ITAIS Newsletter - July 2016 (Plain Text Version)

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In this issue:
LEADERSHIP UPDATES
•  LETTER FROM THE CHAIR
•  LETTER FROM THE CHAIR-ELECT
•  LETTER FROM THE EDITOR
ARTICLES
•  WAYS TO EVALUATE RATER TRAINING FOR ITA PERFORMANCE TESTS
•  CAN TOEFL IBT SCORES PREDICT ITA TEACHING PERFORMANCE?
EXTRA CATEGORY
•  TEACHING TIP: SELF-EVALUATION ACTIVITIES FOR VIDEO-RECORDED ITA PRESENTATIONS
ABOUT THIS COMMUNITY
•  ABOUT THIS COMMUNITY

LEADERSHIP UPDATES

LETTER FROM THE CHAIR

Elizabeth Gillstrom, University of Pennsylvania, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, USA

Hello ITAIS,

This is my first official letter to our crew as the chair, and I’m thrilled to be writing it!

I would like to express my deepest thanks to all of you not only for your efforts presenting and participating at TESOL in April, but also the push many of you made to submit proposals to next year’s convention. Good work! I look forward to reviewing many of these proposals, and hope that lots of you on our team are signed up to be reviewers yourselves.

I know many of your institutions are gearing up for summer programs—we’re in the midst of that ourselves here at Penn. Good luck with your incoming cohorts of new ITAs! Hopefully, you walked away from the convention in April with several new ideas to try.

After the June-August rush, we hope to continue to stay connected. The steering committee is currently in the process of planning two webinars and is aiming to run the first on 5 October. Stay tuned for further announcements on this topic on our original email list. I also hope that those of you who regularly participate in local ITA conferences are thinking about setting the date for your first meetings. Please share it on our email list once planning is underway.

Finally, I’d like to take a moment to articulate some more specific thanks to several key members. Special thanks go to everyone from last year’s steering committee, but most especially my mentor, Liz Tummons. Additionally, I’d like to thank Diane Costonas and all of her wonderful work on our website. Actually, if you’re impressed by the work of the steering committee, we are still looking to fill a few positions. Specifically, we need an editor-elect this year to learn from Maureen, and are looking for members-at-large and a chair-elect to begin in 2017. If you’re interested, please get in touch with Liz Tummons, who as past-chair is responsible for recruiting.

I look forward to all of the insightful discussions that will take place this year on our email list. Thanks again to all of you who contribute to our professional development as a community!

Sincerely,

Elizabet