International Association of Communication Sciences andDisorders (IALP)PRESIDENT’S LETTER
December 2023
Dear IALP Individual Members, Colleagues of the Affiliated Societies and Friends of IALP—
I hope this communication finds you well and are preparing for the upcoming holiday
season and New Year.
The IALP Executive Committee (EC), Board, and many IALP members have been busy since
my last communication. Below please find some of the major activities and initiatives
undertaken or forthcoming for 2024.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------NEW IALP WEBSITE
I am pleased to announce that the new IALP website (https://ialp-org.com) will be launched
on January 1, 2024!
This endeavour has been undertaken by many over many months and under the leadershipof Wiebke Scharff Rethfeldt (DE), Vice President for Communication. Please know that thewebsite remains a ‘work in progress’ and continues to evolve with more content and features
being uploaded over the coming months.
We look forward to your feedback and ask that you direct all feedback on the new website
to Vanessa Ebejer, Chief Executive Officer at: ceo@ialp-org.com

2023 IALP WORLD CONGRESS, AUCKLAND, NEW ZEALAND
IALP and the New Zealand Organizing committee were delighted to welcome 1,024 delegatesfrom 54 countries around the world to Auckland, New Zealand for the 32nd World Congressof IALP and the start of the celebration of IALP’s 100 th anniversary period/Centennial.
Congress delegates were warmly welcomed to Aotearoa, New Zealand by the local iwi(indigenous tribe) of the land, Ngāti Whātua Ōrakei and the honorable Marama Davidson(Member of Parliament) in the Opening Ceremony. The invited keynote speakers, Prof GailGillon (NZ), Prof Georgia Malandraki (US), Prof De Wet Swanepoel (ZA) and the WHO
representative, Antony Duttine presented very engaging and thought-provoking
presentations. The scientific program was complemented with an equally exciting social
program with various half-day excursions and a memorable Gala Dinner.

IALP STRATEGIC PLAN (2023-2028)
At the outset of my term as President, it was important that IALP develops a strategic plan
which could pave the way for our future over the next number years. As a result, the EC andBoard engaged in a number of months of work in collaboration with a strategic planningconsultant to address the current status of IALP and its future. I am pleased to report that anIALP Strategic Plan was recently approved by the Board in September 2023. At a macro-level,
the Plan contains the following Four Core Strategies:
STRATEGY 1: RESEARCH AND IMPLEMENTATION
Facilitate implementation and evidence-based practice by fostering and disseminating
research and data that advances the science and practice in the field of communication
sciences and disorders.
STRATEGY 2: NETWORKING AND EDUCATIONAL PROGRAMMING
Support knowledge sharing and skill development by providing networking and educational
programming among multidisciplinary professionals working in the field of communication
sciences and disorders.
STRATEGY 3: ADVOCATE AND PARTNER
Increase access to and quality of services in the field of communication sciences and disorders
through awareness raising, influencing, and partnerships.
STRATEGY 4: GROW AND SUSTAIN
Grow and sustain a vibrant and effective professional association that upholds the highest
standards of governance and integrity in all that we do.
In turn, each of these strategies contains a set of four (4) Priority Action Items to be
implemented to track the progress of the objectives over a 5-year period by committee chairs
and their respective members along with our large-, medium-, and small-sized affiliatedsociety representatives on the Board. Meetings are currently underway with each of thesestakeholder groups to discuss implementation of the Action Agenda. I am confident that theimplementation of this strategic plan will result in extremely positive outcomes for IALP overthe next number of years.
The entire Strategic Plan will be posted on the new website in early-2024.

IALP VALUES STATEMENT WORKING GROUP
As part of the deliberative strategic planning process referenced above, a detailed set ofterms were developed by the Board which reflected on the core values of IALP. The Working
Group will meet in January to develop a final IALP Values Statement which will be embeddedin the new Strategic Plan and subsequently shared with you. The development of the Values
Statement will represent the final step in the strategic planning process which has been an
enriching activity for all. The members of the Working Group are Tamer Abou Elsaad (EG),Fernanda Dreux (BR), Mershen Pillay (ZA), Thomas Law (HK) and Debbie Phyland (AU). My
personal thanks to each of them for their willingness to serve.

MENTORING PROGRAMSTransforming Faces (TF). The third year (2023-2024) of the TF Mentoring Program began inOctober 2023. The program, which is being coordinated by the Cleft Palate Committee under
the leadership of Valerie J. Pereira (HK), has 22 mentors and 22 mentees from India, Sri Lanka,Vietnam, Bangladesh, Ghana, Kenya, Nigeria, Uganda, Tanzania, Fiji, Bolivia and Mexico. IALP
offered the mentees one full year of Individual Membership.
Tavistock Trust for Aphasia (TTA). TTA has agreed to continue funding another cycle of theIALP Aphasia mentoring program. TTA is facilitated and coordinated by the IALP Aphasia
Committee through its committee members Abena Asiedua Owusu Antwi (GH) and Roxele
Ribeiro Lima (BR) under the leadership of the Committee Chair, Marian Brady (UK). The
second cohort of the TTA program will consist of 10 mentors and 10 mentees and is expected
to begin in February 2024. It is currently recruiting mentors. If you are interested in serving
as a mentor on the IALP Aphasia mentoring program, please send your CV by email to Vanessa
Ebejer – ceo@ialp-org.com by not later than 15 January 2024.

WORLD HEALTH ORGANIZATION (WHO)IALP continues to be active as a Non-State Actor in Official Relations with the WHO.
1. IALP is represented on the WHO on the Management of Post Covid (Long Covid)
working group. This international forum developed and continually updates
guidance related to this condition. The WHO COVID-19 Clinical Management:
Living Guidance documents published in August 2023 contains the most up-todate recommendations for the clinical management of people with COVID-19.
The latest version of this living guideline is available in pdf format (via the‘Download’ button) and via an online platform, and is updated regularly as newevidence emerges. This updated (5th) version contains 16 new recommendations
for the rehabilitation of adults with post COVID-19 condition:
https://www.who.int/teams/health-care-readiness/post-covid-19-condition
This group meets regularly to hear Post Covid (Long Covid) research presentations
and discuss issues related to new knowledge which may inform changes toguidance.
2. IALP has contributed to the development and dissemination of WHO’sRehabilitation 2030 initiative: https://www.who.int/initiatives/rehabilitation2030 and rehabilitation competency framework.
3. Since August 2023, IALP was represented at the:✓ 74th session of the World Health Organization Regional Committee for theWestern Pacific October 2023 – Sharynne Mcleod (AU) and Ferdeliza Garcia(PH) presented 2 statements on behalf of IALP.
✓ Strategic planning meeting of World Health Organization collaborating centres
and organizations in official relations for the Ear and Hearing Care program 1718 October 2023. Christie-Yoshinga Itano (US) (Audiology Committee)
represented IALP in Los Angeles, USA.
✓ World Hearing Forum stakeholders‘ and members‘ meeting which was held on
27-29 November 2023 by Katrin Neumann (DE) (Audiology Committee).
World Rehabilitation Alliance (WRA)
IALP continues to be a member of the World Rehabilitation Alliance (WRA). The World
Rehabilitation Alliance (WRA) is a WHO global network of stakeholders whose mission
is to support the implementation of the Rehabilitation 2030 Initiative throughadvocacy activities. It focuses on promoting rehabilitation as an essential healthservice that is integral to Universal Health Coverage and to the realization ofSustainable Development Goal 3 Ensure healthy lives and promote well-being for all
at all ages. Additional information about the WRA may be found athttps://www.who.int/initiatives/world-rehabilitation-alliance.
As a member of the WRA, 8 IALP members are actively participating on 4 WRA
workstreams:••••

Workforce - Abena Asiedua Owusu Antwi (GH); Sally Hewat (AU)Primary Care – Maria Christopoulou (CY); Rangasayee Raguntharao (IN)
Research – Marian Brady (UK); Angela Morgan (AU);
Emergencies – Mershen Pillay (ZA); Brooke Hallowell (US)I have been recently appointed to the External Relations Workstream as part of theWRA.
The objectives of the External Relations Workstream are to:• Raise the profile of the WRA through various targeted activities both as a whole
but also by aligning the different advocacy activities of each of the other work
streams.
• Increase membership of the WRA community through ensuring diversity and afocus on considering whose voices may be missing.
• Extend the influence of the WRA with a diverse stakeholder map - ensuring theWRA engages with the right partners.
As you can see, IALP continues to be very actively involved with the WHO. At a recent meetingwith many of the representatives of our affiliated societies who were able to attend, I alsostressed the importance of connecting and collaborating with WHO’s Regional Offices. Moreto follow on this in the forthcoming months and in my subsequent communication.

IALP COMMITTEES
Our 14 committees continue to be very active. I want to note that our Phoniatrics Committee
has been reactivated under the leadership of Matthias Leonhard (AT).
Below are highlights from just some of our committees.
Aphasia Committee – Chair, Marian Brady (UK)(i)
Aphasia Rehabilitation Field Manual
Prof Laura Murray [CA] has led the development of a research project application
to a Canadian funder which includes Abena Asiedua Owusu Antwi (GH) and Marian
Brady (UK) and external collaborators in support of this project. A second
application to a Danish funder has also been submitted.
(ii)
Continued to contribute to the update of the IALP website and to populate theAphasia Committee webpages. The Aphasia Committee looks forward to being
able to restore access to the multilingual lay summaries of information on aphasia.
The committee is very grateful to Prof V.P. Vandana (IN), Aphasia Committee
member for her work to develop the aphasia summaries in the following languages
Hindi, Kannada, Malayalam, Telugu and Tamil bringing the total number oflanguages that will be represented on our website in excess of 50.
(iii)
An Aphasia Committee video was recorded and produced by committee members
Maya Henry (US), Roxele Ribeiro Lima (BR) and Annette Rotherham (NZ). The video
aims to serve as a resource on the Aphasia page on the IALP website.
(iv)
The Aphasia Committee also hosted a successful session at the 32 nd World
Congress of IALP, in Auckland, New Zealand in August 2023 with many abstracts
reflecting input from the following Aphasia Committee members: Karen Brewer

(NZ), Miranda Rose (AU), Bronwyn Davidson (AU), Laura Murray (CA), Angelika
Rother (DE), Annette Rotherham (NZ]) Abena Asiedua Owusu Antwi (GH).
Augmentative and Alternative Communication (AAC) Committee – Chair, Janice Murray(UK):
3 key activities which resonate with IALP’s strategic plan and objectives:(i)
Developing the AAC conference preparations work into an article for submission.
This sub-group is being led by Sally Clendon (NZ).
(ii)
Sub-group exploring the best and most fruitful way to signpost AAC on the IALP
new website. This sub-group is being led by Nika Jilenc (CR).
(iii)
Supporting WHO – AT by reviewing their suggested module content for AAC +AAC product list. Janice Murray is momentarily leading this sub-group.
Child Language Committee (CLC) – Chair, Marleen Westerveld (AU)(i)
Global TALES Consortium: The focus of the CLC in 2023 has been on the Global
TALES (Talking About Lived Experiences in Stories) project. The committee haveestablished a Global TALES consortium with members from more than 20countries (including South Africa, Canada, Belgium, Sweden, Taiwan, Korea, China,
Hong Kong, Denmark, India, Turkey, Spain, USA, Brazil, Australia, New Zealand,Canada). The consortium meets on a bimonthly basis for a dedicated project
meeting (separate from our CLC meetings).
The Global TALES protocol has been made public on Open Science Framework –https://osf.io/ztqg6/ - currently, there are available translated versions of theprotocol in Arabic (Israel); Croatian; Dutch (Belgium); Greek (Cyprus); Hebrew;
Icelandic; Mandarin (Taiwan); Portuguese (Brazil); Spanish; Turkish (Türkiye)(ii)
Special Issue Folia Phoniatrica et Logopaedica. Nicki Nelson (US) and Marleen
Westerveld (AU) guest-edited a special issue of FPL, which will be published inDecember 2023. The editorial has been made free access: Westerveld, M. F., &Nelson, N. W. (2023). Evaluating children’s personal narrative skills using theGlobal TALES protocol: Implications for Practice. Folia Phoniatrica et Logopaedica:
https://karger.com/fpl/article/doi/10.1159/000534510/4043746/000534510.pdf
The special issue contains 10 research papers. These are studies involving children
from 15 different countries, speaking 12 different languages, ranging in age from
7 to 16 years.
(iii)
Digital Literacy Project: Barbara Ehren (US) is leading the new project on Digital
Literacy. The CLC expect to send out a survey to investigate speech therapists’ levelof knowledge and confidence with digital literacy; how speech therapists employdigital formats in their therapy for children and adolescents; what digital literacy
goals speech therapists target in their therapy.
(iv)
Jelena Kuvač Kraljević (CR) is leading a CLC project listing child language
assessment tool suitable for different countries (i.e. with local norms). This list has
been posted and currently includes: Arabic, Croatian, Icelandic, Portuguese(Brazil), Greek, English, Irish, Maltese.

(v)RADLD (Raising Awareness of Developmental Language Disorder). A meeting washeld between Shaun Ziegenfusz (RADLD ambassador), Brian Shulman, Marleen
Westerveld, and Vanessa Ebejer. An MoU between the two organisations is in theprocess of being developed.

All of our committees are very active and continue to be so. Updates on the activities of theother committees will be shared in my next President’s Letter.
Cleft Palate and Craniofacial Committee – Chair, Valerie J. Pereira (HK)Standing committee session at the IALP Congress NZ Aug 2023 on “Evidence-based SpeechIntervention in Cleft Palate/Velopharyngeal Dysfunction”. 3 committee members attended inperson (Yoshiko Takei, Mikaela Bow and Valerie Pereira), and represented the committee.
The session was well attended (over 50 participants). A pre-session poll was undertaken: 75%of participants had previous experience working with children with CLP (30% < 1 year, 40% 15 years, 30% > 5 years). 40% of participants worked in a hospital setting and about 5% in acleft service/centre). A post-session poll revealed that 75% of participants strongly
agreed/agreed that the seminar was pitched at the right level; > 90% strongly agreed/agreed
that they had learnt something different or new from the seminar; >80% stronglyagreed/agreed that the seminar gave practical information which can be applied to theirclinical practice and >95% strongly agreed/agreed that the presenters were knowledgeable
on the topic and presented the information clearly and concisely. In addition to the Standing
Committee session, members presented other papers at the congress.
An oral paper on the Transforming Faces Mentorship program was presented at the IALP NZ
2023, garnering a lot of positive feedback and interest.
Dysphagia Committee – Chair, Mershen Pillay (ZA)The Dysphagia Committee reformed itself with new members and a new Chair in August ’23
and is excited to announce that they have a wonderful webinar series planned for 2024.
Details of the IALP Dysphagia Committee webinar series will be announced shortly. Thewebinars are scheduled to start in February 2024.
Motor Speech Committee – Chair, Dora Knezevic (CR)The Motor Speech Committee is working to expand the committee with new motivatedpeople and increase global diversity. The committee is also working on strengthening
communication between committee members through monthly/bi-monthly meetings andmotivating members to collaborate on a cross-cultural and cross-linguistic research project in
the field of motor speech disorders, which is planned to be presented at the next IALP WorldCongress.

CONNECTION AND COLLABORATION WITH AFFILIATED SOCIETIESIALP currently has 60 Affiliated Societies representing over 300,000 members. Our small-,medium-, and large-size affiliated societies are an integral component of IALP. To that end,
there are three Board members, each of whom represents a sub-group of our affiliatedsociety membership.

These Board members are:
Small-Size Affiliated Societies: Cristina Politi (GR)Medium-Size Affiliated Societies: Mami Kaneko (JP)Large-Size Affiliated Societies: Sean Pert (UK)The role of the Vice President for Membership and Partnerships is a new role. Since taking up
this position at the end of August 2023, Kamini Gadhok (UK) has had several meetings withthe representatives of the Affiliated Societies to develop a joint action plan linking to the IALP
Strategic Plan. Further meetings are to be held to share these proposals with all AffiliatedSocieties. Kamini has also worked with Vanessa Ebejer, the CEO of IALP to develop materials
on member benefits for the different IALP membership categories along with a draft
recruitment and retention plan.

MEMORANDA OF UNDERSTANDING (MOUS)
The purpose of MOUs is to increase the number of partnerships IALP has with entities whose
mission and vision parallels IALP’s. At the 2023 Congress, IALP renewed its MOU with theEuropean Speech and Language Therapy Association (ESLA). This MOU memorializes not only
current projects and activities currently underway but also those in which our twoassociations may wish to engage in the future. Inquiries have already been made with two
additional professional entities about a potential MOU which hopefully will materialize in2024. More information to follow of this.

IALP’S CENTENNIAL EVENT
Our Association will celebrate its 100th birthday in June 2024. We have already started
celebrating this important milestone for IALP at the August 2023 New Zealand Congress. The
highlight of the Centennial period is a composium which is being held between 27-29 June
2024, in Vienna, Austria, the birthplace of IALP. Preparations have reached an advanced stage,
and we are very close to finalizing the program details. This event, entitled “ContemporaryPerspectives in Communication Sciences and Disorders” will consist of a full scientific programon speech-language therapy, audiology and phoniatrics spread over two and a half days. Early
Bird Registration will open in January 2024. Registration will be limited to under 200
participants. Stay tuned for more exciting news!

2025 IALP WORLD CONGRESS
With the current challenges faced regarding the tensions in the Middle East, please know that
the EC and Board have been discussing the implications of such challenges on a regular basis
and in consultation with our colleagues in Israel. Updates on the 2025 Congress will be further
communicated when they become available. We continue to wish our members and affiliatedsocieties in the area continued safety.

On behalf of the IALP Executive Committee and the Board, I wish you a safe, healthy, andrelaxing holiday season and a very Happy New Year!

Brian B. Shulman, PhD, CCC-SLP, ASHA Fellow, FASAHP, FNAP
President
President@ialp-org.com