Update on potential AOU-COS merger

20 MAY 2016 UPDATE:

AOU and COS Members,
Thanks so much for sharing your thoughts with us on the prospects of merging the American Ornithologists’ Union and the Cooper Ornithological Society. You can read a detailed summary of these results on the American Ornithology website http://americanornithology.org/content/aou-and-cos-merger-status.

A clear message emerged from the poll that a vast majority of members wish to pursue merging the two societies, with 87% of the 614 respondents in favor. Support for merging was expressed strongly from members of both societies and across all age groups. Members were more varied in their opinions about a name for the merged organization. Nevertheless, members of both societies expressed a willingness to consider changing the name of the AOU, the receiving society, if the two societies merged.

The COS Board of Directors met on 16 May 2016 to reflect on the member poll results, discuss the findings of the Joint AOU-COS Merger Working Group, and to reconsider their desire to engage in further merger discussions. The Board affirmed their position to pursue merging with AOU and transmitted it to the AOU Council.

AOU Council met on 17 May 2016 held a similar discussion on merger issues in order to develop a response to COS. AOU Council was pleased that COS had voted to resume the effort and voted unanimously to restart merger discussions to resolve the remaining issues.

Next steps will be to develop a formal plan of merger with further input from our members. To move this forward in advance of our upcoming annual Council and Board meetings, we will be on a swift timeline to reach resolution.
Sincerely,
Scott M. Lanyon
President, American Ornithologists' Union
University of Minnesota
1987 Upper Buford Circle
St. Paul, MN 55108
612-624-6291
lanyo001@umn.edu
President, Cooper Ornithological Society
3625 93rd Ave SW
Olympia, WA 98512
360-753-7662
mraphael@fs.fed.us

AOU and COS Members,
We write to inform you of progress toward addressing the issues relating to merging our two societies and to ask for your input through a short, six-question online poll.

AOU and COS leadership initiated discussions of merging the two societies in July 2016 when we met together in Oklahoma to review the progress and success of our partnerships: the joint publication of our journals, our joint communications and website http://www.americanornithology.org , our joint Science Arbitration initiative, and our joint meetings. A joint AOU-COS Merger Working Group was appointed at the Oklahoma meeting to move the discussion forward.

Today we write to inform you that the Working Group has completed their report. It presents the potential advantages and disadvantages of merging, hurdles to merger and their resolution, and initial feedback about them from membership and leadership. The report can be found on our American Ornithology website here. Although the report is long, the Executive Summary produces a concise abstract of the Working Group’s findings.

In short, most of the hurdles to merger can be addressed. The name of the merged organization is perhaps the most significant remaining issue.

You can also help AOU and COS leadership to understand how our members think about the possibility of merging by answering 6 short questions in an online poll. We ask that you a few minutes to inform yourself about merger issues by reading the joint AOU-COS Merger Working Group report before you participate in the online poll, as this will help to inform your choices.

The last day to record your preference in the poll is 13 May.

Thanks very much for your participation.

Sincerely,

Scott M. LanyonPresident, American Ornithologists' Union
University of Minnesota
1987 Upper Buford
Circle
St. Paul, MN 55108
612-624-6291
lanyo001@umn.edu

President, Cooper Ornithological Society
3625 93rd Ave SW
Olympia, WA 98512
360-753-7662
mraphael@fs.fed.us