Dear IALLT Colleagues, Friends, and Family:

As we begin a new year and decade, I want to take a bit of time to thank you for your support of IALLT, and to update you on what the Board has been doing in the past six months since our conference at the University of Oregon.   IALLT owes Jeff Magoto and Julie Sykes, as well as their teams, a considerable debt of gratitude.  The conference was a financial and programmatic success, which is a testament to the abilities of Trish Nolde, Stacey Powell, Amanda Romjue, and the rest of the program committee.

We are very pleased to announce that IALLT 2021 will be held in New Orleans, June 16-19 at the brand new Higgins Hotel New Orleans (https://www.higginshotelnola.com/), located next to the National World War II Museum in the Lower Garden District.  This is IALLT’s first time hosting a conference in a hotel, rather than on a university campus – we hope that the location, amenities, and flexibility will make for a fantastic event.  New Orleans offers a convenient air destination, world-class tourism, a vibrant nightlife steps away in the French Quarter, and an opportunity for many of our colleagues from the southern US to join us.  Stay tuned for registration and more conference information but save the date!

This spring join us at SCOLT, the Southern Conference on Language Teaching, on March 28 and 29, 2020 in Mobile, Alabama for the annual Board and Council meeting and IALLT Summit.  This is a chance for us to hear from you, our membership, on issues that are of importance to you, and offers an opportunity for real-time dialogue and planning.  Your input, as always, is crucial in helping IALLT deliver the information and opportunities that matter to the profession.  You can register to attend the Summit via Zoom or in person at https://iallt.org/conferences/.

The IALLT Board has been hard at work on a number of fronts:

IALLT continues to support our representation in the Joint National Committee for Languages.  Through JNCL, we advocate for language teaching and learning in the K-16 environment, indigenous languages, study abroad, immersion programs, and programs that enhance and support our nation through knowledge and understanding of other cultures, nations, and languages. 

As many of you know, the IALLT Journal has ceased publication.  This was a decision that the Board took seriously and discussed at length prior to making.  IALLT is proud to have FLTMAG and its amazing editorial staff and contributors as our primary serial publication.  If you have contributed to FLTMAG, IALLT thanks you for sharing your expertise with the profession.  If you have not, please consider doing so – FLTMAG is a wonderful venue for scholars who are early on their career paths, for practitioners of CALL, for language center directors, for classroom teachers, and for instructional designers who are engaged with L2 teaching and learning at their institution.

In coming weeks, you’ll see announcements for a few new initiatives that IALLT is undertaking in light of our town hall meeting at IALLT 2019 at Oregon.  IALLT is establishing its first special interest group in recent memory; Szymon Zuberek at Columbia is organizing an initial meeting for those IALLTers who are interested in exploring extended reality and its affordances and best practices for learning language and culture.  Margherita Berti, Molly Godwin-Jones, and Shannon Spasova are putting the final touches on a plan for an IALLT mentorship program designed to connect longtime and experienced practitioners of CALL with graduate students who are interested in exploring the field, or who are engaged in adjacent areas of interest.  Stay tuned for more details and to find out how you can become involved.

The Board has also approved the formation of something that’s long overdue in IALLT; an emeritus/emerita council.  The idea is to keep retired members of our professional community involved with the organization; we have a great deal to gain from their experience, and we believe that understanding IALLT’s history over the last 55 (!) years, if we’re counting NALLD, is crucial to the organization.  We’re asking our retired members to help us put together a history of IALLT, an initial version of which may be ready in time for IALLT 2021.  If you have something to contribute, or want to help with the project, please contact programs@iallt.org.

A few upcoming topics for the Board include a discussion of member benefits, something we’re always looking at.  If you have ideas on what you’d like to see as a benefit that’s exclusive to IALLT members, let us know at info@iallt.org.  We are considering the idea of institutional memberships to IALLT; in more than a few cases, there may be more than one IALLTer at a given school or university.  What’s the best way to encourage memberships that can bring colleagues tangible benefit, and make it cost-effective for an institution to underwrite its employees’ IALLT experience?  The Board has also been asked to consider having IALLT serve as a true “umbrella” organization for at least one regional group, providing services that those regional groups may need to be successful.  We think this would entail rewriting our 501c3 non-profit status to include those regionals that wish to align themselves with IALLT and its resources.  We’re in the early days of that discussion and would welcome input from the membership at info@iallt.org.

Finally, CALICO and IALLT leadership are in discussions regarding the ways in which we can collaborate in the near and long term.  There’s active interest on the part of CALICO in contributing to FLTMAG, to the IALLT conference, to shared outreach to graduate students and junior colleagues in the profession.  We will keep you posted as these plans coalesce, but believe that the professions involved with CALL are stronger when our two organizations work together.

Wishing you all a successful spring semester, and looking forward to seeing you at the 2020 Summit and at IALLT 2021 in New Orleans!  As always, don’t hesitate to reach out to any of the Board at info@iallt.org, or directly to me at president@iallt.org.  

Andrew Ross
President of the International Association for Language Learning Technology
Director of the Language Center
Harvard University

Andrew F. Ross, PhD

Director of the Language Center

Harvard University

Science Center B06.40

1 Oxford Street

Cambridge, MA 02138

(617) 496-0607

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