Dear Colleagues,
I have an excellent professional development opportunity to tell you about! In March of 2012 the University of Vermont will be hosting The Hanen Centre’s It Takes Two to Talk® workshop (ITTT). This will be followed by the More Than Words (MTW) training in August 2012. The training for ITTT must be completed before taking the MTW.
Due to a generous donation by an anonymous funder committed to supporting parents of children with ASD, the MTW training will be free of charge to VT licensed and/or ASHA certified SLPs with the condition that the SLP must have taken the ITTT first and must then implement at least one program for parents in their community within one year of taking the MTW training.
This 3-day workshop offers hands-on, interactive training on parent-implemented, family-centred early language intervention for speech-language pathologists who work with young children with language delays (birth to 5 years) and their families. You’ll learn effective, research-based strategies for involving parents in the early intervention process to ensure the best possible outcomes for their child.
When you take It takes Two to Talk, you get:
• A license to offer the evidence-based It Takes Two to Talk® Program for Parents of Children with Language Delays
• A helpful framework and quality resources to use in your day-to-day clinical work to facilitate parents’ understanding of concepts and maximize their ability to apply strategies with their child
• A Hanen membership that keeps you up-to-date on the latest research, offers ongoing professional development opportunities, and connects you with like-minded professionals around the world
• 2.1 Continuing Education Credits
You can find out more about the It Takes Two to Talk workshop by visiting the Hanen website at www.hanen.org/ITTTworkshop.
Workshop space is limited to only 14 SLPs and spots fill up quickly! We would like to give priority to Vermont SLPs, please contact me soon if you are interested. I can be reached by email at: Louise.Lareau@uvm.edu
I hope you will consider this wonderful opportunity to learn best practices for working with families.
Smiles,
Patty Prelock, Ph.D., CCC-SLP
Dean, College of Nursing & Health Sciences

Many VSHA members have expressed interest in an opportunity to discuss professional issues that are pertinent to their practices. For those of you who haven’t heard about this, there are many ways to make this work. You might decide to gather once every month or two at a local restaurant for dinner, news exchange, and a discussion of a journal article. You might even take it a step further and plan to read a journal article that earns CEUs for your credentialing requirements. Whatever you end up doing, you will create a stronger professional network. In the spirit of getting to know each other better and sharing our talents, we hope you will consider a regional get-together and let us know so that we can post it on the VSHA website.  email: academicprograms@vsha.us.  

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President’s Message

I am no stranger to VSHA and its Board. During the 1980’s I served on the Board and then as an ex-officio member from the Department of Education. I returned to the Board in 2006 as the Chair of School Affairs until one year ago when I became President-Elect.
As a speech-language pathologist for nearly 30 years, I have predominantly worked in school related venues, though not exclusively. In addition to school jobs in my early years, I also worked in Home Health and then with the Vermont Department of Education. Taking a hiatus from speech-language pathology and education, I managed the state’s foster care and residential care system for what is now known as the Department of Children and Families. Over the last ten years I re-entered the profession and set up a school for students with severe disabilities. I have continued to balance direct services, diagnostic evaluations, management of the school, and consultation to public and private agencies regarding efficient and effective service delivery in our field, as well as in special education, administration, and Title 1 services.
There are so many areas of importance to our profession. My approach is to focus on a few priorities and lay the groundwork for future Boards to work on other priorities.
My priorities are:
• Updating the licensing law with current language, inclusion of telemedicine, and a possible change in the administering agency. We must ensure input from our state’s audiologists to ensure that their perspective is properly represented.
• Clarification on the role and training of assistants and aides to speech-language pathologists,
• Establishing a standards and ethics committee,
• Fair and clear Medicaid rates for speech-language pathology regardless of setting or billing agency.
• Engaging students and associate members in the association
This is in addition to overseeing the basic operations of the association including
• Modernizing our website and other uses of social networking,
• Offering high quality programs and other professional development opportunities for both disciplines of our profession
• Expanding our membership through active recruitment of potential members
• Recognizing past and present exemplary members,
I am fortunate to be working with an extraordinary Board of Directors. I hope that you will take advantage of opportunities over the next two years to participate in important professional decisions. I expect VSHA will entice more and more of you to work with us and to come to the upcoming programs.
Respectfully submitted,
Susan Kimmerly
President
president@vsha.us