Registration enquiries and student volunteers

Enquiries have started to come in about registration fees and the conference programme.

CCN Conferences have always aimed to provide a strong conference that is good value for money, and  members of the CCN pay a discounted rate. It is planned that the registration fee for the 3.5 day conference this year will include morning and afternoon teas, lunch on the first 3 days, welcome drinks, attendance to all sessions, and a practical 'Neuropsychology in Action' conference backpack and drink bottle (to facilitate your brain-enhancing walks around Launceston and Tasmania). There may be a small charge for attendance at workshops, but this will be decided when the programme composition is known.

We will not be able to set the registration fees until we have finalised the conference program. However, for the 3.5 days of this year's program, we are confident that the early bird rate for CCN members will be less than the member rates for the APS2011 and College of Clinical Psychology conferences,  (early bird $695 plus >$100 for workshops at APS 2011, and $780 for CClin members at their conference in 2012).

We hope the early-bird  registration fee for CCN student members will be no more than $200 for the whole conference. This compares to $395 for student members of the College of Clinical Psychologists to attend their conference this year, and $310 for APS student members to attend the APS 2011 conference. The CCN student registration fee is heavily discounted, to encourage student participation and presentations which enrich the conference programme with contemporary research and developments in our field, and to facilitate broader student learning from engaging with the wider professional community.

Student volunteers
Students are very important to the CCN - you are the future of our profession! We want you to be involved with our professional community, and the annual conference is one forum where we value your input, through formal presentations and also as volunteers to help make the conference run smoothly.

Student volunteers will be needed at this year's conference, but unlike previous years, the conference is being held in a state without a postgrad neuropsychology program, which have usually supplied resident student volunteers. I've already received several email queries from interested students, which is fantastic! However, to be fair to everyone, we will need to have a formal volunteer selection process.

Before we can call for volunteers, our conference committee will need to consider how many volunteers we need, what we need them to do, and if we will offer them free registration at the conference, or a subsidised registration fee. We will also need to consider the selection criteria - e.g., should we set a cap on the number of students from each course, so that students from each course can have an opportunity to help out and to meet each other and develop a sense of camaraderie?

School holidays are about to start in Tasmania, so we will not be meeting as a committee to discuss these issues until after June 18th. Rest assured that we will be calling for student volunteers in July or August.

Launceston and the Tamar Valley

Two videos about Launceston, one contemporary, one from the National Film and Television Archive in 1966.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=g3Y1RauJmZU&feature=related

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mlklnP25_2A

The visitor can decide what has changed in 47 years...

CCN Student Conference Award

The CCN is pleased to offer a student prize to the value of $500 for this year's conference. See details at http://www.psychology.org.au/Content.aspx?ID=3910
There will also be prizes awarded for the best student platform and poster presentations at the conference, as mentioned in the Call for Submissions document.

Submissions portal is open

The call for submissions is available at https://events.psychology.org.au/ei/speakers/Clinical_Neuropsychology_Call_for_Submissions.pdf

We hope to have a full and stimulating conference programme for the discerning clinical neuropsychologist, including several different presentation formats which will allow translation of research evidence to clinical practice at an advanced level.

The online portal for submissions is at  https://events.psychology.org.au/ei/cm.esp?id=1285&pageid=_3FH0L6S7S

We are particularly interested in presentations addressing upcoming and controversial issues in clinical neuropsychology. 

Topics of interest, in alphabetical order, will be added to this post later this evening

Call for submissions - closing date 18 June

Watch this space for the formal call for submissions!

The final proofs have been approved, so we're just waiting for the APS to go live with the submission portal, and to release the final version of the submissions document (hopefully on Monday). The submissions will need to be made via the conference website, at www.groups.psychology.org.au/ccn/events-cpd/conferences

Launceston and the Tamar Valley look beautiful in the submissions document, and we hope that many of you will set aside time to attend the conference and visit this wonderful place.

The photos at the end of this post were taken on a Tamar River luncheon cruise just two weeks ago - a wonderful four-hour cruise up the Tamar, featuring heritage buildings, farmland, vineyards, and our wonderful bushland. There was abundant birdlife, including sea eagles, and even a young seal sleeping by a navigation marker.

In case the location isn't enough to tempt you, think of the programme that we hope to offer this year: clinical neuropsychology papers backed by the most recent research evidence, that put the science of our profession into action.

We're particularly interested in presentations that look at evidence for the efficacy of neuropsychological assessments and interventions (e.g., behaviour management, memory groups, and for patients with complex comorbidities (psychiatric, medical, substance abuse), and the role of neuropsychologists in the community (e.g., community reintegration and interventions), and in less common decision-making contexts like sexuality and testamentary capacity.

We'd be delighted to have a program that educates and informs us on infrequently covered issues like sexuality and brain impairment, informed consent, e-health, ethics, the new driving guidelines, DSM-V, and the new diagnostic guidelines for dementia.

As you'll see when you look at the submissions guidelines, there are several different presentation formats to choose from. So think about submitting a presentation, especially if you haven't done so before - there are over 500 members of the CCN with talents in many areas. Our conference is a chance for you to share your professional passion and expertise with your colleagues.

Finally, in a spirit of community service, we hope to offer a small number of public forums on the last day of the conference for people affected by conditions like TBI and dementia and their carers. There is a great hunger in the community for information about neurobehavioural conditions. If you enjoy educating consumers and other professionals about these areas, please let the committee know via email.