Statement of Policy Relative to Membership
Membership in the Academy shall be conferred upon an applicant previously approved by the Board, and who remains eligible for membership, on the occasion of the approved applicant’s attendance at a new member orientation and presentation at the business session of any succeeding Annual Meeting or at a plenary session of any succeeding National Fall Education Conference.
In considering applications for membership, the Academy will apply the following standards: (1) The applicant should be of good moral character, as demonstrated by adherence to sound ethical standards in professional activities. (2) The applicant should have substantial and current experience as an impartial arbitrator of labor-management disputes, so as to reflect general acceptability by the parties. (3) As an alternative to (2), the applicant with limited but current experience in arbitration should have attained general recognition through scholarly publication or other activities as an important authority on labor-management relations. This Alternative Standard has been utilized by the Board of Governors only under exceptional circumstances. It only applies to an individual who is a recognized, prominent authority in the field of labor-management relations. Individuals may not self-nominate themselves under this Alternative Standard. Finally, there is also a so-called Veterans Procedure which is a membership application process that intends to attract established arbitrators to join the Academy by lessening the rigors of the standard application process. The Veterans’ Procedure is identical to the standard application process save for two (2) major differences. First, the applicant is not required to provide the first and last pages of awards and other decisions which qualify as “countable” cases or the supporting worksheets. Rather, she or he attests to having a sufficient caseload so as to meet our membership requirements. Second, the Veteran application must be supported by letters of reference from seven (7) current NAA members instead of three (3) NAA member references. In most cases, these seven members should be from the same region as the applicant. References from management and union representatives are still required. Who qualifies as a Veteran? (a) A Veteran is an individual who (1) has been an arbitrator for a substantial number of years, and (2) would without question meet our membership standards. Both criteria must be met. In that regard, the mere fact that an individual has a longstanding practice is, itself, not sufficient to qualify under the Veterans’ Procedure. (b) In accord with our by-laws, a potential candidate must be of good moral character and must have substantial and current experience as an impartial arbitrator of labor-management disputes so as to reflect general acceptability by the parties.
Membership will not be conferred upon applicants who serve partisan interests as advocates or consultants for Labor or Management in labor-management relations or who are associated with or are members of a firm which performs such advocate or consultant work.
The Academy deems it inconsistent with continued membership in the Academy for any member who has been admitted to membership since the adoption of the foregoing restriction to undertake thereafter to serve partisan interests as advocate or consultant for Labor or Management in labor-management relations or to become associated with or to become members of a firm which performs such advocate or consultant work.
Because the foregoing restriction was not a condition for continued membership prior to April 20, 1976, it is the Academy’s policy to exempt from the restriction members who were admitted prior thereto. However, the appearance of any Academy member in any partisan role before another Academy member serving as a neutral in labor-relations arbitration or fact-finding proceeding shall, from and after April 21, 1977, be deemed inconsistent with continued membership.