Cynthia DeRoma, Yale University, New Haven, CT, USA

Dear colleagues,

Here we are again at the end of one more year. In 2022, some of us had the privilege of seeing each other in person for the first time in so long and, amazing as that was, our group has established such a strong tradition of keeping in touch online that we can safely affirm that meeting in person might be the cherry on top of the sundae, but the sundae is still there and as tasty as always! With the collaboration of so many of our members, our community remains strong via our listserv, our webinars, and our working groups.

For this issue of the newsletter, I tried to address some of the criticism directed at our field about the usefulness and potential harm of oral English tests. It is far from a comprehensive review on the topic, but it is an issue I hope we are able to talk and write about more and more. Most criticism directed at our field comes from the outside, usually revealing severe misunderstandings about our goals and practices. Perhaps because so many of us work under contracts that leave us little time for research and publishing, we don’t always get our voices heard and have to deal with pushback alone within our institutions instead of collectively as a group. With our new working group to discuss equitable testing, I hope we will be able to not only think through new ways to tackle this issue, but also to have better conversations with stakeholders outside our field.

On a different note, keep an eye out for the election ballot for the 2023-2024 ITA-IS Steering Committee.

Warm wishes,

Cynthia L. Z. DeRoma, Ph.D.
Chair, ITA-IS