The American Center for Mongolian Studies (ACMS) is a US registered 501(c)3 not-for-profit, academic organization which promotes research and scholarship in Inner Asia, a broad region consisting of Mongolia and parts of China, Russia and Central Asia, including Inner Mongolia, Xinjiang, Buryatia, Tuva and eastern Kazakhstan. International academic activities in Inner Asia are often conducted within the confines of particular disciplines because opportunities for discussing and sharing cross-discipline research are rare. As a result, research produced within one discipline is not readily available to researchers of other disciplines, and this creates circumstances in which valuable knowledge about Mongolia and Inner Asia is underutilized. The American Center for Mongolian Studies was established in order to facilitate and coordinate the various multi-discipline research activities occurring each year in the region. It is a consortium of more than 30 academic and cultural institutions in North America and Inner Asia, including the National University of Mongolia, the Smithsonian Institution, Western Washington University, the University of Wisconsin, Indiana University, University of California Berkeley, and University of Pennsylvania. Although similar in some respects to the Mongolia Society at Indiana University, the ACMS is the only US based Mongolian Studies and Inner Asia focused academic and research organization operating a permanent office in Mongolia. History The ACMS was incorporated in 2002 in Austin, Texas and established its home office at Austin College. It moved its home office to Western Washington University in 2003, and opened its Mongolia office in 2004, which is currently housed in the School of Foreign Affairs at the National University of Mongolia. From the fall of 2009 to Spring 2014, the University of Wisconsin-Madison Center for East Asian Studies provided logistical support for the home office. In 2014, the ACMS moved offices to the Center for East Asian Studies at the University of Pennsylvania. Mongolian Studies scholars and discipline based Mongolian researchers were instrumental in the establishment of the ACMS, and the United States Department of Education, United States Embassy in Mongolia, and Council for American Overseas Research Centers (CAORC) contributed significant financial resources to establish and operate the ACMS Mongolia office. In November 2013 the ACMS Mongolia office moved to its current location inside the East Entrance of Natsagdorj Library in Ulaanbaatar. Governance A board of directors comprising one representative from each member institution and “board members at large” elected by ACMS individual members oversees the activities of the ACMS and provides