Every year the College hosts its Annual Meeting and Education Day (AMED), a full-day event exclusively for registered social workers and registered social service workers.
This year’s event takes place on Thursday, May 24, 2018, at the Metro Toronto Convention Centre and features important updates from College leadership, an address from a prominent keynote speaker relevant to those providing social work and social service work services, and educational breakout sessions in the afternoon. AMED is an amazing learning opportunity not only for registered College members but for you, their employers, as well.
Here are five reasons why employers should encourage their social work and social service work employees to attend AMED:
1. Stay informed
During the morning Annual Meeting portion of AMED, College leadership provides members with important updates that affect all registered members and their employers. Such updates may be related to College operations or they may be about existing and new legislation. Staying informed with respect to these updates will help you and your employees prepare for upcoming changes.
2. Network
Registered College members belong to a community committed to professional and ethical practice. AMED is one of the few times of the year – along with the Educational Forums – when College members can get together, network and discuss common issues and challenges that social workers and social service workers encounter in their daily practice.
3. Complete ongoing professional development
AMED is an educational event featuring a keynote presentation as well as eight afternoon breakout sessions from which attendees can select two. In the afternoon sessions, members have the opportunity to learn about a range of relevant topics and issues related to their practice.
AMED participation can be used as a learning activity towards the completion of members’ Continuing Competence Program (CCP) requirements. The CCP ensures that social workers and social service workers are qualified, continually enhance their knowledge and remain up to date in their practice throughout their careers.
4. Have a great experience!
By an overwhelming margin, members have told us that attending AMED was a valuable experience. The proof can be found in these survey results from AMED 2017:
- 9% agreed that the keynote address was relevant to them.
- 3% agreed that the Annual Meeting information was relevant to them.
- 100% would participate by webcast again.
“I have been attending AMED for many years and always left feeling uplifted and re-motivated to ‘spread the social good’ again and try hard. THANK YOU.”
5. Attend for free
AMED is part of the added value of College membership and is free for members to attend. This makes AMED a wonderful return on investment for registered members and their employers.
With the benefits listed above, it’s not surprising that AMED is a popular event for College members.
[ocswssw_blue_callout]Registration for AMED 2018 on May 24 is already at full capacity. Fortunately, the Annual Meeting portion of the day as well as the keynote address and two of the educational sessions will be available via livestream. We also encourage members and employers to connect with us on Twitter during the event, using the #AMED2018 hashtag.[/ocswssw_blue_callout]
Invitation to social work and social service work employers
Although attending AMED is for registered social workers and registered social service workers only, the College encourages employers to tune in to the livestreamed events throughout the day as well! For more information regarding this year’s livestream, visit the College’s AMED webpage.
For more information about the Annual Meeting and Education Day and its relevance to social work and social service work practice, please contact Sarah Choudhury, Communications Manager, at schoudhury@ocswssw.org.
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