Tuesday, July 26, 2022
As the CAATE continues to grow and evolve, its approach to program education continues to evolve as well. The Education Committee is preparing for its third annual CAATE Accreditation Conference, Oct. 7-8, in Atlanta, Georgia.
In years past, the Committee has selected a theme and solicited speakers from the larger athletic training education community. This year, it has adopted a new approach, which stemmed from the Committee’s work to better understand accreditation conferences across athletic training peer professions.
Committee members compared and contrasted various approaches to conference aims and content delivery, and also analyzed and weighed the cost of accreditation conferences. This work yielded a proposal for a new conference mission, organizational approach, and registration structure.
The mission of the CAATE conference is to provide an engaged learning experience that ensures quality program delivery and promotes quality assurance, quality improvement, and innovation. To that end, each of the sessions over the course of the two-day program will be designated according to key areas of focus — quality assurance, quality improvement, or innovation — to help stakeholders better envision the goal of each session.
Quality assurance sessions will include educational content aimed at helping program directors ensure there is evidence of adequate performance associated with teaching, learning, research, and service, including the integrated way in which learning, practice, and discovery are fostered by institutions and their programs.
Quality improvement sessions will feature content geared toward the design and implementation of regular evaluative processes that improve standardization and structure to achieve predictable, academic results.
Innovation sessions will highlight ways in which program directors can design, implement, and support initiatives that advance academic quality and innovate program delivery.
In addition to the new mission and organization of the conference sessions, the Education Committee also changed how it selected sessions this year. Instead of a traditional call for proposals, the Committee sought session content by meeting with each standing CAATE committee to identify opportunities to develop (or provide) conference programming that improves the CAATE’s collective communication to stakeholders.
The Committee’s intent is to develop programming that serves stakeholders directly by identifying areas where programs were misinterpreting accreditation guidance and where the CAATE can improve in communicating accreditation expectations. As part of this initiative, the Education Committee recruited speakers who align with the current work of various CAATE committees and councils, as well as speakers who will address common questions and feedback the CAATE has received from programs.
The conference will also feature sessions that explore the CAATE’s approach to comprehensive peer review, and there will be sessions for program directors to learn how to better integrate standards within their individual programmatic framework.
The CAATE invites you to join the Education Committee and your colleagues for this year’s CAATE Accreditation Conference, Oct. 7-8, at the Hilton Atlanta Downtown Hotel. Gain critical insight on how to implement and maintain AT standards through lectures, learning labs, and panel discussions curated by AT professionals and scholars. Click here to register.