Goals & Initiatives

[Wes]

During the summit, a series of high level initiatives were agreed to by the attendees as critical to propelling opticianry forward. On June 3rd, the steward team held their first in person meeting. During the meeting, the team outlined their official purpose statement and clarified the following goals and outlined next steps.
National Education Standards, Licensing, Accreditation & Certification
A group of volunteers, led by Bill Underwood (Hillsborough Community College), are working on a plan to define an educational minimum (technical & practical) required for certification and licensure nationwide. The steward team has asked Bill to collaborate with team members to identify a timeline and provide more clarification, including a plan for a study on the results/metrics of current certifications and education programs, to the project plan by June 25th.
Branding
Volunteers, led by team leader Pat Kuhl (Opticians Association of America), are researching the existing definitions for opticianry that are already in existence with the various states. Upon review, the group will recommend a new (or existing) definition for the steward team to review by June 25th.
Healthcare
Volunteers, led by team leader John Bruening (Society to Advance Opticianry), are working to write a purpose statement for the Healthcare initiative so that it is more reflective of general healthcare and managed care, and there's less emphasis on health care reform. They will provide it to the steward team for review by July 2nd.
Collaboration
Recognizing that there are many state and national organizations representing the various facets within opticianry, the group of volunteers charged with handling a new Collaboration initiative will be led by Sam Morgenstern (Opticians Association of New Jersey). The group is working to establish a forum, during which the leadership of the various groups can join together to discuss the goals of the summit, as well as share information about their key initiatives and programs to allow collaboration where possible and decrease duplication in efforts among organizations. A first forum event will be held by the end of this calendar year.

The working groups will continue to advance their agendas by developing timelines and budgets and the steward team will meet via conference call at the end of each month. The next in-person meeting for the steward team will be held on June 3, 2013. Updates from that meeting will be available shortly afterwards.