Greetings SLWIS Members,

Welcome to the October 2017 issue of SLW News! This newsletter begins with an important announcement. Elena Shvidko, our SLWIS community manager, has come on board as coeditor of SLW News. Elena has been a critical member of the SLW News editorial staff, conducting interviews with second language (L2) writing experts and interviewing graduate students for our Graduate Student Spotlight section. She has made excellent contributions to the SLWIS, and we are thrilled that she will assume a larger role on the editorial staff. Thank you, Elena!

In this issue, SLWIS Chair Nigel Caplan provides an update on proposal submissions for the TESOL 2018 convention. The issue also features articles on various topics in the area of second language writing. Silva, Yang, Shvidko, and Shin provide a comprehensive review of L2 writing scholarship for 2016; Reichelt and Shucang discuss writing challenges faced by Saudi students at a U.S. university; Randolph describes observation journals as a way to help students develop their observation skills and become more comfortable writing in English; Xue shares personal struggles as a creative writer participating in writing workshops at a university in the United States; and Lee and Yilmaz discuss a flipped classroom approach in elementary English as a second language teacher education, elaborating on how this approach can influence their pedagogical skills for teaching writing to English language learners.

Our regular section, Graduate Student Spotlight, features three graduate students: Hadi Banat from Purdue University; Kelly Cunningham from Iowa State University; and Joseph Wilson from the University of Tennessee, Knoxville. We love to hear from our graduate students, so if you are a master’s or doctoral student and would like to contribute to our Graduate Student Spotlight section, please contact Elena Shvidko for more information. Finally, the issue features reviews of two recently published books—Discipline Specific Writing: Theory into Practice (Flowerdew & Costley, 2017) reviewed byTetyana Bychkovska, and Academic Writing Step by Step: A Research-Based Approach (Candlin, Crompton, & Hatim, 2016) reviewed by Steven Thurlow. If you have recently read a book on L2 writing or used an L2 writing textbook in your class, consider reviewing it for SLW News. Contact Steven Bookman for more information about book reviews.

We would like to thank all authors as well as those on the editorial team for their contributions to this issue. We encourage you to share your teaching experience or research findings with our community members through SLW News. Our next issue will be published in March 2018, and the deadline for submissions to this issue is 10 January 2018. For more information, please have a look at the Submission Guidelines in this issue.

We hope you enjoy this issue. Happy reading and all the best in this new academic year!

Sincerely,

Ilka and Elena (on behalf of the editorial team)

SLW News Editorial Staff

Gena Bennett
Steven Bookman
Adam Clark
Ming Fang
Helena Hall
Joel Heng Hartse
Kristina Lauer
Peggy Lindsey