Idea No. 20 for keeping AAJA extraordinary:

In recent years, some people have proposed adding a third vice president to our five officers, a National Vice President for Digital, to recognize members whose work appears primarily or exclusively online. My concern is that when former AAJA President Victor Panichkul proposed the current 11-member Governing Board, he intended that the six Governing Board members elected from among the Chapter Representatives would outnumber (and could outvote) the five national officers. Adding another officer would create a 12-member Governing Board with the potential for tie votes.

Therefore, I’d like to propose that we recast the two vice presidential roles as “National Vice President for Print & Digital” and “National Vice President for Broadcast & Visual.”

Why? This acknowledges the fact that nearly all print journalists are also digital journalists. And I like the title “VP for Broadcast & Visual” because it honors our talented and vital photographers, video journalists, illustrators, graphic designers and artists (apologies if I left out any categories).

What does AAJA get out of it? Hopefully, this would satisfy those who want a National VP for Digital and invite more participation among our visual journalists - as well as increase the pool for future AAJA presidential candidates. If we add more seats to the AAJA National Board, it should be because we’re growing new chapters, not because we’re creating more officers.