Are you looking for a way to advocate for your students and their families? If so, consider coming to AMTESOL's Advocacy Forum in Montgomery on January 16, 2025. This Advocacy Forum is an opportunity for educators to hone their advocacy skills and, by doing so, become empowered to effectively advocate for multilingual learners and communities. Over 150 advocacy enthusiasts attended AMTESOL's 2024 advocacy event this past January in Tupelo. Even more attendees are expected at our 2025 advocacy event this coming January in Montgomery — a city that promises an advocacy-rich experience given how it has spawned many society-changing advocacy efforts and is home to numerous advocacy entities.

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As Chair of AMTESOL's Advocacy Committee, I encourage everyone to attend our 2025 Advocacy Forum. This annual AMTESOL event is modeled after the Advocacy Summit hosted each year by the TESOL International Association. As AMTESOLers, we hosted our inaugural advocacy event in 2018. In that year's conference book, the AMTESOL president described our first major venture into advocacy as "just the beginning of AMTESOL's concerted efforts to engage and support our members in their ongoing advocacy work with English learners, their families, and the communities in which we live and teach." Though paused briefly by the pandemic, AMTESOL's annual advocacy event strategically focuses on initiatives that support educators to become community-based advocates. In January 2025, this yearly event (now called Advocacy Forum) will again provide participants with ideas, energy, and networking opportunities for finetuning advocacy efforts and enhancing advocacy outcomes.

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With this 2025 Advocacy Forum, AMTESOL will be hosting its fifth such event. As in previous years, this one will feature speakers who are at the forefront of advocacy outreach. Our 2025 event will also include local, interpersonal moments with the potential for huge impact. While exploring the Wh's of advocacy (who, what, where, when, why, how), we will have conversations that can lead to meaningful change in classrooms, on campuses, and around communities. By participating in AMTESOL's Advocacy Forum, you can acquire a stronger sense of yourself as an advocate and gain a toolbox of techniques for advocacy work in diverse contexts.

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Let's join forces at AMTESOL's Advocacy Forum and, in this way, become more skilled at advocating for our multilingual students and their families. By doing so, we can change "A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Forum" (1966 comedy about an underprivileged Roman trying to improve his life) to "A Wonderful Thing Happened on the Way to the Forum" (2025 reality about us improving the lives of others). With advocacy on our minds, let's all be on our way to the Advocacy Forum!

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Looking forward to seeing you January 16th in Montgomery!

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Jamie Harrison, Chair

AMTESOL Advocacy Committee