The Affiliate Council started three years ago with the enthusiasm of a core group of very dedicated people. At the recent Fall Meeting of The American in New York, the Affiliate Council ratified its first national election of officers. As a result, Joan Liebermann is the new secretary, and Jonathan Aronoff is the new treasurer. As the incoming president of the Affiliate Council, I want to let all child and adult candidates know that The American and the Affiliate Council both welcome and need your active participation.
If you have not been very involved with The American or with the Affiliate Council, let me give you some sense of the opportunities that exist.
First of all, each institute of The American appoints a voting delegate to the Council and an alternate delegate. The delegates convene twice a year at the meetings of The American, where they act as representatives for all the candidates of their institute. The delegates are also an informational link between The American and local institutes. Although only one delegate from each institute actually votes, all candidates are welcome at the Affiliate Council meetings. The Affiliate Council convenes Thursday at 9 a.m. during the meetings of The American. This year the Affiliate Council will meet May 15 in San Diego and December 18 in New York. Come to the Affiliate Council and meet your analytic siblings across the country!
A second opportunity is open to any affiliate member of The American who wants to become involved in the activities of the Affiliate Council. We need help in a variety of areas: making social arrangements for the meetings, developing candidate discussion groups for the scientific meetings, helping local institutes develop their candidate organizations, putting together articles for TAP, arranging for candidates to spend time with senior analyst mentors at the meetings, developing affiliate membership in The American, exploring training issues of specific interest to candidates, expanding our connections to IPSO and the international community of analytic candidates, etc. We need your ideas as well. Please contact me in San Diego (619-452-5728) or come to the Affiliate Council meeting to get more formation—and remember, you do not need to be a delegate to participate.
More opportunities for candidates to become involved in The American are opening up all the time. For example, Donald Rosenblitt, the incoming chair of the Board on Professional Standards, will speak to the Affiliate Council in San Diego this May about candidate involvement in BOPS. He has also asked me to welcome candidates to attend the all-day meeting of BOPS on Wednesday. You will now be able to sign in at the door as a candidate. These are exciting developments given that BOPS is the component of The American that has the responsibility of supporting psychoanalytic education in all of our institutes.
I hope you will come to the meetings of The American in May. For more information about the May meetings and San Diego, look in this edition of TAP for articles by Jack Miller, Alan Sugarman, and Sharon Zalusky.