The TAA Board approved a new policy on how the association develops position statements relevant to textbook and/or academic authors with the goal of addressing critical issues that affect its members.
The policy states that “Position statements must be aligned with the association’s mission to support textbook and academic authors in the creation of top-quality educational and scholarly works that stimulate the love of learning and foster the pursuit of knowledge.”
Dr. Andrea Honigsfeld, a Professor of TESOL Teacher Education, and Dr. Audrey Cohan, Senior Dean for Research, Scholarship, and Graduate Studies, both of Molloy University, co-authored a new book, Collaboration for Multilingual Learners With Exceptionalities: We Share the Students, published by Corwin, a Sage company. The book includes models, strategies, and real-life stories to strengthen readers’ collaborative practices. The authors won the Most Promising New Textbook award from TAA in 2016 for their book, Serving English Language Learners. Congratulations, Andrea and Audrey!
TAA Board Secretary Brenda Urich, an intellectual property attorney with Archstone Law, was selected as one of 30 first-time boxers to participate in Haymakers for Hope’s 11th Annual Belles of the Brawl event on October 10 at the MGM Music Hall in Boston. Watch her promotional video.
“In the four months leading up to the fight I have been undertaking an intense training and fundraising journey which will prepare me to step in the ring in front of 1,500 people and literally fight to KO cancer!,” said Ulrich.
Cengage, the leading provider of higher education materials, is currently seeking new textbook authors across all disciplines to join its creative team.
“While we’re eager to collaborate on full-length narratives, we’re equally interested in working with writers on smaller, focused projects as well,” said Erika Longstreth, Cengage’s Author Relations Manager. “If you’re a writer looking to contribute your unique viewpoint, whether through a comprehensive narrative or more targeted endeavor, we’d love to hear from you.”
Macmillan Learning’s Marisa Bluestone posted an article in the publisher’s online Macmillan Community about CEO Susan Winslow’s Keynote presentation at the 2024 TAA Conference, “The Very Human Experience of Learning.”
The article, “How Authors & Educators Can Shape AI’s Future in Education,” shared how Winslow’s discussion with the authors in attendance, many of whom are also faculty, “focused on the critical role that they can and should play in guiding AI use in the classroom.” Bluestone recapped Winslow’s key message in her Keynote, that “learning is very much a human experience and while the integration of AI and other tech tools in educational settings may change how teachers teach and learners learn, the core of the experience—what makes us want to learn—has not.”
The following takeaways and “aha” moments were shared at the end of the Saturday Author Talk session at the 2024 TAA Conference in Nashville June 22:
“Writing is thinking. Remember that one small step can change your life.” – Qian Ji
“I learned two things that were somehow in opposition to one another. The first one is: The journal article is not ‘about’ the data, it is about the story, and the data is there to give support to the story. The second one is: Don’t impose a theme on the evidence, let the theme emerge from the evidence.” – Serena De Stefani
