Background/Question/Methods ESA as an organization has internal challenges that are increasingly becoming acute as the world around us changes. Issues include the retention of members, a persistent lack of diversity and gender equity, a dearth of professional development for students and early career ecologists, among others. As we have historically drawn the majority of our members from academia, we must now recognize the declining number of tenure track positions for an increasing number of graduating PhD ecologists. Meanwhile cross-sector “sustainability” investments produce emerging new job constructs, requiring interdisciplinary skills. To enhance ESA’s relevance and to address inclusion issues, the “Extend the Tent” (ET) Task Force was initiated in 2017. Our intention was for ESA to embrace those ecologists who work in the private sector or in related professions that use ecological knowledge to achieve informed innovative solutions. More importantly, we felt ESA must constantly improve the ways in which it welcomes and supports all ecologists – including race, gender, career stage, economic background, and the many other intersectional aspects of human diversity. In this opening session presentation, we discuss recommendations emanating from the ET initiative, ESA’s progress up to now, and future steps that are needed in the wake of Covid-19. Results/Conclusions Recent analyses suggest that less than a quarter of graduating PhD ecologists are finding tenure track positions in academia. A relatively larger number of undergraduate students are female with overlapping percentages representing ethnic diversity. Even with these trends, the majority of our members continues to be largely academic, white, and male (66, 72, and 51%, respectively). These data raise some obvious questions--how can ESA be more inclusive and embrace ecologists with more diverse backgrounds and changing career trajectories? More importantly, what should our membership look like 5, 10, or 20 years in the future when today’s environmental issues are more acute and socio-economically complex? How may ESA become a vital resource for diverse organizations that are part of solutions innovation? The ET initiative resulted in several recommendations to enhance the relevance of ESA and to be more inclusive of a diverse and interdisciplinary membership. We report on steps currently being taken and suggest further efforts to achieve the ET vision in light of the Covid-19 pandemic. We suggest that in taking these steps ESA would be better positioned to engage decision makers and the general public across the geographic, social and economic divides facing our nation and the world.
