Division 20: Adult Development and Aging
Mid-Year Executive Committee Meeting
Friday, December 10, 2021
3:00–4:30 pm EST
Via Zoom
In attendance: Joann Montepare, Rowena Gomez, Lisa Brown, Courtney Polenick, Grace Caskie, Joseph Gaugler, Susan Whitbourne, Maggie Syme, Nicole DePasquale, Alissa Dark-Freudeman, Kaci Fairchild, Lisa Lind, Tammy English, Jennifer Birdsall, Cecilia Poon, Abigail Nehrkorn-Bailey, Charissa Hosseini, Walter Boot, Kelly Cichy, Alexander Erickson, Harvey Sterns, Kyrsten Costlow, Mandana Mostofi, Shelbie Turner, Judith Sugar, Celeste Beaulieu, and Kelly Trevino.
Welcome and Overview – Division 20 President Montepare welcomed members and reviewed the agenda for this virtual meeting. She also recognized new Executive Committee members, including Alissa Dark-Freudeman, Cecilia Poon, Abigail Nehrkorn-Bailey, Alexander Erickson, Sheila Park, Shelbie Turner, Brian Carpenter, and Celeste Beaulieu.
Program Committee (Maggie Syme and Kelly Cichy reporting) – Division programming for the APA 2022 Convention is currently open until December 17, 2021. The number of proposals has been low so far across the organization, so APA is extending their call through January 10, 2022. Since we should be able to be in person, there is an emphasis this year on making the programs more interactive. There will be three days for programming at the 2022 convention. We will be co-sponsoring a session on cognitive aging with Division 3. Division 20 will take three out of the six planned lightning talks and there will be a facilitator. Division 20 members who are interested in participating should email Maggie or Kelly directly. It was also mentioned that we may want to consider submitting other sessions, such as those featuring students and some of the work of the 75th Anniversary Committee.
Treasurer’s Report (Grace Caskie reporting) – Expenses have been low this year since we have not had in-person conference expenses. APA Division Services and awards have accounted for most of our expenses. With fewer expenses than usual, we have a larger surplus in our account.
APF Fund for Division 20 (Joseph Gaugler reporting) – Fundraising during the COVID-19 pandemic has been challenging. We are about two-thirds of the way to meeting our goal. There may be some good candidates for additional donations. It was noted that we might want to consider moving some surplus funds from our operating budget to this account. Once we meet our goal for this fund, we will establish an endowment that will support early career psychologists with interests in aging.
Age-Friendly University (Joann Montepare reporting, Rowena Gomez, Susan Whitbourne, Brian Carpenter, Celeste Beaulieu) – The AFU initiative currently includes over 85 institutions and has been endorsed by GSA/AGHE. D20 funding was received for an APA BEA grant that supported a summer virtual teaching workshop after the recent APA conference. This workshop focused on teaching tips to advance better age inclusivity in psychology. An APA CODAPAR grant was proposed and pre-approved to conduct a needs assessment across divisions that examines the needs and interests of people planning to retire or transitioning to retirement. In reviewing the age demographics across all APA divisions, the highest is 60 and older. This highlights the value of making APA more aware of what it means to be age-friendly. Other upcoming activities include an APA Monitor article on the AFU initiative and a symposium submission on advancing age inclusivity. D20 AFU members may be called upon to participate in an RRF funded grant on age-friendly campus practices. Finally, there are plans for a virtual information session on AFU for Division 20 members. This will include ways to get more involved with AFU, how to keep the momentum going, and how to connect with GSA and AGHE and the Reframing Aging initiative. Ultimately, these initiatives will help to energize and support the growth of the AFU network and continuation of gerontology programs.
75th Anniversary Committee (Harvey Sterns and Judith Sugar reporting) – There are plans to film five vignettes of past Division 20 presidents and integrate this into conference programming. This might be a good way to present the history of the division and would not require participants to travel. It was noted that no more than 25% of presenters can be remote for symposia, so we could film this in the style of a documentary or it could be part of our social event and archived on our website. Other ideas included enlisting the help of students for the film, showing the film in the programming hour for past presidents, devoting a newsletter to the 75th Anniversary Committee, and repurposing the film for classroom use.
Council Report (Susan Whitbourne and Maggie Syme reporting) – Resolutions passed at the October council meeting include APA’s Ongoing Efforts to Dismantle Racism: a) Apology to People of Color for the Role of the American Psychological Association in Promoting, Perpetuating, and Failing to Challenge Racism, Racial Discrimination, and Human Hierarchy in the US; and b) Resolution on the Role of Psychology and the American Psychological Association in Dismantling Systemic Racism Against People of Color in the US and Resolution on Advancing Health Equity in Psychology. Other new business items include proposals for a council ombudsperson and term limits for council.
APA/CONA Science Directorate (Kelly Trevino reporting) – CONA is planning a series of webinars about strategies for identifying and addressing ageism. This will include resources to help psychologists within APA and other settings. CONA is collaborating with GSA and the Reframing Aging initiative in developing these resources. Other plans include a webinar series on new guidelines around the diagnosis and treatment of dementia through the Clinician’s Corner of APA and continuing to build on CONA’s Exploring Careers in Aging Roadmap and its connections with community colleges and universities. All of these plans have important DEI implications, so that will be infused into each of CONA’s initiatives. It was also mentioned that the AFU initiative might be another good partner for CONA.
Membership Committee (Charissa Hosseini and Abigail Nehrkorn-Bailey reporting) – This year, there were 37 new members of the division. It was noted that revisiting some of the work supporting student members that was started when Gloria Luong was co-chair may help to retain student members. It was also mentioned that there is a new life status membership rate for those with 25 consecutive membership years, which should be shared with division members.
Awards Committee (Jennifer Birdsall and Cecilia Poon reporting) – Cecilia was welcomed to the Executive Committee. In January, we will start advertising for awards and seeking nominations. The group was asked to think about colleagues to nominate and encourage people to apply for the awards. Fellowship Committee (Walter Boot reporting, Toni Wroolie) – There are plans for information about the fellowship application process to be added to our division website. We have received two fellowship nominations for 2022. There has been discussion about having endorsers write only one letter of support rather than separate letters; however that change will not be made at this time. Elections Committee (Lisa Lind reporting, Tammy English) – We will be seeking nominations for president-elect, Council representative, treasurer, and two members-at-large. We have reached out to some potential candidates and invite suggestions for other candidates.
Education Committee (Kelly Cichy reporting, Kaci Fairchild, Alissa Dark-Freudeman) – Alissa was welcomed to the Executive Committee. For the spring newsletter, Joann Montepare is developing a special issue of Teaching Tips as part of the AFU initiative. If there are additional ideas for teaching tips for the summer 2022 newsletter, please email Kelly, Alissa, or Kaci. At the start of next semester, the committee will compile updated syllabi and will update the graduate program directory. It was noted that there may be additional resources that can be added from the AFU initiative.
Early Career Task Force – Mentor Matching Program (Rowena Gomez reporting, Yin Liu, Victoria Guinn) – In January and February, we will start to recruit mentors and mentees for the program. The time commitment is minimal and we try to match based on interests in aging, especially those of the mentee. We plan to recruit more clinical mentors to better meet the needs of mentees with interests in clinical mentoring. Rowena has reached out to Cecilia Poon and the president of Division 12-II for their help in recruiting more clinical mentors and to potentially partner our mentoring program with Division 12-II. Feedback from participants indicates a need to recruit more diverse mentors. There will also be greater effort to make sure that both mentors and mentees are committed to serving in their roles.
Early Career Task Force – Special Interest Groups (SIG) (Nicole DePasquale reporting, Shelley Condon, Briana Sprague, Emily Behrens, Kyrsten Costlow, Lewina Lee, Jamie Peven) – Lewina Lee and Jaime Peven were welcomed as new members of the team who were both former SIG leaders. Feedback from SIG members indicates that they would like to see former SIG leaders move into leadership positions on the Early Career Task Force. The active SIGs are now listed on our website. There is a greater push for organization and engagement on both the leadership and membership side, which includes plans for the development of universal bylaws. It was noted that each SIG might be interested in submitting symposia presentations. Some SIGs have already done this and their work could be highlighted as examples.
Graduate Student and Postdoctoral Representatives (Victoria Guinn, Mandana Mostofi, Nicole Greenberg, Sheila Parker, Shelbie Turner) – There are no updates at this time. It was mentioned that graduate student and postdoctoral representatives may have future opportunities to get involved with the APA CODAPAR grant and several committees within the Executive Committee.
Social Media and Communications (Joann Montepare and Alexander Erickson reporting, Toni Bisconti) – Alexander was welcomed as the new Webmaster. He has emailed the APA team about our website structure and is considering setup changes to our homepage to make it more user-friendly and easier to navigate on smartphones. Please email Alex with any feedback or suggestions. There are no updates on social media or the listserv at this time. Please contact Joann or Alex with any feedback or suggestions.
Newsletter (Grace Caskie reporting, Julie Boron) – Grace will be on sabbatical in the spring, so Julie will take the lead on the spring 2022 newsletter. The plan is to issue this in early April, with March 1 as the submission deadline. We need a feature article and it was suggested that this article could focus on our mentoring program. Other suggestions for newsletter content included AFU teaching tips and regular updates from the Aging Leadership Council, CONA, and Division 12-II. To save space in the newsletter, we could include brief descriptions and links to this content.
Other Announcements/New Business – Shelbie Turner introduced herself as our new postdoctoral representative. It was also noted that we should consider featuring student and postdoctoral members more regularly in the newsletter, which might include putting together helpful tips for students and postdocs. Shelbie has previous experience with GSA’s ESPO newsletter and can help with these plans.
Meeting was adjourned at 4:30 pm EST.
Respectfully submitted,
Courtney A. Polenick
Division 20 Secretary
Assistant Professor of Psychiatry
University of Michigan Medical School