| International Language Testing Association/Language Testing Research Colloquium Minutes of the Annual Business Meeting 15 December 2002 1:15- 2:15 p.m. ILTA Vice-President, Liz Hamp-Lyons (LHL), welcomed all ILTA members and LTRC participants to the Annual Business Meeting on behalf of the ILTA President, Fred Davidson (FD), who was unable to be present due to an accident which prevented him from travelling to 1. Minutes of previous meeting Copies of the minutes of the previous ILTA/LTRC business meeting held in St.Louis, 2. Matters arising from the previous minutes All matters arising from the previous minutes would be dealt with on the agenda for the Hong Kong 2002 meeting, which was also placed on each table. 3. President's Report ILTA EB member-at-large, Jim Purpura, presented the main points of the President's report on behalf of FD. These included: § Redesign of the ILTA Website by Glenn Fulcher § ILTA-MEM, the private email list for ILTA members. In the past, this list was managed by Glenn Fulcher from the University of Surrey, U.K. § Language Testing Update (LTU), the official print communication channel of ILTA - all members receive a print copy as part of their subscription § ILTA members receive a reduced subscription to Language Testing FD thanked all past and present members involved in the above ILTA associated endeavours. § On 22 March 2003, ILTA will again co-sponsor a joint half-day colloquium on language testing with the American Association of Applied Linguistics (AAAL). FD is co-organizing this colloquium with Prof Larry Selinker of § Results of FD's survey on ILTA membership revealed 3 main concerns 1. ILTA’s costing structure may be inappropriate. 2. ILTA needs to consider an affiliate member structure 3. ILTA's communications are inconsistent The President's report was accepted by the membership (LHL proposed, Lyle Bachman, seconded) 4. Treasurer's Report: The ILTA Treasurer, Antony Kunnan (AK), presented a statement of accounts. His report covered the period from January 1, 2001 to December 8, 2002. The main points were as follows: Year 20011. The opening balance on January 1, 2001 was US $ 4,759.66
Year 2002
At the conclusion of his report, AK answered members' questions. The Treasurer's report was accepted by the membership (Alan Davies, proposed, Lynda Taylor, seconded). 5. Announcement of ILTA Officers and Executive Board for 2002 Prior to announcing the ILTA Executive Board recommendations, LHL reminded members of the composition of the EB. The elected members of the ILTA Executive Board for 2002 were: President Fred Davidson (FD) Vice-President Liz Hamp-Lyons (LHL) Immediate Past President Caroline Clapham (CMC) Secretary Vivien Treasurer Members-at-Large Annie Brown (AB), Cathie Elder (CE) Dorry Kenyon (DK), Jim Purpura (JP) LHL thanked all retiring members, AK, CMC, CE, DK and Tom Lumley (ex-officio EB member as LTRC 2002 organizer). She offered a special commendation to CMC for her long service to ILTA (Secretary/Treasurer, 1997-1999, VP, 2000, President, 2001, IPP, 2002. 6. ILTA Executive Board Announcements and Recommendations LHL presented the ILTA Executive Board recommendations for information/ discussion by Members. a) ILTA-MEM: ILTA-MEM will be managed by ILTA Secretary, Vivien Action: VB b) ILTA Homepage As mentioned in FD's address, Glenn Fulcher will continue to run the ILTA Homepage Website. LHL recorded a vote of thanks to Glenn, on behalf of the EB and the membership, for his work over the past few years in setting up and maintaining the Website and membership list. Action: Glenn Fulcher c) Awards to be presented at the LTRC banquet, Sunday 15 December · ETS/TOEFL Jacqueline A Ross Dissertation Award for best Ph.D. dissertation (to Dr. Tom Lumley, · Cambridge ESOL/IELTS award for best M.A. dissertation (to Sang-Kuen Shin, UCLA) · Robert Lado Memorial award for best presentation at LTRC 2002 by a student · LHL informed members that the ILTA award for Best Paper published on language testing in 2000, awarded to Alex Teasdale and Constant Leung, had been presented to Constant Leung after the symposium on Sunday morning as he had to leave d) Setting up of committees in order to give structure to ILTA whilst retaining the free spirit of the organization i) By-Laws committee charged with: - articulating the role of the VP and IPP more clearly - drafting a new By-Law to effect the staggering of the Secretary and Treasurer's terms of office LHL thanked the previous By-Laws committee, Sari Luoma (chair), Yeonsuk Cho, Constant Leung and Brian Lynch for their work. Action LHL and 2003 By-Laws committee ii) Awards/Workshops committee charged with: 1. Clearly defining ILTA's role on various awards committees: ETS Library Award, established to offer reference books on language testing and language pedagogy, valued at up to US$1000 for each category per year to a deserving institution. ILTA will provide input to ETS on appropriate titles on language testing UCLES/ILTA Lifetime Achievement Award, established to acknowledge distinguished service and scholarship in the field of language testing. The committee will consists of 4 members - a representative of Cambridge ESOL, a present or former member of the ILTA Executive Board, a member of the current LTRC Program committee, the winner of the previous award or a member of ILTA to be chosen by the committee chair 2. Carrying out ILTA's mission of promoting good testing practice throughout the world: ILTA workshops award: it was recommended that the committee should review the practice of offering US$2500 to hold workshops as ILTA's current financial situation cannot support this amount automatically 3. Considering guidelines for having ILTA represented at all conferences + financial aspects of being ILTA affiliates 4. Asking Best Paper/ Article Committee 2001 to consider broadening review base to automatically include all papers published in Language Testing, in addition to nominated articles. There was much enthusiasm and general approval for this proposal but it was considered that the Committee would necessarily need to be expanded to cope with the increased review load. A member also pointed out the disadvantage of privileging one journal. LHL confirmed that nominations from the membership would still be solicited as in previous years; this encompasses all book chapters and articles published in all journals. In previous years, experience had shown that most nominations, though not necessarily winners, were for articles published in the only journal dedicated to language testing and therefore it was thought appropriate to automatically include these in the best article review process. It was agreed that the 2001 Best Paper committee would be asked to consider this. 5. Instigating fund-raising efforts of schemes to benefit the future of language testing, such as travel scholarships, etc. It was hoped that a scheme similar to AAAL's appeal for the future of Applied Linguistics could be initiated by ILTA on behalf of the language testing community. Action LHL and 2003 committees 7. Progress Report: Code of Practice Committee (Lyle Bachman (LFB), Chair) LFB reported that the Code of Practice committee had met in Action: LFB and Code of Practice Committee. 8. Progress Report: LTRC 2003, BOS circulated an information sheet about LTRC 2003 which will be held at the BOS outlined the proposed schedule and registration fees, which would include early bird discounts for registration before May 1 and student, ILTA member and non-ILTA member rates. The submission deadline for proposals to present papers, symposia, poster sessions and research network sessions was January 31 and proposals would only be accepted if submitted using forms provided on the Website: http://www.reading.ac.uk/AcaDepts/ll/teru/ltrc2003/homepage.htm Accommodation would be provided in rooms reserved for conference attendees in the Whiteknights residence on the university campus (100 single rooms to be allocated on a first come, first served, basis) at a cost of GBP38.00 per night. A list of alternative hotels and guest houses would be provided on the Website. Action: Barry O'Sullivan and the LTRC 2003 Committee 9. LTRC 2004 LHL informed the meeting that the ILTA EB had received a proposal to host LTRC 2004 in The annual conference of ILTA is the Language Testing Research Colloquium (LTRC). LTRC is held in different locations over a three-year cycle, which will normally be: every third year consecutively with AAAL in USA; every third year consecutively with AILA wherever it may be in the world; every third year in another location anywhere in the world. An outline of recent and future locations with affiliations according to the By-Laws, was presented for comment (reproduced below):
LHL explained that members of the EB greeted the proposal from Morocco enthusiastically, as ILTA is, in principle, very keen to diversify especially in geographical areas where language testing is important but generally under-represented in ILTA and LTRC. However, two major problems were noted: i) the current ILTA By-Laws require LTRC 2004 to be located geographically compatible with AAAL (to be held in Portland, Oregon). To hold LTRC in Morocco would require compatibility with "another location anywhere in the world". The earliest this could be achieved is 2006. ii) It is very important that at least one of the potential organizers of LTRC should present their proposal in person in order that members may ask questions before voting. None of the organizers from Morocco attended LTRC in Hong Kong and could not therefore provide any follow-up clarification of their proposal. LHL, on behalf of the EB, expressed a hope that several of the team from Morocco would attend LTRCs in 2003 and 2004 so that they could get a clear idea of members' expectations regarding organization and facilities. Discussion then took place as to an appropriate location for LTRC 2004 which had not, to date, received any offers for hosting which complied with the geographical requirement to be held consecutive with AAAL as specified in the By-Laws. In addition, a problem was noted in that in 2004, AAAL will be held in Portland, Oregon from 1-4 May, whereas TESOL will be held in Long Beach, Ca from 29 March - 3 April. For many years previously AAAL and TESOL meetings were held in close proximity to each other, both in timing and geographical location. The change in practice by AAAL has led to a situation that could not have been predicted when ILTA set up the By-Laws regarding LTRC. Two solutions were suggested: i) LFB and AK volunteered to coordinate the development of a proposal to hold LTRC in Southern California to coincide with TESOL ii) West Coast members could be asked to run a conference in Portland, Or prior to AAAL. It was pointed out that an ILTA member, Brian Lynch, is already the local chair of AAAL 2004 and would not be able to chair LTRC 2004 at the same time. Much discussion ensued. A member pointed out that many LTRC attendees preferred to also attend AAAL rather than TESOL if a choice had to be made. Another member commented that AAAL and ILTA have a joint session + AAAL has a strand on testing. It was noted that TESOL also has a strand on testing/assessment and that the AAAL/ILTA joint session would take place even if LTRC 2004 was located in proximity to TESOL. A motion was proposed (proposed, Randy Thrasher; seconded, Cathie Elder) to hold LTRC 2004 pre-TESOL in Southern California. Those present at the meeting voted as follows: for, 33; against, 3; abstained, 13. LHL declared the motion carried and thanked LFB and AK for their offer. They were requested to begin working on a proposal as soon as possible to be presented formally at LTRC 2003 in Reading U.K. LFB reminded the EB that a change to the By-Laws would be required to account for the delinking of AAAL from TESOL. Action LFB, AK and EB. 10. Results of 2002 elections for ILTA Officers and Executive Board for 2003. VB announced the results of the 2002 elections. The following members will commence duties in January 2003: Vice-President Antony Kunnan Secretary Vivien Berry Treasurer Janna Fox Members-at-Large Pauline Rea-Dickins & Sara Cushing Weigle Nominating Committee Kathryn Hill, Brian Lynch & Daniel Reed The ILTA EB 2003 is: President Liz Hamp-Lyons (LHL) Vice-President Antony Kunnan (AK) Immediate Past President Fred Davidson (FD) Secretary Vivien Berry (VB) Treasurer Janna Fox (JF) Members-at-Large Annie Brown (AB), Jim Purpura (JP), Pauline Rea-Dickins (PRD) & Sara Cushing Weigle (SCW) 11. Any Other Business (AOB) A member requested that all members of organizations wishing to become affiliated to ILTA should get together to present an appeal or request for affiliation to ILTA. A member requested that serious consideration be given to holding parallel sessions at future LTRCs. This will be tabled for further discussion. There being no further business, the meeting closed at 2:15pm. |