Jim Plaxco is a digital artist and computing professional who has been a space activist since the mid-80's when he became a member of the National Space Institute, the predecessor of the National Space Society. In 1988 he joined and became an active member of the Chicago Space Frontier L5 and Chicago Society for Space Studies chapters of the National Space Society. He subsequently went on to serve as founder and President of the Northern Illinois Space Advocacy. He is currently the Webmaster, a Director, and Public Affairs Vice President of the Chicago Society for Space Studies. Mr. Plaxco also created the CSSS Speakers Bureau.

Mr. Plaxco was elected to the National Space Society (NSS) Board of Directors as the Region 6 Director in 2002 and was subsequently elected to serve as the Vice President of Chapter Affairs for the NSS. His term of office ended in January 2005. In May 2006, Mr. Plaxco was selected to serve as the Chairman for the National Space Society's Space Settlement Art Contest and Space Settlement Calendar Project. The success of this project led to Jim being presented with the NSS Award of Excellence at the 2007 International Space Development Conference. Jim continued as a judge in the art contest the following year.

In October 2007, Jim was selected to serve as the Chair of the National Space Society Web Oversight Committee. In 2008, Jim successfully ran for a seat on the NSS Board of Directors. His term will expire in 2012.

Mr. Plaxco's other previous non-profit experiences include having served on the Board of Advisors for the Harper College Center for Meteorite and Planetary Studies; being the Program Director for the Henize Science Learning Center; serving first as Membership Director and Editor of PSF News and later as Webmaster and Vice President of the Planetary Studies Foundation. In 1995, Mr. Plaxco received the Planetary Studies Foundation President's Award, that organization's top award, for his work on behalf of the society.

Mr. Plaxco currently serves as a member of the CSSS Speakers Bureau and as a NASA JPL Solar System Ambassador. In these roles he provides educational presentations to schools, museums, and various organizations and special interest groups. A few of the topics that he has spoken on include:

• the exploration of Mars and Mars imaging
• Space Solar Power and Lunar Solar Power
• NASA's Vision for Space Exploraton
• space mission planning
• the Hubble Space Telescope

Mr. Plaxco's newest presentation is "The Universe According to Monty Python". Detailed information about this and his other presentations is available at http://www.astrodigital.org/ambassador/.

In addition to his many lectures, Mr. Plaxco is also the creator and webmaster of Astrodigital - www.astrodigital.org , an educational web site for space and computing related subjects and the Mars Art Gallery - http://www.marsartgallery.com/ , a web site devoted to Mars imaging. You can read about his latest exploits at the Artsnova Blog.

Mr. Plaxco received a Bachelor of Science Degree in Economics and a Master of Science Degree in Computer Science from Northern Illinois University. While at Northern Illinois University, Mr. Plaxco founded and served as President of the NIU College Republicans.

Mr. Plaxco may be reached via email at