Dear ISCA members:
Welcome to the next installment of the ISCApad for December 2018!  This is the last edition for 2018, so I would like to highlight some activities as well as point to updates from the community including meetings, job openings, theses, and announcements in this edition.

ISCA INTERSPEECH-2018:

A Tremendous Success!  [http://www.interspeech2018.org/]

                                                                      
Interspeech-2018 took place September 2-6, 2018, at the Hyderabad International Convention Centre (HICC), Hyderabad, India, with the theme of: Speech Research for Emerging Markets in Multilingual Societies. From an historical perspective, ISCA made it a point to actively work with potential countries/regions who had not had a major conference in speech. India had been on ISCA’s radar for many years given the significant number of labs, industry, and activity for speech communications within the country – and so ISCA committed at least 3-4 different ISCA Distinguished Lecturer’s visits over a several years to both identify critical institutions & individuals as well as to encourage a submission from this region. While there are many challenges in organizing a major conference such as Interspeech in a country like India (traffic, logistics, infrastructure, etc.) – it is safe to say this was a resounding success! Between 1500-1600 attendees participated in Interspeech-2018, with aproximately 1688 paper submissions originally received for the review process from over 60 countries. The venue was exceptional, and much credit goes to the General Chair (B. Yegnanarayana), the General Co-Chairs (C. Chandra Sekhar,  Shrikanth Narayanan, S. Umesh, S. R. M. Prasanna), and Technical Program Chairs (A. Hema Murthy, Preeti Rao, Paavo Alku, Prasanta Kumar Ghosh). Excellent credit goes to V. Suryakanth Gangashetty for his extensive work overseeing the Local Organization Program. Finally, recognizing the ISCA SAC (Student Activities Committee) retiring member Ravi Shankar Prasad (India), and retiring volunteers (Dimosthenis Kontogiorgos (Sweden), Yaru Wu (France)). We also had a record number of recipients for ISCA Travel Grants to attend and participate in Interspeech-2018 (congratulations to all the recepients!). Here, I include some pictures of Interspeech-2018 to remember the event!

Interspeech-2018: Opening Ceremony!

Interspeech-2018: Keynote talks!  

Recognizing our new 2018 ISCA Fellows: Richard SCHWARTZ, Haizhou LI, Keikichi HIROSE, Carol  ESPY-WILSON, Denis BURNHAM, Simon KING

Recognizing 2018 ISCA Special Service Medal recipient: Christian WELLEKENS

Recognizing 2018 ISCA Medal for Scientific Achievement recipient: Bishnu ATAL

INTERSPEECH-2018 Banquet Event (do you spot any former ISCA Presidents in here?)

Recognizing General Chair & Co-Chairs for INTERSPEECH-2018: B. Yegnanarayana, Co-Chairs:C. Chandra Sekhar,  Shrikanth Narayanan, S. Umesh, S. R. M. Prasanna; much credit goes to V. Suryakanth Gangashetty for overseeing the local arrangements!

Recognizing Techncial Program Co-Chairs for INTERSPEECH-2018: A. Hema Murthy, Preeti Rao, Paavo Alku, Prasanta Kumar Ghosh

Recognizing future INTERSPEECH Events:  2021 (Brno), 2020 (Shanghai),

and 2019 (Graz)

Countries that have hosted ISCA INTERSPEECH (Austria to be added next year!)…

ISCA Nominations for Awards/Recognition: I would like to thank those of you who have renewed your ISCA Membership or joined ISCA this year!  I will also note that December is a great month for reflecting on our colleagues contributions and impact to the field. As ISCA members, we hope you will use your time to consider a number of ISCA nominations opening this month. Which of our colleagues should receive the honor of being awarded the ISCA Medal for Scientific Achievement? Or recognized as an ISCA Fellow for sustained contributions to the field in 2019? Who can help spread Speech Communication around the world throughout Distinguished Lecturers program? Which young speech scientist or engineer could benefit from the Christian Benøit Award? Finally, would you consider helping ISCA continue to grow by running for election as a member of the ISCA Board? Calls for each of these can be found in the ISCApad. We hope you would either nominate your colleagues or consider contacting us! We look forward to hearing from you (nomination deadlines for ISCA recognition awards listed below and on ISCA website/and in ISCApad):
1. ISCA Board elections (nominations close 1st March)
2. ISCA Medalist 2019 (nominations close 15th January)
3. ISCA Fellows 2019 (nominations close 10th February)
4. ISCA Distinguished Lecturers 2019/20 and 2020/21 (nominations close 31st January)
5. Tenth Christian Benoit Award (applications close 15th May)

You will found other announcements in this ISCApad including call for papers for the next INTERSPEECH-2019, job opportunities, and announcements related to speech communications for our community. As always, we welcome feedback and input from the ISCA community – if you have suggestions for our society or want to be involved, please let us know!

We look forward to your participation in ISCA and Interspeech-2019!

John H.L. Hansen, ISCA President

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 Tenth Christian Benoît Award conferred by the International Speech Communication Association  and the Association Francophone de la Communication Parlée
  Deadline May 15, 2019
 
The Christian Benoît Award has been conferred periodically by the Association Christian Benoit until 2017. In 2018, the oversight of this Award was assumed  by ISCA and sponsored jointly by both ISCA and AFCP. It is awarded through a competitive nomination and review process to promising young scientists in the domain of SPEECH COMMUNICATION to further their career in the field. The focus of the award’s research topic may emphasize basic science or applied research projects.
 
The Award provides the elected scientist with financial support for the development of a personal short-term research project that:  (1) illustrates concretely the achievements of her/his research work; (2) could help in promoting his/her work in the scientific community, institutions and grant agencies in their geographical region/country; (3) gives an overall view of the state of the art in the particular research domain.  The proposed research project can take on the form of a demonstration, a technical product/system, or of a pedagogical multi-media product (movie, website, interactive software…).
 
The Award is valued at 7,500 Euros(*)
 
The commitments of the elected scientist who receives the award are: -- to attend the Interspeech-2019 Conference in Graz, Austria -- to deliver the final product of the project within 2 years -- to present her/his results at a future ISCA-endorsed event, specific to the research domain of the applicant.
 
In the application, the candidate should provide -- a statement of research interests (2 pages max), -- a detailed curriculum vitae including a list of the most relevant publications for the project. -- a description of the proposed short-term research project (5 to 15 pages max). The description should include a presentation of the scientific and/or pedagogical objectives and the methodological aspects, a link to the former research work of the applicant, and a detailed description of the provisional budget.
 
Applications will be evaluated by an international committee including experts in the field of Speech Communication and representatives of the institutions supporting the award.
 
Applications should be sent to gerard.bailly@gipsa-lab.fr before Monday May 15, 2019 Electronic submissions are mandatory
 
The successful candidate will be notified by June 15, 2019. The Award will be conferred at the Interspeech-2019 Conference in Graz, Austria (www.interspeech2019.org)
 
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* 3,500 Euros will be given immediately; with the remaining 4,000 Euros  available on reception of the multimedia project by the chair of the ISCA Award committee. Travel and registration costs necessary to attend the Interspeech 2019 Conference will have to be paid from this grant.
** For details about the Association Christian Benoît and the past awardees of the Christian Benoît Award see http://www.gipsa-lab.fr/acb/

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Election of members for the Board of ISCA (2019-2023)

[8-Dec-2019] The ISCA Board currently has 14 members from 8 countries (see full list below). Members are elected to the Board for a period of four years and no member may serve on the Board for more than two consecutive terms. The following Board member will have served for two consecutive terms in August, Satoshi Nakamura, and thus will be retiring.

According to the ISCA by-laws, elections to the Board will take place in April-May 2019. We invite nominations from the ISCA membership. Each nomination requires the support of three members of the Association and agreement from the candidate (e.g., by email). The ISCA statutes specify a maximum of three Board members from any one country. Each ISCA member will be asked to cast a anonymous ballot in the election, via a survey website.

Members elected to the Board will be expected to have one of the areas of responsibility listed below, to commit time to furthering the work of ISCA in their area, to attend the two-day Board meetings that take place at each annual INTERSPEECH conference and to participate in additional virtual meetings during the year (teleconferences). All candidates should be aware of these obligations and commit themselves to fulfilling them before agreeing to be nominated.

The Board will accept nominations either from proposers or self-nominations, as long as indication of support is provided. Please send your nomination(s) to the ISCA Secretariat secretariat@isca-speech.org BEFORE March 1st, 2019 (Friday) with the following information:

Full Name and Title:
Position and Institution:
Research area: 
Indication of willingness to serve if elected:
E-mail:
URL:
Short biography (one paragraph)
Short statement (one paragraph, describing the work they would intend to do on the Board)
Names and emails of three proposers (ISCA members).

Please provide a photo, for posting on the ballot.

Please do not hesitate to contact us if you require further information about the nomination process or about duties of ISCA Board members. 

Best regards,
Kate Knill (ISCA Secretary) secretariat@isca-speech.org

Areas: 

FINANCE, CONFERENCES, WORKSHOPS, MEMBERSHIP SERVICES AND ISCA WEBSITE, PUBLICATIONS AND ARCHIVE, DISTINGUISHED LECTURERS AND GEOGRAPHICAL OUTREACH, SPECIAL INTEREST GROUPS, TRAINING & EDUCATION, TECHNICAL, GRANTS & AWARDS, FELLOWS, INDUSTRIAL RELATIONS, SECRETARIAT

Current Board:

John HANSEN (ISCA President)
Torbjørn SVENDSEN (ISCA Vice-President)
Mark HASEGAWA-JOHNSON (ISCA Treasurer)
Kate KNILL (ISCA Secretary)
Gerard BAILLY
Kay BERKLING
Phil GREEN
Tatsuya KAWAHARA
Lori LAMEL
Sebastian MÖLLER
Hema MURTHY
Satoshi NAKAMURA
Bhuvana RAMABHADRAN
Odette SCHARENBORG

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ISCA Fellows Nominations for 2019

The ISCA Fellows Program recognizes and honors outstanding members who have made significant contributions to the science and technology of speech communication. To qualify for this distinction, a candidate must have been an ISCA member for five years or more with a minimum of ten years experience in the field. Nominations may be made by any ISCA member.  A nomination should be supported by 4 references from ISCA Fellows or ISCA Board members. Current ISCA Board members are not eligible for nomination. The Fellows nomination form can be downloaded from http://bit.ly/2lwjfFr and the reference form from http://bit.ly/2iMJUNo. Nominations should be sent to fellows_nomination@isca-speech.org by February 10 2018. Those who plan to make a nomination are strongly advised to send a brief email to fellows_nomination@isca-speech.org. giving their candidate's name and affiliation.

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Dear Fellow Members of SProSIG,

The SProSIG officer election is now completed.  164 members of SProSIG participated in the election, from 27 member countries.   The top five candidates each received very strong support, received very similar vote totals (three were within one vote of each other), and have the strong support of the outgoing SProSIG officers and Permanent Advisory Committee.  The new SProSIG officers are:

Plinio Barbosa
Aoju Chen
Hongwei Ding
Martine Grice
Nigel Ward

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We are pleased to announce the Distinguished Lecturers for 2018-2019:

(1)   Dr. Daniel Hirst, Directeur de Recherche Emeritus, CNRS & Aix-Marseille University, France

(2)  Prof. Takayuki  Arai, Professor, Department of Information and Communication Sciences, Faculty of Science and Technology, Sophia University, Japan

Congratulations.

Satoshi Nakamura

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Video archives are available in 

http://www.isca-speech.org/iscaweb/index.php/archive/video-archive 

where keynote speeches from IS 2010 can be seen. You will also find video archives 

of many other conferences.

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 The photographs are representative and to go to the respective albums, please click on the photographs.

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ISCA SAC has 4 members and 8 volunteers. We are happy to welcome two new volunteers:

Haala Deeba Abbas,  a Ph.D. student from the Speech Processing Lab, IIIT-Hyderabad, India and

Midia Yousefi, a Ph.D. student from University of Texas at Dallas. 

Welcome! 

Barak

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