As all of you know, the program for the ICA 2009 conference in Chicago is now online (http://www.icahdq.org/conferences/2009/confprg.asp)! Barbie Zelizer, our President-Elect and conference planner, along with our division/interest group planners and local arrangement coordinators, have done an absolutely outstanding job with the plenary sessions, conference theme events, and other opportunities for sharing research, networking, and having fun in Chicago in May! At the time of this writing, one of our 13 preconference has already sold out!

Barbie's column in this newsletter provides further details but please keep in mind that an innovation in our conference schedule this coming May is having not only an opening but also a closing plenary and reception. Please plan to attend our first ever closing plenary (with Naomi Klein, whose most recent book is The Shock Doctrine; see http://www.naomiklein.org/shock-doctrine) on Monday. Our opening plenary features Michael Copps (U.S. Federal Communications Commissioner; see http://www.fcc.gov/commissioners/copps). We also will have a full morning of panel presentations on that day.

Besides the conference program going online and our opening and closing plenaries, I'd also like to brief you on some other ICA happenings. These include: (a) an Executive Committee (EC) meeting with our publisher, Wiley/Blackwell; (b) results from a midyear Board meeting; (c) awards committee and unit work; and (d) a comment on our associations' stand regarding social issues.

First, our EC and representatives from our Publications Committee (Dale Hample), our original strategic planning committee (Bob Craig) and our New Media areas (J. Alison Bryant) are meeting with representatives from Wiley/Blackwell to review our partnership and engage in strategic planning for the next several years. Among other things, we have collaborated on our International Encyclopedia of Communication, our latest journal (Communication, Culture, & Critique), our translation of ICA journal abstracts into multiple languages, a handbook series, and ISI listings of our journals for impact factors and inclusion in the Thompson Web of Knowledge. But the question remains: How might we better serve our members? And, given today's new media, what more can and should we be doing? Although we engage in ongoing discussions about these issues, we intend to revisit topics such as new technologies, including e-books, opportunities to serve global regions, and ways to influence public policy through our research. I'll provide an update in a future newsletter column.

Second, we completed our Midyear Board Meeting in January. There were over 20 items on our agenda. Among the most discussed were article review time frames, future conference sites for 2013, practices and procedures for greening ICA even more than we already are doing currently, ways to handle multiple language submissions for our conferences, and updates on our 2010 Singapore and our 2009 Melbourne regional conferences (http://www.culture-communication.unimelb.edu.au/journalism21st/index.html). The discussion was lively on a number of issues but especially on future conference sites and criteria for site selection as well as how to implement changes, such as multiple, especially local, languages at our conferences and in our publication submissions. For these issues and many more, we recognize that there are no easy solutions. But we are committed to deep internationalization and appreciate the insights of our members about ways we can pursue our goals. There was consensus that we'll continue our committee and task force work with the input from our online discussions and with the aim of providing reports to our members in May. I'll also provide information in newsletter columns.

Our awards and other committees are hard at work. Nurit Guttman is overseeing all of the different ICA awards committees. There also have been quite a few e-mails sent by Division and Interest Group chairpersons about dissertation and thesis awards, where applicable. Unit chairs have been sending out e-mail messages about other information such as preconferences in Chicago, calls for papers for regional conferences related to divisional/interest groups topics. We keep a running list of communication conferences around the globe and invite you to submit your calls for papers and website links to http://www.icahdq.org/news/connected.asp.

There have been online charges to our associations, including ICA, that we can and should take a stance regarding social and political injustices. Some of these issues, such as solitary confinement and torture, get at the very heart of human dignity and rights. I suspect that we might disagree on what constitutes human rights violations and how to interpret acts and consequences in specific contexts, but none of us would argue that we should not be engaged in such causes. It is evident when we look at the diverse activities in which our members are engaged. The manner of such engagement varies greatly among our members-from course topics and research conduct to the active lobbying of domestic and international bodies for change.

The role of ICA, however, is somewhat more complicated. Not only would an ICA charge to transform particular policies and practices mean adjudication of such debates among our global membership, but it also would necessitate structural modifications of our charter. We are a professional association dedicated to the pursuit of research that can provide greater understanding of and (perhaps) advocate for transformation in the communicative rhythms of everyday life as well as public policy and multinational corporate and governmental actions. However, our organization's charter prohibits us, as a body, from political activites and lobbying. Perhaps this charter will change in the future. You can rest assured that deliberations about such a move would not be undertaken without the representation of our membership.

It is highly ironic that I write these words. As you know, my theme for the Montreal conference last year was "Communicating for Social Impact" and the underpinnings of my theoretical work and empirical research has been a desire to create communicative conditions fostering equity and opportunities for full participation in career/work and life realms.

I believe that there still is much we can do as individuals and collectivities within ICA to make change about issues that matter most to us. We have social networking avenues through our member pages where each and every one of us can connect with like-minded advocates to discuss issues, collaborate on research, and consider the implications of our findings for public change. We also have this newsletter, Division/Interest Group preconferences and panels, and other outlets for voicing issues. Please take these opportunities to work on behalf of human well being and dignity through communication.