Dear Andrea, Audra, Christine, Lynda, Martha, Melanie, Sheila,
It has been a great gig. These past six years, seeing how each of you has been responding to the needs of your members has been, in turn, for me a great education and a great pleasure. This, of course, also includes the work and dedication of some of your predecessors: Katie Madigan in Greater K.C., Justin Charles in WI, Lydia Belatèche and Joëlle Vitiello in MN, Anna Amelung in St. Louis, Kristine Sieren and Elizabeth Zwanziger in IA, and Katy Dueppen in Downstate IL.

So as the New Year arrives, it's the perfect opportunity to say good-by and to give a very warm welcome to Sheila Conrad, whom you all know as the President of the AATF of Iowa, and now the next Regional Representative of Region VI beginning a 3 year term. It's also a time to give a big thank you to Audra Merfeld-Langston, the President of the AATF of Greater St Louis for her willingness to also be a candidate for that position.
TEACHER SHORTAGE & RECRUITMENT
At the Iowa and Illinois WL state conferences this past Fall, Sheila and I and Martha and I gave
presentations on how to enlist the efforts of high school and college teachers to address the French teacher shortage. It is something of an uphill battle to convince some that the shortage exists and others that encouraging students to become French teachers is yet another professional duty.

http://www.waflt.org/conferences-events/waflt-conference-2017/high-school-guest-program-future-colleagues/
The Chicago/N IL chapter is thinking about incorporating into one of their programs the Académie de Français workshop that the Greater Kansas City chapter regularly organizes to encourage high school students to become French teachers and that was featured last year in the National Bulletin.
Happily, communicating news of job openings is a task that chapter presidents in Region VI have embraced in email messages and on their facebook pages.

In collaboration with the Service Culturel of the French Consulate in Chicago, the AATF of MN, under the leadership of President, Christine Lac, facilitated a workshop for members on pedagogy this past Fall with Dominique Licops of Northwestern University. Chicago/N IL chapter members acted as consultants and judges for a student competition in collaboration with the consulate on their "A la carte" promotion of French gastronomy last October.
CONVENTION IN ST LOUIS


Take out your phones and mark your calendars for a January 20 AATF webinar on Martinique to be co-presented by Jayne Abrate and our own Region VI Audra Merfeld-Langston, President of the AATF of Greater St Louis.
In late July, immediate Past President of the Chicago/N IL Chapter, Robin Jacobi, was decorated as a Chevalier dans l'Ordre des Palmes Académiques. Look for AATF of WI's Justine Frieman Charles, earlier named Chevalier, to formally receive this honor in March.
STUDENT EVENTS
What a pleasure it is to see that events such as the Concours Oral in Minnesota (dating back to1973, with 30 schools and a whopping 1223 students in 2017), Wisconsin (40 schools, 350 participants, including 6 regional prior competitions), and Illinois (7th year, 12 schools and appproximately 100 students) continue to offer French students the opportunity to use and develop their linguistic strengths through poetry, literary and theatrical excerpts, original texts, and music.
A video to publicize the Concours Oral in Wisconsin is on the home page of the AATF of WI website: http://www.aatfwi.org/ and an 2016 exceptional performance in Illinois can be found at https://sites.google.com/site/ilconcoursoral/media-photos.
The Chicago/N IL chapter added a Meme Competition to their National French Week line-up of contests this year and the AATF of Wisconsin decided to follow suit. Here is a link to the Wisconsin "Un Moment dans la vie d'un(e) élève de français" Meme winners on the AATF of Wisconsin website. http://www.aatfwi.org/
The AATF of Chicago/N IL will hold it's 10th Student Immersion Day in March for almost 100 students. http://aatfjourneeintensive.edublogs.org/immersion-2010/. Authentic entertainment is part of the day:
WORKSHOPS & PROGRAMS
Region VI chapters know how to offer professional development and also how to have a good time. Greater St Louis had a Fall Workshop on using Chansons in the classroom for their members and Chicago/N IL's Fall program centered on Martinique including a presentation on Skype by a travel contact in Fort de France.
STATE WL CONFERENCES
Region VI chapters were active at the state level. Audra and Vie-President Jennifer Tadsen presented a session on the AATF at the FLAM conference. Lynda Lopez presented "Exerçons nos méninges en poésie" and Martha presented a session #Low Prep #High Engagement at ICTFL this past Fall. Two AATF of MN members, Annie Muske and Patricia Mougel of the AATF of MN presented on songs and authentic texts/tasks respectively last October at MCTFL. At WAFLT, the AATF of WI presented an Idea Share and Networking meeting as well as an AATF Business Meeting where several lucky teachers walked away with bottles of French wine at Tombola time. Breakout EDU boxes were the focus of one session offered by Andrea and at another the topic was creating contextual lessons through film.
JUST FOR US
The Greater Kansas City chapter has just celebrated the holiday season with a gift exchange and the Greater St Louis members will very soon be receiving a slice of galette hoping to become the king or queen. Chicago/N IL tasted wines and cheeses to celebrate National French Week.
RECOGNITION
Iowa inaugurated their Teacher of the Year award at the October IWLA conference and Chicago/N IL is getting ready to do the same at the ICTFL conference in their state in the Fall of 2018. Great opportunities to lift the level of visibility for French teachers within our WL profession.
CHANGES TO CONSTITUTIONS
Both Wisconsin and Iowa are working on making some changes to their constitutions to reflect new
practices.

Comparing your constitution to those of other chapters can prove interesting. Chapter numbers can be found below and also on the second page of the Membership form on the AATF webpage at: http://frenchteachers.org/hq/forms/membapp.pdf:
13 Chicago/N IL 14 Downstate Illinois
17 Iowa 26 Minnesota
28 Greater Kansas City 29 Greater St Louis
68 Wisconsin
My greatest pleasure has been bringing you all together so that you can see what others are doing. It is when we "rub elbows" with our colleagues at AATF events, through print media such as the National Bulletin or through emails or electronic messages such as this blog posting, that we learn and grow and become for each other sources of information, respect and support.
Et bien, merci et au revoir, mes collègues! Bonne chance et bonne continuation!
Amicalement,
Eileen
P.S. Pour l'avenir et la survie de l'AATF, je compte sur vous!