As we slide into the last few months of the year, what a month October ended up being. Thank you to all our members who attended the General and Annual General Meeting on the 29th of October – with the GM cementing a 100% vote for the future of our profession. For those who weren’t able to attend – what does this mean?
AHPA (Allied Health Professions Australia) membership had been put on hold following the need for ARTA to consider the wording of our current constitution:
AHPA (Allied Health Professions Australia) application
• Held up following the initial application earlier this year.
• Wording of our ARTA Constitution.
Why?
• Health professionals and those entering an allied health profession should hold a degree.
• Grandfathering is not an issue as the profession has developed from other qualifications.
• Moving forward all allied health professionals will require a degree.
What is happening in other allied health professions (who have AHPA membership)?
• Occupational Therapy – need to have a degree.
• Physiotherapy – need to have a degree.
• Individuals with Certificate 4 have a professional body of its own – for example Occupational Therapy Assistants. They are under AHANA (Allied Health Assistants National Association).
Note: This does NOT affect current financial ARTA members with a Certificate 4 or diploma.
ARTA’s financial Certified members (voting members) voted in favour of a constitutional change which reflects:
• For eligibility for AHPA membership as an ordinary member requirement includes: all of its new members (ARTA’) within the primary discipline hold a recognised tertiary health qualification at a level of at least Australian Qualifications Framework 7 (AQF7).
Next steps
• Our current constitution is with our solicitor for finalisation.
• The wording will go to ASIC.
• ARTA will meet with AHPA to confirm the voted change to constitution.
• ARTA will continue to liaise with AHANA for anyone who isn’t a current member who is seeking an association on how they can join AHANA.
It is a momentous achievement for our profession and our association and I believe will cement our future in the allied health industry. It will require time and definitely some adjustments to change over the next 12 months. ARTA and it’s board will be exploring continued engagement with Universities for increasing and developing professional development pathways, how we bring current Degree Qualified Recreational Therapists back to their professional body and continuing the growth of our research, knowledge and skills within the various industries we engage.
So I ask for your patience and understanding. We want our members to support our communities of practice as we envision that these COP should be the connection to the specialist areas and driving the information to the board for ARTA’s strategic plan now and into 2030.
Consider completing this survey on ARTA’s strategic plan, you as members should be the driving force for the future https://docs.google.com/forms/
d/e/1FAIpQLSeFZeBB6D-2PkEdb7UB7RpRvQ3nMBJclAj1sP4CruM-xPJ6GQ/viewform
I will be presenting to our sister association Diversional Therapy Japan’s DT worker training course in November also and will give an update in December on how we go.
Thank you to Charlise for all the work she has put into the application and various iterations, the office and board for their support and to our voting
members for seeing the future of our profession.
Until next month, thank you everyone for all your contributions to the profession.
Renée Smith
ARTA President