As I look back at the many accomplishments of our organization in Egypt, I cannot help but feel both proud and fortunate. In trying to find an umbrella term under which to place these achievements for this year, three terms come to mind, professional development, outreach, and service.

Before elaborating, let me first begin by introducing our organization. As is stated in its Constitution, NileTESOL is a professional association for all those individuals who are actively involved in the development of the teaching of English and in teaching content in English in Egypt and globally. It is funded and supported by The American University in Cairo’s School of Continuing Education. For further information, kindly visit our website at http://niletesol.org. By examining NileTESOL’s objectives, the terms professionaldevelopment, outreach, and service, stand out and I believe encompass everything we focused on doing this year, hence my choice of these terms to describe the focus of this year’s achievements.

To begin with, this year was a particularly auspicious occasion for us at NileTESOL, as it marked a milestone in the history of our organization, namely the twentieth anniversary of the annual NileTESOL Conference, where English language teachers and scholars, both national and international, come together for two days to participate and share their research, knowledge, and expertise. We were particularly honored to have Dr. Andy Curtis, President of TESOL International, whose organization is also celebrating a milestone in its history, namely its 50^th anniversary, as one of our conference’s plenary speakers this year.

Dr. Curtis also helped inaugurate our first ever Chat Show by agreeing to be interviewed by two members of our board and responding to questions by the attendees. During the chat show, he shared highlights of his career as an English Language professional, his teaching philosophy, research and predictions for developments in the field of English language learning and teaching.

In terms of outreach, NileTESOL also offered numerous professional development workshops, not only in Cairo, but also in many governorates around Egypt. This I believe is a wonderful example of our growing endeavor to reach out to our colleagues in the locations where they practice to exchange ideas and experiences, and get to know their needs and how best to serve them. In January 2015, Dr. Leslie Opp-Beckmann, Director of eLearning at the American English Institute of the University of Oregon and plenary speaker at the NileTESOL 2015 Conference gave post-conference outreach workshops in Hurghada on the Red Sea, Aswan in Upper Egypt, and Kafr El Sheikh in the Nile Delta. These workshops, along with another held in Zagazig last October in the Sharkia governorate in the Nile Delta, were funded by the Regional English Language Officer (RELO) at the American Embassy in Cairo and one of our main sponsors. The workshop held in Zagazig was conducted by our very own founding member, Dr. Deena Boraie, who is a Past-President of TESOL International, and Dean of the School of Continuing Education at the American University in Cairo.

In that vein, we were also able to provide a new opportunity for professional development for our membership this year, which was for twenty participants to come to Cairo to attend a week-long series of ToT (training of trainers) workshops, also funded by a grant provided by the RELO. The topic of these workshops was “Communicative Approaches Without Resources”, whereby the goal was to develop a diverse group of participants’ skills towards training English language teachers in communicative approaches appropriate for low-to-no resource contexts in Egypt. Applicants from the major cities of Cairo and Alexandria, where such professional development opportunities are usually centralized, were excluded to ensure that we reach out to those who work and live in governorates as far as Sinai, Upper Egypt, the Western Desert, and the Nile Delta. The criteria for selection of the participants were, that they be fluent in English and representative of different teaching contexts, including public and private pre-university and university teachers. They also had to have demonstrated their interest in improving teaching in low-to-no resource educational contexts and willingness to train teachers practicing in such contexts. The first track of the training session focused on teaching techniques appropriate for teaching in low-to-no resource contexts. The second track focused on training attendees in methods to train teachers who work in the aforementioned contexts. After completion of the workshops, it is expected that the trainees will be able to serve as mentors to English language teachers and teachers teaching in English within their areas or governorates. The ToT workshops were conducted by Dr. Jerry Gebhard, Director of Doctoral Studies in Composition and TESOL, and Professor of English, at the Indiana University of Pennsylvania, and a plenary speaker at the NileTESOL 2016 Conference. Dr, Gebhard was assisted by members of the NileTESOL Board of Directors. I am happy to report that the ToT workshop was so successful, and very much appreciated by the attendees, that we hope to be able to provide another such opportunity to a new cohort of experienced and enthusiastic Egyptian English language professionals next year.

In addition to the support we receive from the RELO, we are also grateful for the support of another very important sponsor of NileTESOL, namely the British Council in Cairo. It is thanks to their generous funding that we were able to have Dr. Stephen Bax, Professor in Applied Linguistics at the University of Bedfordshire, as a NileTESOL 2015 plenary speaker. In addition, we held workshops last April in Mansoura in the governorate of Dakahlia, another Nile Delta governorate, which were also supported by a grant from the British Council. Two members of the British Council, in addition to a NileTESOL board member, gave a day’s-long series of workshops. This year, the British Council was sponsoring the 2016 plenary speaker, Dr. Barry O’Sullivan, Professor of Applied Linguistics at the University of Roehampton. However, he was unfortunately unable to attend the conference. Nevertheless, we were very fortunate to have Dr, Liying Cheng, Professor of TESOL/TEFL at Queen’s University, who was giving a workshop at the conference as the featured speaker of the NileTESOl’s Testing, Evaluation, and Assessment Special Interest Group (TEA SIG). We are very grateful to Dr. Cheng for agreeing at the last minute to also be a plenary speaker at the NileTESOL 2016 Conference. Our last, but certainly not least, 2016 plenary speaker was Dr. Nadia Touba, an education consultant based in Cairo, who shared her extensive experience in Egypt to speak about education reform and learning in Egypt in the 21^st century.

In a further endeavor to serve our membership and provide more opportunities for professional development, and as an IATEFL Associate Member, we were invited to bid for, and won, 100 IATEFL subsidized one-year memberships for NileTESOL members. Several members have availed themselves of this wonderful opportunity, which continues to be very attractive to our growing membership.

I began by saying that by looking back at all our activities I cannot help but feel both proud and fortunate. Proud of our many achievements this year at NileTESOL and fortunate to be a member of this dynamic organization which strives to reach out to its members in order to best serve them and provide as many professional development opportunities as possible for them. Hopefully, next year we’ll be able to report on more successful activities and initiatives.