AAS Welcomes New Staffers to Membership & Meetings Teams

Please join me in welcoming two new staff members to the AAS Executive Office. Diane Frendak (at right), our new Director of Membership Services, comes to the AAS after 14 years as Director of Membership at the Association of Science-Technology Centers (ASTC), a nonprofit organization of science centers and museums dedicated to furthering public engagement with science among increasingly diverse audiences. ASTC is headquartered just south of Dupont Circle, whereas the AAS is located in the American Geophysical Union (AGU) building just north of Dupont Circle, so Diane's daily commute hasn't changed much.

Lynn Ervin (at left), our new Meeting Services Specialist, is experiencing even less of a change to her commute, as she comes to us from the AGU! Lynn, who will manage our meeting-registration process, just needs to remember to get off the elevator on the 3rd floor rather than the 4th floor, where she has been working for 8 years on registration, abstract submission, and housing for various AGU meetings, including the annual Fall Meeting held every December in San Francisco. That gathering attracts more than 20,000 attendees, so when the rest of us at the AAS start expressing concern over how we're going to deal with 3,000+ people at one of our own meetings, Lynn will, no doubt, put our concerns into the proper perspective!

Diane and Lynn join an Executive Office staff of highly engaged people who are dedicated to their work on behalf of you, our members. They bring our membership and meetings teams up to full strength, which is critical as we look forward to our big winter meeting in Seattle and our even bigger IAU General Assembly next August. Welcome to the AAS, Diane and Lynn!