An Update

By Jason Sanders, PT, DPT

Access to educational resources ranked very highly in importance (4.25 out of 5) among respondents to the recent Private Practice Section (PPS) Member Survey, and it was the number one reason they visit the PPS website. Last year, PPS moved all online educational resources, including archived webinars and Annual Conference recordings and the 101 video modules, to the American Physical Therapy Association (APTA) Learning Center. This move makes it possible for all APTA members to easily find our valuable resources while still offering members-only discounts to PPS members. In fact, many of the resources there—including the five Marketing 101 video modules, seven Finance 101 video modules, and three Operations 101 video modules—are free to PPS members. The Education Committee is currently discussing additional 101 video series to round out the curriculum.

The Education Committee oversees the programming for PPS webinars and video creation, and we direct that programming based on feedback from members, via membership surveys and other mechanisms through which you express your needs. We look at proposals offered to the PPS Annual Conference and Combined Sections Meeting (CSM) Program Work Groups and read your feedback about topics you would like to see covered in Impact magazine. In December I joined the Chairs of the Annual Conference Program Work Group, CSM Program Work Group, Marketing and PR Committee, Payment Policy Committee, Government Affairs Committee, and Impact Editorial Board at a meeting at the PPS headquarters to discuss how to coordinate our efforts to improve how education is designed and delivered to our members in a coordinated and amplified method. The goal is to ensure that topics are covered through multiple channels (webinars, live programming at Annual Conference and CSM, in Impact magazine, and more) and a variety of media that give you the information you need in the format you want. I look forward to working more closely with my counterparts and their committees to improve the knowledge of our membership.

The Education Committee also began an effort to look at the business-related education of our future members in physical therapy programs around the country. In September the Committee’s Business Leadership Education Task Force hosted a meeting at the PPS headquarters with representatives from APTA’s American Council of Academic Physical Therapy (ACAPT) to begin this discussion. The two-day meeting focused on how PPS and ACAPT can collaborate to leverage the strengths of both organizations to create a positive image of business for educators and DPT students, deliver efficient and effective leadership and business education to DPT schools and students, and advance the autonomy of DPT professionals so they can transform society. This very positive and energetic meeting was the first of many that will happen as we reach out to include more APTA sections to engage in this initiative.

As you can see, there is a lot of exciting work ahead and 2018 promises to be a busy year for the Education Committee. My thanks to Committee members Amy Gulledge, Yogi Matharu, Thomas Carlton, Tim Vidale, Jennifer Leach; to Business Leadership Education Task Force members Yogi Matharu, Jim Hoyme, Nannette Hyland, Nancy Reese, Susie Deusinger, Mike Connors, Thomas Carlton, Leigh Langerwerf, and Joseph Lipsky; and to Mike Horsfield as our PPS Board Liaison, all of whom move our important work forward.