Business Meeting Minutes 2021

Association for the Development of the Person-Centered Approach

Annual Conference July 7 – July 11, 2021

Minutes of the Annual Business Meetings

The conference was conducted virtually via Zoom due to continuing problems with travel and expense during the global COVID pandemic.  The first time a person’s name is mentioned, both first and last names are given, after which only the first name is given.

Proposed Agenda Items:  Planning for future conferences, Report from the Treasurer, Report on the Archive Project, Open positions for Membership Secretary and Renaissance Editor, Status of the Person-Centered Journal including issues regarding mode of distribution, Website Report

  The following summarizes decisions made during all 3 of the business meetings.

1. Planning for future conferences. Mark Harrison from the UK has volunteered to conduct next year’s conference with the online format.  Congratulations to our new President! Blue Roth in Chicago has volunteered to coordinate the 2023 conference.  The format of that conference is to be determined by Blue and his committee.
2. Our esteemed Treasurer, Laura Lauko Fernandez submitted her Annual Report and it can be found as an appendix to these minutes.
3. Our new membership Secretary is Rachel Agnew. The torch has been passed by the most wonderful, supremely competent, devoted Membership Secretary of the last many years, Jessica Shipman, to Rachel. Jessica reminds us that all materials related to the membership secretary position are uploaded to the Google Drive.
4. Our new Renaissance editor is Paula Williams. Contributions to Renaissance can be submitted to renaissance@adpca.org.

Business Meeting July 8, 2021

1. ARCHIVE REPORT

Ashley Allcorn will pass on her role as director of the archive project to Todd Odell. She wishes to express our thanks to John Fuentes who has digitized a lot of the materials. [And we wish to express our sincere appreciation for her willingness to shepherd this unwieldy bunch of important stuff for the past year!] She notes that 233 tapes were gathered for evaluation and digitization. Some were not audible and could not be digitized.  At times audio quality was very poor.  One hundred forty-five recordings have now been coded, including individual, group, and family sessions, lectures, workshops with Hannah Frisch, Margaret Warner, John Bateman, Jim Iberg, Nat Raskin and others. At this point, 25 of the tapes are digitized using Adobe.  A sound engineer will be hired to do professional work to preserve the tapes.  We have scanned 850 documents including transcripts, Counseling Center Discussion Papers and dissertations. 

Budget for the Archive project:  In July of 2019 our membership decided to allocate $10,000 to support the work of the archive.  By the end of this year (2021), work should be close to complete.  There are currently about $1300 remaining. The funds were used to purchase a scanner, hard drives, and for labor costs. The group at Chicago Counseling Associates who have been working on this project request $2500 going forward to complete the work of the project. Kudos also to Carolyn Schneider at the helm of this project. And thanks to Todd Odell for his willingness to assume responsibility for its completion.

Motion carries allocating $2500 for the continuation of the work. Passed.

Subsequent discussion addressed the issue of confidentiality of the materials in the archive.  Jo Hilton reminded us of the issues with confidentiality and suggested that proper names be redacted from the materials. Anyone with resources regarding redaction processes and guidelines, please send to mcrosswitty@gmail.com.

1. TREASURER’S REPORT and Issues of its dissemination

Laura Lauko submitted the report to the meeting and will send an amended update to the website.

Mark Harrison states that Dave Rutlidge and Teri Tivey have spent many, many hours setting up the current conference and should be compensated for their time.  Bert Rice says that people who have hosted the conferences since their inception have worked on volunteer basis.  Both Dave and Teri are ok with there being no personal compensation, but thank Mark for bringing up the issue.  Jo Hilton expresses her appreciation to Teri and Dave for doing an amazing job with the technology enabling us to have an international conference. 

Kathy Moon suggests that the Treasurer’s report and the business meeting minutes need not be published in Renaissance because they can be found on the website in the members’ only section.  Laura is fine with the Treasurer’s report not being in Renaissance.  However, Bert Rice asserts that the business meetings are often small groups compared to the community-as-a-whole, thus he thinks that it is important to try to maximize the connection between those who join the business meeting and the larger community.  Including the minutes and Treasurer’s report in Renaissance allow those who were not present for business meetings to be informed about the issues before the organization as a whole.

Tanya Komleva states that there is a need to have people be aware of the need for continuity in the organization.  Having more awareness of the decisions and issues taken up in the business meetings is made possible by including the minutes and the reports from projects included in the Renaissance.  At this point discussion turned to the issue of how to distribute the Person-Centered Journal, and Kathy retracted her suggestion for excluding the minutes and the Treasurer’s report from Renaissance. Both the minutes of our business meetings and the Treasurer’s report will remain in the Renaissance.

• PERSON-CENTERED JOURNAL

Mark Harrison raises the question of whether the journal will be translated in full or just abstracts. Dave Rutlidge advocates for mailing print copies if people request them, but mainly relying on electronic distribution. Jin Wu supports the electronic option but states that older people may need more support with that option; she also suggests that there could be an additional fee if the journal were to be mailed outside of the country of publication which is now the US.  Dave states that we should not abandon the print option but switch to electronic distribution as the default. If the journal is sent electronically, he can send out 100 copies within the UK.  Dave volunteered to be part of the team regarding the distribution of the journal.  Editors will contact Dave at the point of publication of the next issue.

1. CONFERENCE IN 2022, 2023

At this point discussion turned to the issue of the 2022 conference.  Bert wonders about the format of the upcoming conferences in 2022 and 2023.  Will they occur in person or in a virtual format?  [At the time of the discussion, we did not have a volunteer for the 2022 conference. By the end of the meetings, Mark Harrison offered to host the next meeting in 2022 in a virtual format.] Dave suggested that a hybrid conference might be possible, meaning an in-person event combined with the zooming in for other participants who cannot travel to the conference site.  Kathy archly points out that her preference for a technology-assisted hybrid conference should be managed by someone from the ADPCA versus a smooth operator which could lead to our looking like the American Psychological Association! Jo Hilton also likes the idea of a hybrid conference. Tanya Komleva said that a possibility might be to have the in-person conference in St. Peter, Minnesota where she works. St. Peter is about 1 and ½ hours from St. Paul. 

Business Meeting on July 9, 2021

1. PUBLICATION AND DISTRIBUTION OF THE PCJ

The meeting began with a discussion of the Person-Centered Journal. A call for papers went out earlier in the year, asking for submissions by September 15, 2021. [Since the conference the deadline has been extended to October 15, 2021.] Editors are Jane Flotte and Mei Zarnitsyna. Associate editor is Marge Witty. The theme of the next issue has to do with the nature of the intersection of power and psychotherapy. The following volume will focus on practicing in the person-centered context.

Kathy opines that if authors submit papers which are not related to the theme, that papers be reviewed anyway and possibly published electronically on the website. Mei responds that we want to continue to encourage new writers; that we are actively reaching out to writers and want people to submit first articles. She says that the articles will be considered. Kathy says that the Person-Centered and Experiential Psychotherapy journal (PCEP) publishes articles that overflow the current issue and lists the DOI number which are then listed on their website.  Mei is curious about other options and will look into the details about the possibility of publishing articles on our ADPCA website.

More discussion ensued regarding the distribution of the journal. Maria Kontarini expressed concern about the environmental impact of the practice of printing journals and sending them through the mails.  Kathy suggests that if the complete journal were in a PDF format, it could be made available for download.  Bert clarified that we are trying to figure out whether or not members would receive a print copy of PCJ unless you “opt out” and in which case you would receive the electronic version.  Carolyn Schneider moves that we switch to the electronic distribution and that people must “opt in” for a print copy.  Bert calls the question.

 Motion:  For the purpose of cost-effectiveness and environmental impact, we move to switch to an electronic version by default and print version by request.  Motion passed.  Dave suggests going to all of the email lists, websites and listservs to blanket the membership regarding the policy change in order to find out how many people want to “opt in” for the print copy.  He suggests publishing a letter immediately after the end of the conference.  In terms of the challenge of expanding accessibility of the PCJ to other institutions and libraries, Martin Ambrust volunteers to contact the PCEP as a liaison and send his info to Marge Witty for the editors’ further perusal. 

Concerns were expressed about accessibility to researchers and students outside of the person-centered community.  Maria notes that if the journal is published electronically, people can share it more easily.  Martin expressed the desire that the journal and past issues be searchable for university students.  Kathy mentions the newly named Person-Centred Association and the possibility that Janet Tolan or other members in the UK could make the journal available. Kathy also notes that for any current university library subscribers, the digitized version should automatically accompany the hard copy.

1. ADPCA WEBSITE REPORT

Jo Cohen offers kudos to Kathy and Dave for all the work they have put in on the redesign of the website and for the transition to WordPress. Kathy credits Dave with the “heavy lifting.” 

Dave redesigned the website and transitioned it to WordPress this last winter. The new site offers site wide key word searching. PCJ is included full text searchable by keyword, author, volume and year. ADPCA documents are available in the members only section. 

Laura, Dave and Kathy welcome hearing comments, concerns, and any difficulties people are having at the site. Please, when you remember, email all three of us with your requests, comments and concerns.

kmoon5555@earthlink.net, lauralauko@gmail.com, Dave@Rutlidge.com 

Kathy Moon 
Laura Lauko 
Dave Rutlidge

• FACEBOOK AND SOCIAL MEDIA

Kathryn Grubbs and Tiane Corso Graziottin keep an eye on the technical aspects of the FB site.  It is open to anyone interested in the person-centered approach.  The FB page is useful in posting conferences and workshops from around the world. It also can serve as a way for researchers in the approach to publish appeals for participants in their studies.  Jin reminds us that people in China do not have access to Facebook and Twitter so that WeChat might be an alternative (although the problem with We Chat is that it is monitored by the Chinese government.)  [No decision was reached on using WeChat.]  The Twitter account is apparently moribund. Apparently no one has tweeted anything for the last 7 years.

Maria Kontarini opined that if we are not using the various social media platforms, it might be better to close the accounts. She notes that younger people are very active on Instagram and TikTok, and that if we were to more effectively market ourselves on social media, we might be more successful in reaching more potential members. Kathy expresses a tension here between wanting to enlarge our profile on social media but not wanting professionals to write content. We have a volunteer culture and that is important to preserve.  Maria expresses the reservation that our volunteers do not have the specialization or skills to do effective marketing. 

Bert states that in his memory the decision for ADPCA to get involved in social media was made in order to facilitate members in ADPCA to connect in different ways.  The step from that to marketing us is a very big step. There seems to be energy for it here, but this doesn’t really interest him.  Tanya responded that it is desirable to have a way to describe ourselves to the larger community, to say “we are here.” She makes a distinction between announcing our presence and marketing with trolls.

Kathy says that we may get a burst of new members but then it dwindles.  She believes that the PCJ is our best organ but is concerned about the practice of limiting submissions according to themes.  She says that we need volunteers in an ongoing way but is not sure how people decide to get to the place where they can volunteer. Tanya says that she has been involved for 21 years and that she got into it through other people who were passionate about it. Kathy remarks that if we go with professionals, we will possibly lose our character, and that the volunteer system is crucial to our culture. 

Maria responds that she is a very big supporter of marketing.  She has long experience in the sales world and knows that having a marketing presence is not an either/or.  She is angry that we have no larger presence in the outer world. She believes that it would be possible to find the right people who can function in the right way.  She asserts that being commercial does not mean we are going to lose our culture.  She realizes that for people who have not been involved in marketing, they may have anxiety, but believes that our culture and the marketing can be combined.  At this point, Kathy says that she is listening to Maria’s contentions.  Maria concludes that we have expertise in the PC world, we just need to keep our values and be coherent with our culture.  No decisions were reached regarding the concerns about our social media presence.

Business Meeting July 10, 2021

1. CONFERENCE PLANNING FOR 2022 and 2023

Members expressed deep appreciation for the work done by the translators. Discussion commenced about the possibility of remunerating the translators and the possibility of flowers was raised.  The upshot of the discussion was that Mark H will draft a letter of thanks to the translators for publication in the next issue of Renaissance. Antonio remarks that it is important that translators belong to the person-centered community, because they have an understanding of person-centered language and concepts.  Kathy and others express how moving it is for some of us to know that we are being able to be in touch with people in Vietnam and China. The possibility of reduced fees in future meetings for translators was also suggested. No decision was reached except for the publishing of the letter of appreciation in Renaissance.

In planning for the conference in 2023, Blue Roth volunteered to host from Chicago. As to issues of format Blue says that he is new to the organization but that he has a very deep commitment to a collaborative approach and that even though he may ultimately decide, he will include other voices in the process.  He explicitly says that he is not into taking power away from people. 

Dave R moves to accept Blue’s proposal and Bert seconds the motion.  None opposed. Motion passes. 

Appreciation from many members was expressed for Jessica’s long and excellent run as membership secretary!

1. DISCUSSION OF CONFERENCE FORMATS

Further discussion followed regarding members’ feelings about online and in-person conference formats.  The main principle expressed was that whoever volunteers to host the conference, that person/committee has the freedom to determine the nature of the meeting in its design and in its nature i.e., online, in-person, or hybrid; whether to have encounter for the whole meeting, versus workshops and presentations, and whether the business of the organization is combined with community meetings. 

Mark H has volunteered to organize the conference for 2022. (Yay!!) Dave R says that he is able and willing to set up the online conference to run concurrently with 2023.  Ash expressed her hope that the online conference would continue because it is way too expensive for members in China to travel and that members in China have work responsibilities making it very hard to take the time away. Kathy says that for her, the online format is the most comfortable.  She also mentions that Laura Lauko is attempting to keep the Warm Springs meeting going forward in person if possible.  Dave requests that members provide feedback to him regarding members’ experience of the online experience during this conference and is willing to pass along the methods he developed for this year’s meetings.

Kathy reiterates that she wants us to follow the principle of the host’s freedom to determine the format.  Dave responds that he supports the idea of the volunteer host’s decision power, but that a discussion of accessibility is also appropriate. Kathy moves that we accept Mark Harrison’s offer to convene next year’s conference.  Jo seconds the motion and Bert calls the question.  Motion carries. Passed [with gratitude.]  

Sue Wilders mentions that the pandemic has afforded us the opportunity to invent a new way of meeting. Tanya responds that, in her opinion, there are many benefits, but also some negative effects. She feels that we risk losing our unity if we were to commit to an online-only conference more permanently. Bert agrees that the online format is wonderful but says that we give up something by doing that. An in-person conference demands a commitment to the event which is not required in the online universe—people sleeping while others are meeting, distractions which can interfere with our online meetings, etc. For Bert, the essence of the conference has always been the face-to-face community meetings in which people grow together and to be together.  The social experiment involved in our community in-person meetings will end if we go to an online direction in the future. Dave R responds that he hears something is being left behind, but that the experiment is still ongoing. Tanya says that when we design experiments, we want to focus on the values we want to realize and achieve.  Sue Wilders comments that, as fantastic as the experiment has been, in-person meetings have been very costly and have excluded people due to time and financial constraints. She believes that the online format has created a more inclusive community. Teri Tivey expressed her support for Bert’s point of view.  Laura L says that she really misses the in-person meetings as it is a burden to be sitting in front of a screen for long periods of time. She wonders how we could do a hybrid model. No decisions were made regarding this discussion of conference formats and the host of each successive year’s conference are empowered to decide the question. 

Notes by Marge Witty