Happy not-so-new year to all in our ASSBI community! I am writing this from New York, where I have just found out that the International Neuropsychological Society (INS) have confirmed that their mid-year meeting in 2025 will be co-hosted with ASSBI and held in Brisbane. This is a very exciting next step in our longstanding alliance with INS over several successful mid-year meetings. The most recent of these was in 2021, when the conference which was planned to be in Melbourne moved online at the last minute (co-convenors Kerryn Pike, Travis Wearne and I together with conference organisers Margaret and Matt Eagers are still recovering!) It will be wonderful to have the opportunity to meet in person this time.

This year’s ASSBI conference convenor Elise Bogart (Elbourn) and the program committee have put together a fabulous program – don’t miss it in Sydney from 2-4 May 2024 at the Four Seasons Hotel. Don’t forget to book accommodation at the conference hotel while the discounted rate is still available. Early bird registration is also great value for money!

A warm welcome to our new national student coordinator, Nicole Feast (a clinical neuropsychologist who is doing a PhD at the University of Western Australia) – and thank you so much to our outgoing student coordinator Aishani Desai, who thankfully is staying on the ASSBI committee as part of our social media team. Nicole has gone straight to work helping plan a great program of student events and initiatives at both the ASSBI conference in Sydney and the Global Neuropsychology Congress in Porto from 3-5 July this year (https://www.globalneuropsychology.org), which is jointly hosted by ASSBI, INS, FESN and SLAN. There has been a lot of interest from Australian researchers, clinicians, and students for the Porto conference – I can’t wait!

ASSBI is also currently reviewing ways in which we can better support engagement in our conferences, webinars and resources from people from low- and middle-income countries. We are very keen to provide more affordable opportunities to access ASSBI events and activities and expand our reach internationally. I’m looking forward to progressing this and other ASSBI initiatives with the hard-working executive committee in 2024.

Dana Wong, President, ASSBI