VAMFT Newsletter (v. 6, no. 2)

• A Letter from the President
• Getting Students and New Members Involved in Our Professional Organization

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A Letter from the President
by Alison Galway, Ph.D., LMFT, LPC

I am concerned about the future of the Virginia Association for Marriage and Family Therapy. Our membership stands at almost 400, but we are not recruiting the replacement members we need as clinical members retire. Currently, a very small group is active in legislative initiatives, but we have no regular newsletter editor, no election committee, no president-elect, and no eastern or central vice-presidents. Recommendations to the Governor for LMFT's to appoint to the Board of Counseling are also those people who are active now on the Board. I believe we cannot serve both on the Board of Counseling and on the Board of VAMFT. So - we need members to take an active role in VAMFT. You must be a Clinical Member to be on the Board of Directors, but many other active roles, like newsletter editor or elections committee member, do not require Clinical status. Contact me or other Board members listed in the newsletter. Let us know what you are interested in doing. This is the vision I have for what can be, but we need people:

• An annual state-wide conference, one day or more of useful research and clinical applications.
• Semi-annual region meetings of less than one day for networking and clinical updates.
• A regular quarterly newsletter with helpful local and national coverage.
• Statewide or regional projects to increase our visibility in the general population and encourage referral from our professional colleagues (see the "Marriage Check-Up" and "Red Cross" for examples).
• A legislative committee to stay on top of current legislation and get LMFT's completely integrated into the commonwealth's mental health infrastructure: Medicaid and school systems come to mind.
• A telephone tree network for lobbying local legislators, as well as making the effort to go out and meet the legislators when they are home. AAMFT just sent out an appeal to members to contact their congressional representatives about mental health parity. Please do this.
• An elections committee that can work with members all over the commonwealth to seek out and nominate qualified members for Board offices.
• A conference in league with the Licensed Professional Counselors or other clinical colleagues, offering a wide range of clinically useful and enlightening workshops.
• Regular updates to the membership of statewide issues in the legislature, of promising professional opportunities, of changes in the field of family therapy as well as social changes and research findings that have implications for our clinical practices.

These ideas take people willing to volunteer to help plan, coordinate, and implement, to show up for meetings, to stay in touch via phone and email, and to make suggestions and develop ideas. At this time, VAMFT can help pay for expenses in attending leadership meetings at the AAMFT annual conference and in Washington DC in April. I have gone to these and found them helpful in developing ideas, but more of us need to go to prepare for leadership in VAMFT and to help implement the good ideas.

Our Board meeting was November 30 in Richmond, VA, 11 AM to 2 PM. I urge you to attend the next meeting to get to know your board members and help us discuss the issues facing MFT's in Virginia over the next year.
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Getting Students and New Members Involved in Our Professional Organization
by Jennifer Lambert-Shute, M.S.

As a student, trying to decide what organizations and conferences to attend is like entering a maze. I was lucky enough, or maybe just crazy enough, to attend three conferences this Fall semester; the -American Association for Marriage and Family Therapy (AAMFT) in Nashville, the National Council on Family Relations (NCFR) in Rochester, and the Gerontological Society of America (GSA). Conferences are expensive to attend, especially for students on low budgets. I was fortunate to receive funding for two of the conferences. Even so I had to spend a significant amount of money. Not only is money a factor, but so is the loss of time for school-work. Yet despite these obstacles students are still attending conferences. In fact, at two of the conferences it was brought to the attention of the audience that students are important to the survival of the organization and we need to help increase their participation. There were several key but simple efforts that encouraged students to participate and help them feel a part of the organization:

1. A letter listing all the events created just for new and student members. This was unbelievably helpful because navigating the program of events and deciding what to attend is a workshop onto itself.
2. Having a meeting just for students before the keynote and providing breakfast. The key to success in getting students to attend is to always provide a free meal. Having it in the morning allowed me to know I was not going to miss other events taking place during the conference. The meeting provided a time during which students could share experiences and develop long lasting relationships. In addition, the organization could show students how they could become an integral part of the professional fellowship.
3. Providing a space for students to get to know the board members, textbook authors, editors, section leaders, and other professionals who share a research interest. This reception was successful due to its structure. As a student, I have attended network meetings where the pressure is on the student to make all the initial encounters. At this particular reception, tables were set up with subject cards, for example, "adolescence," "minority issues," "marital quality," "how to be involved in the organization." Two or three hosts, knowledgeable in the research topic, were there to help facilitate discussion and make everyone feel welcome. The student merely had to pick a topic, enabling them to meet influential people. This helped the students feel an important part of the organization.
4. Providing more than one opportunity to attend a student/new member meeting. One conference had something everyday for new or student members. If you were unable to attend one time, you had the opportunity to go to another session.
5. Networking with academic institutions. A way I have seen which was very helpful for students was to have a reception at which all academic institutions with a masters and/or doctoral program are invited to set up tables with information for anyone who is interested. This allows interested parties to know a time and place where they can gather information and meet key people. Both the students and the institutions gain in this venue.

These were just a few techniques I saw at these conferences. I thought that AAMFT had the highest rate of student attendance out of all three, yet I know that student participation and membership in general is down. The conference is a perfect opportunity for the organization to facilitate student interest in a long-term commitment. Techniques like those above encourage recruitment of this population. Students only have so much money and time, but there are many different organizations available to them to join. I believe that with a little attention to this area we can ensure students interest and longevity in AAMFT and VAMFT. Regional meetings, which help students get involved locally, help ensure participation at the national level.

In the last newsletter I called on students to be active members. Now I am calling on AAMFT/VAMFT and its clinical members to help students feel they are important and necessary to the continuation of a strong association.
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