ACPE's weekly digest to keep you connected, better informed, and well-resourced for the week ahead.
August 28, 2017
Trace Informal
ACPE's Monday Briefing is a weekly digest from ACPE Executive Director Trace Haythorn
 
Each week you will receive related articles and updates on ACPE transitions. Also included are helpful links to keep you connected, better informed, and well-resourced for the week ahead.
Our thoughts and prayers are with everyone impacted by Hurricane Harvey and its aftermath.
In this season of transition from summer units ending and fall units about to launch, please know the national office team is thinking of students, educators and staff! We hope everyone is having a wonderful experience, one that serves people of all faith well!
New Certification Process Updates
The implementation group has been hard at work as they continue to develop the various components of the new process that will officially begin as of January 1, 2018.
 
I invite you to visit the New Certification Process webpage where you will find background information about the new process, presentations that were given at previous national meetings, and the addition of three resource videos that will provide you with information about competencies and the admission process.
 
New resource videos will continue to be posted, so watch this space for further updates!
Certification Reminder
Just a final reminder that August 31, 2017 is the deadline to declare if you want to meet a certification sub-committee this fall. Review the Certification webpage for more detail.
Communities of Practice (CoPs) Taking Shape  {Reprint}
At the last board meeting, Barbara Bullock was named as chair of the Professional Well-Being Committee, and David Hutchinson has agreed to serve as chair elect. Last Tuesday, our new Directors of Community, Practice and Member Development had a chance to talk with David about the guiding principles and emerging learning about communities of practice in ACPE.

One exciting piece of news is that we have contracted with Etienne and Beverly Wenger-Traynor, the researchers and originators of the theory of communities of practice to offer a keynote and workshop as a part of our 2018 national meeting! This session will provide participants with an opportunity to convene if they already have a group as well as to form groups.

Today we have received over a dozen different registrations for communities of practice. Thank you for the work that has already gone into these. It is clear that we need to make clear that these groups are not just about what happens within the group. As you think about it, what is the teaching and learning practice(s) that your community seeks to explore, address, and/or integrate? In other words, how will your community of practice advance the mission of ACPE?

There are two resources that the Barbara and Dave recommend, one that is a brief introduction and the other that is more of a "deep dive" on CoPs. "Communities of Practice: A Brief Introduction" can be accessed here. For a more through exploration (which would be very wise for anyone serving as a "convener" of a CoP) please read Cultivating Communities of Practice.

In the next few weeks, we hope to have a webpage dedicated to CoPs so that you can see who is participating with whom and the descriptions of the different groups. We are working hard to identify funding for 2018 and will have a final budget to go to the board by mid-October. We have not yet identified all of the members of the Professional Well-Being Committee, but we look forward to that group convening and beginning to help with structures, convening strategies, timelines, and other logistics for these groups.

Keep watching this space for information! I expect to be adding updates almost weekly!
A Poem for Reflection
As students come and go, I know that many wrestle with the question of where they belong in the world, what place they might call home, who will be their people. I love the way this poem invites community:
The House of Belonging by David Whyte

I awoke
this morning
in the gold light
turning this way
and that
 
thinking for
a moment
it was one
day
like any other.
 
But
the veil had gone
from my
darkened heart
and 
I thought
 
it must have been the quiet
candlelight
that filled my room,
 
it must have been
the first
easy rhythm
with which I breathed
myself to sleep,
   
it must have been
the prayer I said
speaking to the otherness
of the night.
 
And
I thought
this is the good day
you could
meet your love,
 
this is the black day
someone close
to you could die.
 
This is the day
you realize
how easily the thread
is broken
between this world
and the next
 
and I found myself
sitting up
in the quiet pathway
of light,
 
the tawny
close grained cedar
burning round

me like fire
and all the angels of this housely
heaven ascending
through the first
roof of light
the sun has made.
 
This is the bright home
in which I live,
this is where
I ask 
my friends
to come,
this is where I want
to love all the things
it has taken me so long
to learn to love.
 
This is the temple
of my adult aloneness
and I belong
to that aloneness
as I belong to my life.
 
There is no house
like the house of belonging.

Something Extra
I think I shared "Humans of New York" last year, but the project has traveled well beyond New York now, and it is worth reminding you of these sometimes lovely, sometimes poignant, and sometimes powerful stories. Many of them make great conversation starters or even mini-case studies. Take a look: www.humansofnewyork.com.
This Week on the Calendar
Thursday, August 31
*Yaum-al-Arafah - Islam
This day is the most important for Muslim pilgrims undertaking the Hajj journey; believers implore Allah for boundless forgiveness and mercy on the plain of 'Arafāt, adjacent to the holy city of Mecca.  
 
Friday, September 1
*Eid al-Adhá - Islam
This three-day festival of sacrifice begins at sundown and is the concluding act of pilgrimage for Muslims; adherents offer sheep, goats, and camels, whose meat is then distributed to the poor.
 
*First Parkash - Sikhism
The commemoration of the installation of the Adi Granth, the first edition of the Sikh scriptures, in the Golden Temple by Arjan Dev, the fifth Sikh guru, in 1604 C.E.
 
Monday, September 4
*Ksamavani - Jainism
A day of universal forgiveness, in which Jains ask forgiveness of others for wrongs committed during the previous year, and they also forgive those who have caused them suffering
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