Gerrit for President!

Last week I heard that my graduation professor Gerrit van der Veer has been nominated as a candidate for the Presidency of ACM SIGCHI.

When I graduated from Twente University in 1995, Gerrit encouraged and supported my efforts towards combining ergonomics with computer science to create information ergonomics.

Gerrit (whose homepage still has a very 1995 feeling to it!) has been instrumental in organizing CHI conferences, both as co-chair (twice) and as a long-time member of the conference management committee. He is currently professor of interaction design at Amsterdam's Vrije Universiteit.

Carolyn Gale, Gerrit's team-mate, isn't a bad choice either. She is the Director of the Stanford Research Communication Program and has been active in the SIGCHI community for years too. I specifically remember CHI 1997 in Atlanta where we were both volunteers with too much time on our hands and spent a lot of time in sunny parks and dark bars.

For those who read Dutch, there's an interview by SIGCHI.NL that gives some insight into Gerrit's background and interests.

So, if you receive a ballot to vote for the 2006 SIGCHI Officer elections, you know who to vote for! Go Gerrit!