Learning Difficulties Australia

LEARNING DIFFICULTIES AUSTRALIA

MINUTES FOR FOURTH MEETING OF 2011/2012 COUNCIL

Saturday 8 September 2012

9.30 am EST

At the Treacy Conference Centre 126 The Avenue, Parkville Vic

1. Opening: Meeting declared opened by Craig Wright at 9.35am EST

PRESENT: Craig Wright (President), Lorraine Hammond (President-elect), Louise Mercer (Immediate Past President), Pye Twaddell (Treasurer), Molly de Lemos (Secretary), Margaret Cameron, Nicole Todd, Anne Castles, Jan Roberts, Ruth Fielding-Barnsley, Alison Madelaine, Sue de Araugo,

Incoming Members by Invitation: Alison McMurtrie, Mary Delahunty

Kerrie McMahon (Minute Secretary)

APOLOGIES: Lyndsey Nickels, Barbara Nielsen

2. Minutes of the last ordinary meeting of Council on 24 July 2012

The minutes of the last ordinary meeting of Council held 24 July 2012 were accepted as a correct record of that meeting.

Moved: Lorraine Hammond Seconded: Jan Roberts

3 Matters Arising

Life Memberships: Craig advised that issues relating to life membership were still under consideration.

Remuneration to Members of council: Molly advised that no agreement has been reached by the Executive. This issue will considered further before any specific proposals are put to Council.

Advisory Board – Molly advised that the Fellowship criteria requirements are on hold pending a review of LDA requirements.

Financial Budget Pye briefed council and advised that in previous years the budget was developed based on the actual income and expenditure from the previous year. Pye suggested that Council needs to develop a more detailed budget including working on a Business Plan to be developed by the Executive. Pye and Kerrie will prepare a budget for 2012-13 to be distributed to council.

Investigation of options re Website – to be discussed under the committee report Visit by Linda Siegel – to be discussed under the committee report

4. Correspondence

Correspondence in: Continuing enquiries from website, mostly from parents seeking help for children with learning difficulties. It was noted that there was a temporary problem with the website email address, with the emails sent to this address not being passed on. This problem has now been fixed.

Correspondence out: Nil

5. REPORTS FROM COMMITTEES a Executive Committee Report – Convenor – Craig Wright No report

b Treasurer’s report Pye circulated the audited accounts for the year ended 30 June 2012 prior to the meeting. These showed that LDA is in a strong financial position. Pye encouraged the use of the Arkadin teleconference to facilitate discussion rather than email correspondence which can sometimes be extremely time-consuming. The President is to be provided with the host number for the Arkadin service.

c Administration Committee Report Convenor Molly de Lemos There are still approximately 70 members who did not renew in 2012. Molly will provide a breakdown of the member category by state. Council discussed whether life membership for long term members who no longer wish to be a paid up members of LDA should be added as a member category. Molly was concerned that there would still be costs associated with sending out information to members including the Journal and the Bulletin. There was a suggestion that there could be a category for Retired Members and they may not be eligible to receive the Journal. Margaret suggested that the website could be utilised to give retired members access to the Journal and the Bulletin on line but not in hard copy format. Council members to consider this option.

Incorporated Associations Flyer was distributed to all Council members.

d Publications Committee Report – Convenor Alison Madelaine Alison briefed the council on the proposal for Kevin Wheldall and Alison Madelaine to take over as joint editors of the Bulletin, with Molly de Lemos and Robyn Wheldall as Associate Editors. This would bring the Bulletin under the existing editorial structure for the Journal, and under the general management of the AJLD Editorial Team and Editorial office. Alison proposed that LDA make an additional financial contribution for the editorial assistance provided to produce the Bulletin, consistent with the policy currently in place for editorial support for the Journal. Increased assistance would also be sought from Flapjack. It was hoped that this would then allow us to commit to a regular schedule of three Bulletins a year, as well as two issues of the Journal. This proposal was accepted by Council and a further motion re the payment for editorial assistance for the Bulletin was put to Council as follows:

That Council approve the payment of an additional payment for Lisa Limbrick to undertake the function of editorial assistant for the Bulletin and Council agreed to an amount not exceeding $3,000 per annum to perform this function.

Moved: Lorraine Hammond Seconded: Pye Twaddell Motion was carried

Alison also noted that the second issue of the Journal for 2012 (Volume 17, Issue 2) is currently in production. This issue includes articles by Linda Siegel (winner of the Eminent Researcher Award of Learning Difficulties Australia, 2012) and Jennifer Buckingham (winner of the Learning Difficulties Australia Tertiary Student Award, 2012). e Consultants Committee Report – Convenor Sue de Araugo Sue briefed the Council on the replacement of Elaine McLeish as the Referral Officer. Ruth Jeffrey has taken on this role and it has operated smoothly. A report was distributed to Council members prior to the meeting. f Professional Development – Convenor Craig Wright Molly reported on the recent Melbourne PD session on Letters and Sounds. This was very successful with an attendance of approximately 70 people. There was also a session on Jolly Phonics presented by Jan Polkinghorn from SA. Members of LDA in NSW were invited to attend a Workshop on Theories, Assessment and Treatment of Reading and Spelling Disabilities, presented by the CCD Reading Research Group at Macquarie University. This Workshop was primarily for schools which participated in the Macquarie study. Six members of LDA attended the Workshop. Craig advised that we needed to develop a process for running PD’s so that everyone knows what needs to be done including a budget process, administrative processes and the distribution of various tasks to specific council members. Pye suggested that discounted membership should be offered to those who join as a new member when registering for an LDA PD event. A record needs to be kept of those attending to ensure we can follow up on encouraging them to become a member. This could be included as part of the procedure for PD and should include the distribution of LDA flyers for membership. It was also proposed that we get more banners to be used for PDs in each state, and plan strategies for attracting new members. The Professional Development Committee would need to meet on-line to develop this procedure. The process of getting LDA PD registered as approved PD for the purpose of renewal of teacher registration in each state also needs to be investigated further. A proposed PD plan needs to be developed for 2013. There was agreement that it would be good to have a large recognisable name present on behalf of LDA on either an annual or biennial basis, as well as using the website to provide broader access to PD. Also to expand PD to topics including numeracy, writing, spelling and comprehension at both primary and secondary level. It was proposed that we survey our members as to what they want with regard to PD. Pye suggested we use the Survey Monkey group. PD sub committee should develop the questions to organise the survey. g 2013 Joint Conference in Brisbane Nicole advised that the first meeting of the organising committee will be held next weekend. Nicole Todd is a member of the organising committee. Molly suggested that we needed to ensure that LDA had more input into the program as previously LDA had received complaints that some of the presentations were not evidence based. Molly suggested that it would be great to get an LDA developed stream so that we could select speakers and ensure that the presentations are consistent with our focus on evidence-based practice. Louise advised that in the past the Committee ensured that any presentations involving promotion of a commercial product were identified as such in the program. It was suggested that if the Committee were able to cut back the number of streams then there would be better quality presentations. Louise felt that having an LDA stream would be extremely difficult to arrange based on the current Committee structure. h Linda Siegel Presentation - Filming The program for Linda’s visit has been finalised, with her Keynote Address following the AGM on 8 September, the Melbourne workshop on Monday 10 September, the Sydney Public Lecture on Tuesday 11th and the Sydney workshop on Wednesday 12th of September. There are events planned in South Australia on the 13th and 14th September, and on the Gold Coast and in Brisbane for 17th and 18th September. Her Keynote Address in Melbourne will be filmed for the purpose of producing a DVD for distribution to members of LDA as well as for using for developing online PD.

i Council Structure 2012-13 Council members discussed the existing structure and operation of the Council including the term of the President. There was concern that the short term for the role prevents the role from being effective. The number of council members per state was also discussed. The Executive has agreed to investigate these issues with the view to proposing alterations to the existing constitution.

Allocation of roles and responsibilities for the 2012-13 Council Office Bearers President: Lorraine Hammond President Elect: Molly de Lemos Immediate Past President: Craig Wright Treasurer: Pye Twaddell Secretary: Alison McMurtrie Other members of Council Lyndsey Nickels, Margaret Cameron, Anne Castles, Ruth Fielding-Barnsley, Alison Madelaine, Jan Roberts, Nicole Todd, Mary Delahunty, Sue de Araugo

Convenors of Committees: Administration Committee, including administration of Referral Service: Molly de Lemos Publications Committee: Alison Madelaine Consultants Committee: Sue de Araugo Professional Development Committee: Craig Wright , in collaboration with people organising PD in each state. Website: Margaret Cameron, in collaboration with Pye Awards: Lyndsey Nickels, in collaboration with members of Council asked to serve on the Judging Panel for each Award. j Website - Convenor Margaret Cameron A paper was circulated prior to the meeting. Margaret briefed the Council with a Powerpoint display on the work of the website committee and Council broke into small working groups to evaluate the proposed website structure. Margaret will use the working papers from these groups in evaluating other areas of enhancement. Website : to become the driver of growth and effectiveness in carrying out our mission Pye Twaddell was nominated and accepted the role of Project Manager with the support of council members. The contract with Net Registry is to be signed by the President and Treasurer.

Motion that council will support Pye in role of project manager Moved: Margaret Cameron Seconded: Ruth Fielding-Barnsley

6 Life Membership The Council proposed that Life Membership be bestowed on Elaine McLeish in recognition of her dedicated service to LDA in the role of the Referral Officer.

Motion passed unanimously

7. Other Business The Council thanked Louise Mercer for her service to LDA and the Council and wished her luck in her future endeavours.

8. LDA Meetings for 2012/13 Council Next meeting to be advised by the Lorraine by email. Lorraine will also propose dates for other meetings of council for the year.

9. Meeting closed at 12.40 pm

Attachment The following action items resulted from the last meeting of Council on 8th May 2012.

Agenda Action Required Responsible No. 3. Review the Life Membership proposal to Lyndsey develop criteria

3. Criteria for Awards to be developed Lyndsey/Craig

3. Remuneration of Executive proposal to be Executive developed

Advisory Board (or Fellowship) criteria Lyndsey to be developed

3 Operating Budget for 2012-13 to be Pye/Kerrie prepared

5b Arkadin teleconference details to be Kerrie forwarded to Lorraine

5f PD Plan for 2012-13 to be developed PD Committee Members to be surveyed as to what types PD Committee of PD they would like to attend 5i Executive to investigate the possibility of Executive changing the Council structure

7. Website – development to be ongoing Website Committee/Executive with Pye appointed to the position of Project Manager.

8. Lorraine to prepare a list of proposed Lorraine meeting dates for 2012-13 for distribution to Council members