President’s Column - April 2021

Here in Ohio, Spring has sprung and it feels like things are looking up: the Covid-19 vaccine is being widely distributed, our state is reopening, and we are hopeful that we will soon be able to spend time creating warm connections with others. My hope is this message finds you all safe, well, and hopeful about a brighter future as well. 

We at AHC have been busy working hard to grow our association and best meet your needs. We are happy to report that our association is experiencing tremendous growth with 625+ members! Our new members bring a wealth of perspective and experience to our association  that we welcome. 

Our virtual conference is going to be a very successful event as we have already doubled our usual conference attendance. We know that virtual conferences can feel lonely so we are striving to create a virtual conference space that has many opportunities for connection.  As examples, we will have various interactive activities basked in such as speed mentoring sessions, interactive games and social opportunities, and, unlike many virtual conferences, our sessions will be LIVE  so that you can interact with presenters and other attendees.  

Our conference keynote speaker on Friday will be Dr. John Sommers-Flanagan who will be  addressing the conference theme and providing a presentation entitled, Growth through Struggle: Embracing Sparkling Moments and Strengthswhile Avoiding Avoidance and Denial. On Saturday, our keynote session will be a panel discussion entitled, Cultivating a Humanistic Antiracist Counseling Approach.  Our conference will offer 200 live presentations. In addition, 85 students will be sharing their prerecorded student poster sessions, which is a wonderful opportunity for them to learn how to navigate the conference presentation process.  The AHC conference is sure to provide many thought-provoking sessions on important topics of interest to humanist counselors, and we hope to see you there! 

As part of our ongoing efforts to meet members’ needs, the AHC board recently voted to begin creating Interest Networks. Interest Networks will provide an opportunity for small groups of AHC members to come together and explore topics of interest. If you are interested in starting an AHC Interest Network, please reach out to us! 

AHC is striving to best meet our graduate  students’ needs and as part of this we have created a Graduate Student Award, and, as mentioned, we offered students the opportunity to present posters at or  conference. Over the next few months we will be rolling out other exciting initiatives based on the input of our Graduate Student Task Force. 

We are also exploring the possibility of creating a Humanistic Counselor Certificate for our members who participate in identified trainings. 

We are so grateful for your membership, and as always, please reach out and let us know how we can best meet your needs! 

Warmly, 

Victoria Kress, AHC President 2020-2021 

victoriaEkress@gmail.com