A Winning Proposition: The Greater Our Numbers, the Stronger Our Voice   

If you care enough about the future of higher education to be an AAUP member, we hope you'll now take the next step and encourage your colleagues to join. This is the perfect time to show your support for our membership initiatives by inviting your colleagues to take advantage of our special introductory offer  for new members. Anyone who joins today will receive new member status through December 2011 – up to 16 months – while paying only the annual, 12-month rate:  http://www.aaup.org/AAUP/involved/join/ .  

As an added incentive, we’d like to recognize, through scholarships to attend national AAUP training workshops or honorary memberships, the grassroots efforts of the chapters and conferences that recruit the most new members—we want to match your investment in our mission with an investment of our own in your continuing commitment to the Association. There will be awards for the three chapters that sign up the most new members and the three that sign up the most new members as a percentage of their faculty. The same incentives will be awarded to the three state conferences that recruit the most new members and the three state conferences that increase their membership by the highest percentage. Winning chapters and conferences can choose from among the following awards: 

1) a member scholarship to the 2011 AAUP Summer Institute or the national meeting in June; 

2) a member scholarship to a regional New Leaders Training workshop or other regional meeting;   

3) an honorary one-year membership for the faculty member of your choice.

Online joins count. Everyone who has signed up so far counts. The deadline is APRIL 1, 2011. Winners will be announced on AAUP’s website , in Academe , and in AAUP President Cary Nelson’s email newsletter. 

The most effective way to get new members is to go door to door to your colleagues’ offices, because people are more likely to join if asked directly and offered the chance to talk with you in person about the work of the AAUP on behalf of the profession, at the local, state, and national level. Give them the new dues schedule, ask them what their key concerns about higher education are, and try to show them what AAUP is doing to help. See if they will join while you are there. 

State conferences can contribute to these efforts in a number of ways:

1) encourage, monitor and help coordinate chapters’ efforts to make office visits;

2) offer local incentives for recruiting—travel expenses for recruiting at nearby campuses; prizes such as books, funds to attend the state conference meeting, or any other appealing local incentive.

For office visits, print off some one-page signup flyers posted on AAUP’s website:

http://www.aaup.org/NR/rdonlyres/6176DB9C-F45A-4D97-A300-9A07644FC8A1/0/2011application_newonly_salary.pdf .  

Or point people to the FAQ page which also contains the pdf link:

http://www.aaup.org/AAUP/involved/startchapter/2010memdrive .

A new version of the glossy brochure with 2011 salary-based dues rates is also available, and includes a tear-off sign up form. These are available by ordering online at:

http://www.aaup.org/Forms/Store/cataloguebrochures.htm .

Best wishes, and thanks for your commitment,

Donna L. Potts
Chair, Assembly of State Conferences