ALEXANDRIA, Va., Nov. 17, 2025 /PRNewswire/ -- ACTFL is pleased to announce the newly elected and appointed members to its Board of Directors for 2026. Brandon Locke (President-Elect) of Anchorage School District, Anchorage, AK; Suwako Watanabe (Higher Ed, at-large) of Portland State University, Portland, OR; Ellen Ericson (K-12, at-large) of Mahomet-Seymour High School, Mahomet, IL; Alicia Dallman Shoemaker (Central States representative); and Zoe Jiang (PNCFL representative) will each begin their terms on January 1, 2026.
"We are honored to welcome these distinguished leaders to the ACTFL Board of Directors," said Milton Alan Turner, ACTFL Board President. "Each brings a remarkable record of service, scholarship, and commitment to language education. Their expertise will strengthen our collective work and ensure ACTFL continues to advance meaningful, inclusive, and high-quality language learning for all."
PRESIDENT-ELECT
Brandon Locke, Ed.D. — Brandon Locke has been Director of World Languages and Immersion Programs for the Anchorage (AK) School District since 2013. ASD is a large urban district of approximately 43,000 students where he provides leadership and professional development for 160 world language teachers, including K-12 language immersion programs in Chinese, French, German, Japanese, Russian, Spanish, and Yup'ik. He was recently awarded a third 3-year federal grant to continue ASD's first Indigenous language immersion program – Yup'ik, one of Alaska's official Native languages. Prior to this, he was an elementary school principal and a middle and high school French teacher.
Brandon holds a B.Ed. in French and secondary education from the University of Alaska Anchorage and an M.Ed. in second languages and cultures education and language immersion education from the University of Minnesota. He holds a second M.Ed. in educational leadership from the University of Alaska. His Ed.D. is in Literacy, Culture, and Language Education from Indiana University. His dissertation title is "Yup'ik Immersion in an Urban Context: An Ethnographic Case Study Exploring the Impact on Indigenous Language Revitalization in a Public School Setting."
AT-LARGE (HIGHER EDUCATION)
Suwako Watanabe, Ph.D. — Suwako Watanabe received her Master of Science and Ph.D. in linguistics from Georgetown University. She is a professor of Japanese and Chair of the Department of World Languages and Literatures (WLL) at Portland State University. She has served as Associate Chair for the WLL department, Section Head of the Japanese language program, and Director of the PSU Institute for Asian Studies. Her research interests include discourse analysis, interactional sociolinguistics, and language pedagogy and assessment. Her publications include "Cultural Differences in Framing: American and Japanese Group Discussions," in Framing in Discourse edited by Deborah Tannen (1993), "Concurrent Validity and Application of the ACTFL Oral Proficiency Interview in a Japanese Program" in Journal of the Association of Teachers of Japanese (1998), and "Cohesion and Coherence Strategies in Paragraph-Length and Extended Discourse in Japanese OPI" in Foreign Language Annals (2003), and "Climactic effect markers in spoken and written narrative: Japanese conditionals tara and to" in TEXT & TALK (2012).
AT-LARGE (K-12)
Ellen Ericson — Ellen Ericson is a National Board Certified Teacher (NBCT) with a B.A. in the Teaching of Spanish and an M.A. in Educational Policy Studies, both from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. She has 29 years of experience teaching Spanish in both public and private schools in central Illinois and currently teaches at Mahomet-Seymour High School. In addition, she serves as an instructor for the University of Illinois World Language Teacher Education program, teaching a methods course for pre-service teachers.
Ellen is a past president of the Illinois Council on the Teaching of Foreign Languages (ICTFL) and continues to serve on the board as Awards Co-Chair. In 2014, she was selected as a TALL-IL leader, where she collaborated with colleagues to promote proficiency-centered teaching. She completed OPI training and spearheaded an initiative in her district to offer testing for the Illinois Commendation toward the Seal of Biliteracy and the Seal of Biliteracy. Through these efforts, nearly 200 Mahomet-Seymour graduates have earned the Seal of Biliteracy.
CENTRAL STATES REGIONAL REPRESENTATIVE
Alicia Dallman Shoemaker — Before serving as a secondary and post-secondary educator of languages and language methods courses in Nebraska, Alicia Dallman Shoemaker lived and taught in South America and Europe. She is also the 2022 Nebraska International Languages Association Outstanding Language Teacher, the 2023 Central States Language Teacher of the Year, and the 2024 National American Council on the Teaching of Languages Teacher of the Year. From the playground to the boardroom, Alicia champions language policies that support student-centered and community initiatives. She is the current advocacy chair for the Nebraska Language Association and an active member on multiple committees for the Nebraska Department of Education. She was recently recognized for her efforts within and beyond the classroom via the 2024 Nebraska Wesleyan University Young Alumni Achievement Award as well as the 2025 Midlands Business Journal 40 Under 40 honor.
PNCFL REGIONAL REPRESENTATIVE
Zoe Jiang — Zoe is a Chinese teacher at Skyline High School in Sammamish, WA. She has also been actively involved at the district level through various roles, including world language leadership, technology committee, teachers of color group, and AI pilot program.
To serve the profession, Zoe volunteers for the WAFLT Board (President, 2022-2023) and the PNCFL Board (President, 2024-2025). At the national level, she has served as the PNCFL Regional Representative to the National Association of District Supervisors of Languages (NADSFL) and as the K-12 Publication Officer of the Chinese Language Teachers Association (CLTA-USA). Zoe is deeply engaged in the ACTFL community, presenting multiple times, mentoring ACTFL mentees, participating as a member of the ACTFL Leadership Initiative for Language Learning (LILL) Cohort 4, serving as an ACTFL AAPPL Rater, and contributing to the Awards Committee, TOY Committee, and Board Nominating Committee.
"I'm delighted to welcome these outstanding leaders in world language education to the ACTFL Board of Directors," said Lawrence M. Paska, Ph.D., CAE, ACTFL Executive Director. "Their expertise, dedication, and vision will be invaluable as ACTFL guides the profession through this pivotal moment in world language education."
Those Board Members whose terms conclude at the end of 2025 are L.J. Randolph Jr., Ed.D., Michele Back, Catherine Ousselin, and Amanda Ramirez.
"We are grateful to our departing board members for the invaluable contributions they have made in service to ACTFL over the past several years," continued Paska. "Their leadership and commitment have helped navigate ACTFL through transition and set our association up for continued success."
About ACTFL:
Providing vision, leadership and support for quality teaching and learning of languages, ACTFL is an individual membership organization of thousands language educators and administrators from elementary through graduate education, as well as government and industry. Since its founding in 1967, ACTFL has become synonymous with innovation, quality, and reliability in meeting the changing needs of language educators and their learners. It is where the world's educators, businesses, and government agencies go to advance the practice of language learning.
ACTFL's work as a trusted, independent center of excellence empowers educators to prepare learners for success in a 21st century global society; helps government agencies build language capacity in the U.S. and abroad; and connects businesses with the resources and relationships they need to succeed.
SOURCE ACTFL
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