Please Read

[John]

Later today I will post the details of the 2009 Caudata.org Grant poll. Put simply, those who contributed to the Amphibian Ark Donations Drive, from December 2nd 2008 to January 2nd 2009, will be able to vote on which grant application will receive the money we raised. To be clear, only they will be able to vote in the poll. For transparency, all members will be able to see the grant application details, but as I said, only those who contributed to the grant will be able to vote. All grant voters will be informed by email in the next 24 hours.

If you are a grant voter, be advised that there are 17 Grant Applications for you to read. Most are somewhat technical in a scientific manner, so if you have any questions or are unsure about anything in any grant application, I urge you to post your question here and we will explain it. It's important that this process is carried out as transparently and fairly as possible, and this can only be accomplished if there is no confusion or misunderstanding among the voters.

Two final points about voting. Firstly, please keep in mind when you are assessing a grant application that our Grant specifies that we have "a strong preference for supporting projects that involve biologists from the species’ native country". Secondly, you may be acquainted with one or more of the grant applicants - please evaluate the applications based on the research propoal.

Thank you to Kevin Zippel for laying the groundwork for this poll.

[John]

One further issue: if you believe you should be eligible to vote due to a donation you made between December 2nd and January 2nd last, yet you do not receive our email within the next 24 hours, please notify me.

[John]

I'm a little behind on this but hope to get it done on Thursday.