5 webheads won scholarships for the CALL 08 conference in Japan

Out of more than one hundred applicants (from low income parts of the world), about a dozen active CALL practitioners were awarded a grant to travel to a world conference on CALL in Japan. And, seven of these are good Webheads! Congratulations to Hala Fawzi in Sudan, to Erika in Brazil, Nelba Quintana and Jennifer Verschoor in Argentina, Evelyn Izquierdo, Venezuela, Nina Lyulkun from Ukraine and Susan Marandi from Iran. (the others are names unknown to me, coming from India, Indonesia, China, Egypt and Turkey).

The criteria were
# People who have been active in CALL (not just language pedagogy or administration) as evidenced by recent publications, presentations or on-going projects.
# People who exhibited in their "Statements of Purpose" a clear goal for their attendance at WorldCALL 2008 and a plan to disseminate the knowledge so gained upon their return home.
# People who represent a wide spectrum of geographical areas, balanced by gender and years of experience. Geographical selection was also, to some extent, determined in proportion to the number of applications from that area of the world.

I feel sure that we will have the pleasure to learn more about their presentations, their experiences and some lively stories about their face to face get-together, which is a special Webheads treat.

I'm thinking of paying these fine teachers my tribute, by sharing this good news with a group of web 2.0 librarians from Norway who will learn about Webheads & the Electronic Village online for my session tomorrow - but that's another story.