What a ride! In 50 days, the conference of the International Communication Association takes place. It marks the end of my 5.5 year tenure on the Executive Committee. A few reflections and thanks as ‘President-Eject’.
It started a long while ago. After election statements, an election, and an October 2018 email, it was real: I became part of the ICA executive committee. The onboarding began. I knew the ICA well (having been PolCom program planner and division chair and having served on several committees). But this is different!
Fast forward to June 2024. The world is a different place. Politics have changed, a pandemic has come and (almost) gone, new wars are raging. It was an ‘interesting’ period to be part of the leadership of an international association. One of the first tasks is to be the program planner for the next conference: ‘my’ conference was #ica20 in Australia. We worked on a fantastic program with all divisions and interest groups and an Open Communication theme. Early 2020 we celebrated that the program was done.
The March 2020 transition to the worldwide pandemic was a rollercoaster. We cancelled (postponed!) the physical conference, we invented an online conference in weeks, we fundraised and created an emergency fund for early career scholars. We managed to hold one of the first large scale international online conferences. None of this would have been possible without Laura Sawyer and the HDQ team. It was a herculean effort.
The ’pandemic president year’ was also interesting; the #ica21 conference was also online. With the EC and HDQ we plotted strategies for regional hubs and hybrid conferences for ICA going forward, to also meet ambitious about inclusion and climate impact. We also continued work on open scholarship. We ramped up efforts on IDEA (Inclusion, Diversity, Equity, and Accessibility) for ICA. My ‘presidential reception’ was a glass of wine at home and an online presidential address: But it felt powerful still because we were very much an #ICACommunity during this weird time.
The excitement for #ica22 was enormous. It felt like a festival to see colleagues and friends again. We also picked up physical #RunningWithPresidents after two online editions. It was kind of magical. And soon ICA could pick up speed again with exciting new initiatives such regional chapters of the ICA spearheaded by Noshir. And in the past year, a huge amount of work has been completed on a new strategic plan for the association, a process that it has been inspiring to be part of.
All good things come to an end. The ride has been fantastic. I am so happy that I got to be part of the ICA leadership, I learned so much, and met so many fantastic new colleagues. My gratitude is enormous: to Laura and the HDQ team, to the changing members of the EC (Paula Gardner, Terry Flew, Peng Hwa An, Patricia Moy and currently Mary Beth Oliver, Noshir Contractor, Eun-Ju Lee, Silvio Waisbord, and Thomas Hanitszch), to the task forces on open scholarship and open access, to the REACH community, to the resilient early career community, and to Hans Beentjes and ASCoR for their support from the outset. 50 more days and then ‘over-and-out’.
Claes de Vreese 