Dear friends of ISCA,

The new year 2022 has brought with it a number of challenges which affect

our association. The omicron strain of covid is spreading in many

countries around the globe, and while it seems to be less deadly,

it shows again how vulnerable a scientific organisation, which has the

aim of bringing people together, really is. We have again seen malfunctioning

and spam attacks on some of our email reflectors. Many of the electronic

tools we use get outdated and vulnerable to attack. While we acknowledge

that a scientific organisation with no commercial interest and dependent

on the dedication of volunteers will always be somehow “unprofessional”,

we would like to bring ISCA to a level which provides

well-functioning tools – for organising our association life, managing

conferences and workshops, and communicating with our members.

In response to this aim, we have set up a task force working foremost on our electronic tools. All members who have specific requests or suggestions, are welcome to contribute to this effort, making our association life a little easier.

Turning to our flagship conference, we have received a number of

high-quality bids for hosting Interspeech 2025. We are currently collecting

opinions from our ISCA Advisory Council (IAC), before re-discussing all

bids in detail in the board, and voting for one team to organise

Interspeech 2025. Having observed the dedication and effort which

past teams have invested in the organisation of Interspeech, we intend

to provide more support to future organisers by hiring a (part-time)

conference coordinator who overlooks the technical aspects of the

program from year to year and helps with logistic and administrative

tasks which do not necessarily require a local organizer or TPC.

A description of the job opening can be found hereunder in this ISCA News

section (2.4).

We hope that in this way we leave more time to organisers to

concentrate on matters which should be unique to each Interspeech. If you happen

to know individuals who might be interested in applying for the post of ISCA

Conference Coordinator, please email secretary@isca-speech.org.

Have a good read!

Sebastian Möller

ISCA president