank
Larry Nation and his staff for their
assistance on this survey. Their preparation
of the article in the AAPG Explorer and
subsequent e-mails to the membership
contributed greatly to the increased
participation in the 2006 survey.
2006 AAPG Member Survey Highlights
General
• 100% increase in participation (2,937
vs. 1,461) from 2003 survey
• 2.6 fold increase in percent
participation from outside the United
States (27.8 % vs. 10.8%)
• Overall satisfaction with AAPG is high.
• Professionalism, networking
opportunities and publications rank
highest as factors for membership.
Dues
• 57.4% said an increase is not justified.
• Of those who thought an increase is
justified, 61.6% would consider not
renewing their membership if the
dues were more than $125/year.
• 37.6% would support a graduated
dues structure, 26.2% would not, and
36.25% are unsure.
Graduated dues structure
• 36.7%-Age and economic condition
• 32.2%-Industry vs. academic discount
• 18.9%-Economic condition
• 12.2%-Age
Should AAPG remove “American” from
its name?
• Overall-33.8% said Yes; 66.2% said No
• United States-25.6% said Yes; 74.4%
said No
• Outside United States-56.1% said Yes;
43.9% said No
Sponsorship Requirements
Has the change from three to two
sponsors compromised membership
standards?
• 17.1% said Yes; 82.9% said No
Should 15 years experience substitute
for one member sponsor?
• 52.7% said Yes; 47.3% said No
Petition Candidates
Should the requirement be more than
50 signatures?
• 18.8% said Yes; 46.0% said No;
35.2% said Not Sure
If increased, to how much?
• 100-42.6%, 200-29.5%, 300-10.3%,
>300-17.7%
Should a percentage of signatures be
from outside the candidate’s section
or region?
• 29.8% said Yes; 35.2% said No;
35.0% said Not Sure.
If yes,-52.5% believe it should be
20% or less.
Contact with Headquarters
• 43.3% of respondents have had
contact with Tulsa in the past year.
• 94.2% of those say their questions
or concerns were handled to
their satisfaction.
The AAPG Bulletin
• 52.9% read at least every other issue.
(52.0% in 2003)
• 92.1% believe the quality is good or
excellent. (89.2% in 2003)
• 86.2% believe the scientific content is
about right. (79.2% in 2003)
• 90.2% believe the length of the
articles is about right. (83.7%
in 2003)
• 65.5% would not pay extra for a
paper copy if the Bulletin were only
provided in digital format.
• 83.5% said the requirement to pay for
a paper copy would not affect the
decision to renew their membership.