20, no. 1 (September 1988): 1-2
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From the Editor
Denise Bourassa Knight
I AM often asked about the work we do at ADFL and in the MLA Foreign Language Programs office, about how projects are begun and how members can participate or contribute. As I reflect on these questions, I am reminded of two points in particular: that the myriad details of the administrative and editorial work of the office provide the base that enables us to address broad issues in foreign language education and that, when all is said and done, the concerns of our membership direct the work of our organization.
I write in June for publication in September—an example of the kind of scheduling that is the norm in an office like this. The two annual ADFL Summer Seminars are just now over, and though there is much wrap-up work to do—thank-yous to be written, bills to be paid, copies of speakers' papers to be solicited, evaluation forms to be sent out, collected, and compiled-planning for the 1989 seminars has already begun. Sites were chosen several months ago and financial questions settled: Seminar East will take place at the University of Georgia and Seminar West at California State University, Northridge. Our next step will be to visit faculty members and administrators at Georgia and Northridge to discuss our plans. Then, at a two-day meeting in late September, the ADFL Executive Committee will set the agenda and make recommendations for topics and speakers. Organizing a seminar is very much a collaborative project: we work closely with both the Executive Committee and the host faculty members and administrators, and we act on suggestions and recommendations from participants in past seminars.
Once the program is set, we will extend invitations to speakers, schedule meetings, and negotiate for meals and accommodations. But before anything becomes final, we will have to make many adjustments and attend to numerous practical matters—coffee breaks, menus, excursion plans, transportation to and from hotels or campuses, and so forth. The correspondence file on the seminars will quickly fatten with letters to invited speakers about their presentations, travel arrangements, and expenses. In late winter the MLA production staff will design the brochure that will go out to all ADFL members in the spring. Registration forms will start to trickle in, then to flow. At that point, we will have begun to draw up lists and to send out more letters: invitations to various participants to chair plenary sessions or cochair discussion groups and memos to on-site participants concerning their duties. Last, after setting meeting locations, compiling information packets, collecting survey data, providing discussion-group lists, badges, and labels, we will be off to the seminars once again.
Seminar planning is but one project in the ADFL and Foreign Language Programs office. By the time members receive this issue of the ADFL Bulletin , Judith Ginsberg, the new director of ADFL and Foreign Language Programs, will have taken over and begun work with other staff members on a major data-base survey to gather information on a wide range of conditions and issues affecting foreign language programs. The staff will also have completed two other studies—the PhD-placement survey and the entrance- and degree-requirements survey—and designed and sent out another short survey, on PhD language requirements. Work will be under way on the second edition of the Directory of Master's Programs in Foreign Languages, Foreign Literatures, and Linguistics ; manuscripts accepted for publication in the January 1989 issue of the Bulletin will be in the hands of our copy-editors; and all will be ready for the September meeting of the ADFL Executive Committee.
Long-term planning seems most necessary for our fall and winter projects: the ADFL membership will elect three ADFL Executive Committee members from nominations made approximately eight months earlier; the MLA convention will come and go as planning for the following year's convention begins; yet another issue of the Bulletin will be published while the subsequent issue is in production; the ADFL Executive Committee will hold its second two-day meeting here at MLA headquarters to determine ADFL projects; other MLA committees in whose work this office participates will meet; plans for the first MLA institute for foreign language supervisors and coordinators will be finalized.
Then there is the work that has no specific timetable or necessarily quantifiable results: our ongoing efforts with other members of the Joint National Committee for Languages (JNCL) to provide leadership in creating national initiatives and government programs for foreign language education; overtures to other organizations to encourage collaboration and the exchange of information for promoting the study of foreign languages; the strengthening of pedagogical and professional connections among the various levels of education; the dissemination of information to members and the general public; and participation in conferences, conventions, and MLA projects and activities in addition to those already mentioned.
All this administrative and editorial work provides the base for our larger, less concrete accomplishments; it enables us to examine professional and institutional matters that deeply concern our members. For example, the recommendations from the summer-seminar discussion groups that met in 1986 led the 1987 ADFL Executive Committee to formulate policy statements on class size, junior faculty development, and teaching loads, among other issues. We have already heard reports that some department chairs have successfully acted on these guidelines. This response proves once again, I think, that change can and must be initiated by those in the profession, rather than by outsiders, and that the strength of this organization lies in its grass roots, the membership. We at headquarters are happy that you, our members, call on us, recognize our services as yours, and allow us to represent you and speak on your behalf. The ADFL Executive Committee and staff welcome your continuing participation and urge you to let us know your interests and concerns.
© 1988 by the Association of Departments of Foreign Languages. All Rights Reserved.
ADFL Bulletin 20, no. 1 (September 1988): 1-2 |
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