Hopefully spring has sprung for everyone during the last couple weeks. Temperatures are climbing here in Colorado, and a sense of renewal is coming over the state as flowers, trees, grass, and plants are greening up. As for my presidency with ARPAS, I’m beginning the last third of my term. It seems like only yesterday we were meeting in Kansas City. Hopefully this final third will be as interesting as the first two-thirds were.

As with the changes in spring, changes will be coming in the future with ARPAS. Our membership numbers are strong and continuing to grow. The challenge we will all face with a continually condensing industry is where will the new leaders come from? Our ARPAS Foundation has taken a leading role in trying to address that question. With the support of the Foundation to cover the cost of the initial examination for college students and graduate students, it’s giving them the opportunity to join ARPAS without a financial risk. The next challenge is to involve and bring forward those new members into an active role as a member of ARPAS. The regional and local chapters of ARPAS are taking up that challenge through their activities and seminars throughout the year. As always, the Ca-ARPAS chapter is a stellar example of this commitment to the future of ARPAS. Their fall education symposium draws ARPAS members from across the disciplines and country to attend. Other chapters are following California’s model with success. I want to congratulate all those regional officers on their efforts to strengthen and build their chapters.

I would like to recognize the efforts of the Ethics Committee, specifically Joanne Knapp for her efforts on increasing the visibility of the ethics pillar of ARPAS. Through Knapp’s efforts, we now have a dedicated tab on our website that links articles on ethics published in popular press, with access for all members. Congratulations, Joanne, on strengthening this critical component of ARPAS.

Our journal, The Professional Animal Scientist (PAS), is a valued resource to members as a delivery vehicle for applied research and review articles. But, recognition outside of our membership is not as strong as it could be. In the coming months, the ARPAS governing council will be evaluating options to strengthen the presence of PAS outside of our membership to increase its recognition and value to a much larger community within the livestock industry. Hopefully, this increased visibility of PAS will further increase the visibility and value of ARPAS as a whole.

Additional decisions will be made regarding our annual meetings. As you all know, currently we hold our annual meeting in conjunction with the national joint annual meeting between the American Society of Animal Science and the American Dairy Science Association. With the agreement not being renewed between those two societies to continue the joint annual meeting, we will have to make a decision as to where to hold our annual meeting in the future. The diversity of our membership, encompassing all disciplines and aspects of the livestock industry, makes selecting one meeting to attend, be it animal, dairy, poultry, meats, and so on, much more difficult and harder to bring our diverse group together. It was clear from our survey last fall that members support conducting the annual meeting in conjunction with their discipline’s annual meeting.

Finally, I would like to close with a challenge to all members of ARPAS. We need each and every member to become more involved. Our organization will only succeed with a strong membership. This is a society that requires you to put forth an effort to make it survive. It is the ethics we all demonstrate and the continuing education in which we participate that make this a vital and living organization. You are not going to get anything more out of ARPAS than you put into it. This is a service society; we serve the livestock industry. And, we will only grow effectively if our membership is an active, involved group. I hope to see everyone in Orlando this fall at our annual meeting and in attendance at our educational reproduction symposium. Take care.