SpeakOut_August2015_web1

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 @SpeechPathAus 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 @SPAPresident and my email is president@speechpathologyaustralia.org.au

Look forward to talking soon!

GAENOR DIXON National President

Speak Out August 2015

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www.speechpathologyaustralia.org.au