Greetings CALL-IS members and colleagues,

It was great to see so many of you at the Electronic Village (EV) in Dallas during the 2013 convention. I enjoyed your company and look forward to seeing many of you again in Portland, Oregon, next March. For those who couldn’t attend the convention, it was great to collaborate with you from a distance both leading up to and after the convention. If you weren’t able to attend the EV in Dallas, please make sure to check out our new Convention Wiki that has links to our webcast sessions from the convention and links to many of the handouts from presenters in the EV. Click on the hyperlink and you can find the Convention Wiki.

Even though the next convention is still several months away, the CALL-IS leadership team is busy getting ready. We are working to prepare the Call for Proposals for the EV 2014, which should come out in early September. I hope everyone will consider submitting a proposal for one of our EV events. In addition, if you have suggestions for next year’s EV, please don’t hesitate to contact me. We would love to have more volunteers help us organize and manage the events. Even if you are not able to attend the convention in person, there is a lot to be done prior to the convention, such as reading proposals or coordinating event preparation. It is a great way to get involved in the CALL-IS and work with a great EV planning team.

You can also participate in free online professional development by volunteering to help with the Electronic Village Online (EVO). The EVO sessions will take place from January to February 2014, and we are always in need of good moderators to lead the sessions. If you have ideas you want to share with your colleagues around the world, please consider moderating a session in the EVO. 

The CALL-IS has also been working hard to collaborate with other professional organizations to promote the use of technology in language teaching. As part of our collaboration, we have been working with the Learning Technologies Special Interest Group (LT SIG) from the IATEFL organization. They have recently offered several online conferences and workshops that have been announced on the CALL-IS Facebook page. We hope those workshops have been beneficial to our members. I would encourage our members to find out more about the LT SIG and what they have to offer.

Finally, I especially want to thank our newsletter editor, Larry Udry. He has worked very hard this year and put out a record number of issues. I know that it takes a lot of time and a lot of teeth-pulling to get people to submit articles and columns for the newsletter. I would encourage any of our members who are interested in submitting articles to contact Larry. Publishing an article in the newsletter is a great way to serve the interest section and develop professionally; it looks great on a CV or résumé, as well.

I look forward to networking and working with many of you as we prepare for the 2014 convention in Portland and our other events during the year. I also look forward to collaborating and meeting others on the TESOL Community discussion board and our hosted discussions. It is an honor serving you as the immediate past chair and working with such wonderful leadership in the interest section.

Sincerely,

Justin Shewell

Justin Shewell is a lecturer at the American English and Culture Program at Arizona State University in Tempe, Arizona, USA. He has taught English in the United Arab Emirates, Korea, and the USA. He is also working on his PhD in Educational Technology at Arizona State University and hopes to graduate in August 2013. His professional interests include technology and language learning, materials and curriculum development, teacher training, and pronunciation pedagogy. When he is not working on his dissertation or serving in TESOL, he spends his time with his wife and five children.