I must say that I feel like I have some big shoes to fill, stepping into the role of President after the amazing job that Sharan Simmons has done on the committee over the last nine years. She has built a great organisation and my plan is to leverage her work to make it even better.
I would also like to acknowledge the amazing efforts of all past committee members, but especially those who have just recently stepped down – Darren Vizer & Felicia Darbyshire-Pirie. You will be missed.
Thank you to the fabulous individuals who have agreed to stay on the committee & I also welcome our two brand new committee members – Meredith Brooks as Treasurer & Narelle Forbes as an ordinary committee member – and the return to the committee of Mary McArthur. I also would like to thank Karen Goh who has now officially taken on the role of Secretary, Chris Lavelle who continues as Vice President & Education Chair & Deanne Castronini, for their amazing contribution on the Education Sub-committee. It is a very competent & passionate team that we have to move us forward.
So, what comes next?
As we find our feet, you will hopefully start to see some changes to make your lives a bit easier. We will be looking at our processes and rules seeing if we can streamline them for you.
As a starting point, we will be making some small changes to the requirements for upgrades.
- When upgrading for the first time, you will only require one business reference rather than two.
- For all subsequent upgrades, there will be no requirement for references.
- We will not require a statement from your past employer if you are unable to obtain that. We understand that can sometimes be tricky. In those circumstances, a statutory declaration will be sufficient.
Also, we will be looking at ways to reduce our carbon footprint. The first change in this direction is to discontinue printing & posting membership certificates. Instead, we will be sending a digital copy of your certificate.
If you have any ideas for simplification, please email me at robyn@pilates.org.au & we will see what we can do.
We will also be adding a page to the website showing the projects that the committee is currently working on. If you feel like you have skills that would help us deliver any of these projects, please contact us. We never say no to help.
As a recap of some of the projects we currently have on the go:
Bruce Hildebrand continues to produce interesting podcasts. He is being assisted by Daniela de Fabio & Karen Goh.
Andree Lupton & Marie-Eve Fairbairn are producing the Elders Project – researching information on all the Pilates elders, including some of the less well known.
Chris Lavelle & Deanne Castronini continue to approve a steady stream of workshops & assess courses to make sure they meet our standards.
Kerry Haywood has been finalising the conference wrap-up, including the PDP certificates, which have now been uploaded to your account and the points added. If you have any questions please direct them to Kerry at support@pilates.org.au.
Carolyn Antony has been busy answering member enquiries & hopefully you have seen the social media posts that Natalie Ryan has been designing and posting.
I am extracting the feedback for presenters from the conference & hopefully will have this distributed to all presenters by the end of next week. I am also working on revamping our website to make it more intuitive.
As many of us come out of lockdown, I hope that your studios are buzzing with clients.
Robyn Rix
PAA President
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