In my last official communication as President of the Canadian Association for the Study of Discourse and Writing, I would like to pass along a few notes to colleagues at both CASDW and CWCA following the completion of our annual conferences in Saskatchewan.

First and foremost, sincere thanks to all CASDW members, presenters, reviewers, session chairs, speakers and guests for your participation in our 10th annual conference in Regina. We were a small but mighty group, fighting off all manner of tribulation, from a banquet venue that had ceased operations, to fire alarm disruptions, to a room for our closing plenary that was office sized! Everyone was so gracious, inspired no doubt by the wonderful people at the University of Regina who hosted us during Congress.

Second, our CWCA colleagues have just published a special issue of papers from last year’s CWCA conference in our journal, the Canadian Journal for Studies in Discourse and Writing. Congratulations to everyone involved! We hope to pursue a similar issue either jointly or complementing CWCA’s efforts this coming year. The level of quality and engagement in writing scholarship should be inspiring to all of us.

Third, discussion among and between our two organizations has led to a proposal that we reconsider some of the principles in CASDW’s 2016 Statement on Writing Centres and Staffing. We anticipate an open and engaged discussion between members of both groups to revise a document that will be seen as both aspirational and realistic – one that is inclusive of all members of the Canadian academic writing community.

Please see our CASDW website later this summer for a detailed account of the CASDW conference in our AGM minutes and the published announcement of our annual research prizes. I have been honoured to represent CASDW as President these past two years and welcome Andrea Williams to take over, while Dana Landry has been named Vice-President and Conference Chair. Please do contact them or any of our new/re-appointed Executive to share your ideas and suggestions.

Finally, both our organizations will be in Vancouver in 2019, so we look forward to seeing many of you there! In the meantime, I hope everyone enjoys a relaxing, energizing summer!

Dr. Boba Samuels