SpeakOut_August2015_web1

3 / 36

Speak Out August 2015 3
From the President
#Talkwithme – it’s Speech Pathology Week (#SPWeek)!
TWITTER, Facebook and Instagram will be busy with Australian
speech pathologists tweeting about how speech pathologists work.
Have you ‘liked’ Speech Pathology Australia yet on Facebook? Have
you followed on Twitter or Instagram? Could you
add to the conversation on social media? (and if you’re unsure how to
navigate social media, ask your children – or your colleagues!) If not,
can you add to the conversation in your workplace? On a Branch
planned Speech Pathology Week event? I look forward to hearing
about the events that are being run around the country designed to
encourage the public to talk with us and understand the profession
and the people with whom we work.
Thanks to the more than 500 private practitioners who talked with
us about Medicare, the chronic disease management items and
other Medicare rebates available, through their rapid response to the
survey distributed. The data collected has been extremely useful in
the development of the submission to the Federal Government about
the CDM items, and will be useful as we develop our response to the
review of Medicare. More about these submissions later in the year…
Talk with us about the Ethics Package, how we could make it more
interactive. If you have completed the package, please help us to
improve it. If you have not yet completed it, you’ll find the details on
how to access the Ethics Package later in this edition.
Talk with your colleagues, particularly those who are just starting
out. It is great to see that we have lots of mentors willing to share
their time and support early career speech pathologists and those
moving into new positions. If you are an early career speech
pathologist and haven’t yet taken advantage of this opportunity,
talk with us and take it up!
Talk with a colleague about CPD. There are some exciting workshop
offerings coming up both online and face-to-face, including the
National Tour. Talk with a colleague about what you have read in a
journal or book. Talk with your workplace about the 2016 National
Conference, talk with your family about coming along in May next
year to talk with your colleagues, and talk with world leaders in our
field.
Talk with your Branch. There are some fantastic projects
happening in Branches around the country – talk with them to
get involved.
Talk with your Board. The Board will be meeting again this
month, and we will discuss Association business – how can
the Association best meet its members’ needs? Talk with us, if
you have great ideas to help us meet our strategic objectives.
My Twitter handle is and my email is
Look forward to talking soon!
GAENOR DIXON
National President