Published on: 16-04-2019

Dear TIAFT Members,

The above lyrics from one of the Rolling Stones’ most famous songs applies well to the upcoming deadline for TIAFT travel grants to attend the annual meeting in Birmingham. These travel grants are for members without financial support and they are offered to both Standard and DCF Members. Each travel grant has a value of up to 2000 US dollars plus the cost of the meeting registration fee. Keep in mind that successful applicants must be TIAFT members for at least one full year at the application’s closing date, in good standing with the organization, have not received a TIAFT travel grant in the past three years, and can demonstrate strong financial need. For complete information about TIAFT Travel Grants to the 2019 annual conference, please visit travel grants for TIAFT meetings. The deadline for travel grant applications is May 10, 2019. Applications received after this date will not be considered.

I cannot emphasize that deadline strongly enough. Often a few TIAFT members try to submit late applications. Understand that late applications cannot be accepted since the process for approval requires independent evaluations by each Board member, followed by a joint decision during the mid-year meeting that closely follows the application deadline.

This year’s mid-year meeting will be held in China in conjunction with a Regional TIAFT Meeting, which will be hosted by Professor Ping Xiang at the Chinese Academy of Forensic Science in Shanghai.

One of the most important topics we will be addressing during our meeting will be to finalize the revision to the TIAFT Constitution based on the feedback we received from TIAFT members. By early June, we plan to have that revised Constitution available to the membership so that we can vote on it during the Business Meeting in Birmingham.

Also, one more reminder that while in Shanghai, the Board will conduct initial reviews of applications to host upcoming annual TIAFT conferences. If you are interested in submitting an application, please let me know as soon as possible. We hope to select the hosts and meeting locations for both 2023 and 2024 while in Birmingham. Complete details of the application process can also be found in the Document Section of the Members Area.

We will also be spending time on a new handbook to address how TIAFT will archive documents that are critical to the organization. This is a big task, but rest assured we will get a solid system in place and will report on the progress later in the year.

As always, if you have any comments or suggestions for the TIAFT Board, please communicate them through the info@tiaft.org email address.

Marc LeBeau, PhD
President, TIAFT

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