International Assembly

How time flies! In less than two months we are going to meet in Washington D.C. for IA annual conference! I hope everyone has been doing exceedingly well and I look forward to seeing you in Washington D.C. this December.

On behalf of the Executive Board and all IA members, I warmly welcome all our old friends and new friends to the IA family. I thank all of you for your dedication to global education and your strenuous efforts to develop globally minded citizens. It is my sincere hope that you will inform your colleagues of IA mission and invite more educators and scholars who are passionate about global education to IA annual conference to be held in Washington D.C. on December 2, 2011.

Our Vice President/Program Chair, Dr. Frans Doppen at Ohio University, took commendable task of putting together the program for our 2011 annual conference. Our program schedule this year is a little different from our previous program schedules. Please check on IA website at www.ncssia.org for the complete program. Presentation abstracts will also be posted on IA website.

The keynote speaker of the Jan L. Tucker Memorial Lecture of 2011 International Assembly is Dr. Guomin Zhen, a Professor and Executive Dean of Teachers College at Beijing Normal University, China. As the leading person of Chinese education reform, Dr. Zheng will speak about current Chinese teacher education reform.

The International Assembly is proud to honor Dr. Kenneth A. Tye as the Distinguished Global Scholar of year 2011 for his great contributions to global education. Please join me in congratulations to Dr. Tye. Great thanks to the Global Scholar Award Selection Committee led by Dr. Fuss Kirkwood-Tucker and for all your hard work.

Presenters in this year’s roundtable sessions on Friday, December 2, 2011will explore diverse social studies issues and global education themes. These themes are consistent with the 91th NCSS conference theme, Dimensions of Diversity, in that the world is ever changing and has become more interconnected. As social studies scholars and educators who are dedicated to promoting global understanding, we need to let the larger social studies education arena know who we are, what we do, and how we address the diverse and critical issues of social studies education in the United States and around the world. Please do remember to share and submit your scholarly work to IA online journal “Journal of International Social Studies” (http://www.iajiss.org). Our IA online journal editors Beverly (Lee) Bisland and Gloria Alter deserve our applause for their dedicated work.

I wish to thank all members of the Executive Board for contributing their time and wisdom to the IA mission. Most importantly, I wish to express my sincere gratitude to Eleanor Goldstein who once again so graciously and generously sponsored our two big events: the Jan L. Tucker Memorial Lecture and the Distinguished Global Scholar Award Luncheon.

We wish you continued success and look forward to your future endeavors. I invite each of you to join IA in Washington D.C. this December for what will be an equally exciting and productive conference.

Yali Zhao

IA President