What is the AACC?
The American Automatic Control Council (AACC) represents the United States to the world automatic control community, the International Federation of Automatic Control (IFAC). Several professional societies have members in the US who are engaged in automation and control, and AACC was formed by those societies to be the single voice of the US within IFAC. AACC was formed in 1957 as a charter member of IFAC. Currently, nine professional societies, listed on each page of this site, are members of the AACC – the American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics (AIAA), American Institute of Chemical Engineers (AIChE), American Society of Civil Engineers (ASCE), American Society of Mechanical Engineers (ASME), Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE), the International Society for Automation (ISA), the Society for Modeling & Simulation International (SCS), the Society for Industrial and Applied Mathematics (SIAM), and Applied Probability Society as a subdivision of the Institute for Operations Research and the Management Sciences (INFORMS APS). AACC is a federation of these professional societies.
Why have an AACC?
The mission of the AACC is to promote cooperation among the various segments of the automatic control profession within the US, and to represent the US in international activities. To do so, AACC hosts the annual American Control Conference (ACC), supports various IFAC workshops and symposia in the US, engages representatives from the AACC member societies, represents the US to IFAC and provides volunteers for IFAC activities, and undertakes diverse other initiatives that promote and coordinate developments in control science and engineering.
Who does the work?
The AACC and its activities are all carried out with volunteers from the control community. As a result, along with providing a service to the automatic control community, the work provides opportunities for career development and visibility for the individual volunteers. There are no individual memberships in the AACC. Volunteers are members of their professional societies. AACC is governed by a Board of Directors with each member society appointing one Director.
What is the funding?
AACC is a registered not-for-profit organization, and any excess income from conferences and publications are returned to the member societies in proportion to their members’ participation in the ACC. Each member society pays an annual dues fee to AACC, but each year throughout the history of the AACC income from the conference and publications has made it possible to return the dues along with additional funds that the member societies can use to support their activities.