The Midwest Chapter of ASGPP

[PATRICIA DESERT]

Dear Mary--I am so sorry to hear about your Chapter.  You know our Middle Atlantic Chapter was facing a crossroads last year after noticing a gradually dropping off of attendance over the past several years.  We worked very hard to bring in directors from other areas, to market to schools, etc. for "new blood, to get the word out via mailers, and paying the sometimes hefty fees that out of town directors required.  Nothing made a difference, and we also noticed that the attendance fees barely met the costs of each meeting.    

The Board was frustrated, concerned, sad, tired, and wanting to keep MAC going.  We continued to brain-storm and learned that what most of us wanted was a place to practice and experience psychodrama  without the pressure of trying to market the organization or to find out of town "talent" to interest people to come to the mtgs.  The consensus was that we wanted a place to be with other psychodramatists and like-minded folks for networking, training, and practice.  And we realized that we have a wealth of psychodrama talent right within our organization.  

So last year we changed our structure to one that offers open psychodrama sessions directed by certified practitioners, students supervised by certified practitioners, and/or professionals working with action-oriented methods.  We set a modest fee for the director who splits that with any co-director.  Attendance fees are also very modest and a person can choose to pay for each session individually or a flat fee for all three sessions in the year.

We don't make a lot of money but following almost a year since we made the changes our attendance is robust, enthusiastic, diverse, and consistent.  I hope this helps.  

Patti Desert, LCSW-C, CP
Treasurer
Middle Atlantic Region-ASGPP
Baltimore, MD




----- Original Message ----- 
  From: maryapalmer at wildblue.net<mailto:maryapalmer at wildblue.net> 
  To: list at grouptalkweb.org<mailto:list at grouptalkweb.org> 
  Sent: Monday, March 05, 2007 2:57 PM
  Subject: The Midwest Chapter of ASGPP


  Dear Collegues,

  I would like to open a discussion about whether to re-energize the Midwest
  chapter or let it fold.We have to renew our webpage listing or let it go.

  The Midwest Chapter was started in 1994. For many years we held an annual
  conference some with as many as 4 workshops running concurrently. Some
  gatherings were a Friday night and a full day workshop on Saturday.
  Usually these occurred either in MN, WI, IL or MO. The Midwest Chapter
  includes 12 Midwest States.

  For several years the chapter has been dormant with no elected officials.
  We have a treasury and a checking account with funds.

  We have had a web page designed and maintained by Karen Carnibucci..
  We have no paying members at this time.

  I want to ask that anyone that would like to help in this endeavor would
  volunteer at this time to be on a temporary start up Board until an
  official election could happen. Also, we need to discuss the needs of the
  people in the Midwest.

  How do we get the word out and revitalize?

  MaryAnna Palmer LICSW, LMFT, CP


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