Volume 38, Number 3                                                      Winter 2015/2016
Welcome from the Editor

Greetings from the AGHExchange editor's desk! By now, you know that the AGHExchange transitioned
from print to electronic format in 2015. We hope this transition will allow us to get valuable and relevant content to you in a timely fashion. Look for four more issues of the
AGHExchange in 2016 and please send your feedback and suggestions my way. I look forward to hearing from you!

Best wishes for a creative and exciting 2016,

Elizabeth Bergman
AGHExchange Editor and Member-at-Large
Associate Professor, Ithaca College Gerontology Institute
ebergman@ithaca.edu
607-274-3859
Don't Miss AGHE's 42nd Annual Meeting
March 3-6, 2016 
The Westin Long Beach 
Long Beach, CA
 
"Developing Educational Leadership in Gerontology Worldwide"
  More details are available here.
Registration is NOW OPEN
  
Accreditation Update
The Association for Gerontology in Higher Education Receives Grant from the Kott Charitable Trust to Develop and Launch an Accreditation Organization 
 
Administrative Sub-Committee, AGHE Accreditation Task Force

The Association for Gerontology in Higher Education received funding in November 2015 from the Russell & Josephine Kott Memorial Charitable Trust to finalize planning and begin the development of an accreditation organization for gerontology education programs. The AGHE Accreditation Task Force will develop policies and procedures related to the oversight and governance of an accreditation organization for associate, undergraduate and master's level education programs. The central goals and scope of the grant are to:
  • develop supportive collaborative processes that foster a culture of accountability, assessment and continuous quality improvement to support gerontology programs and institutional excellence;
  • maintain standards that are influenced by contemporary and evolving practice and that help assure that gerontology, as a profession, continues to meet the needs of a diverse public;
  • maintain standards that foster consistency in educational gerontology programs and that allow for innovation resulting in improvement in educational and professional practices in the field of aging;
  • provide a framework for assessing the preparedness of students to ensure highly qualified gerontologists graduate from gerontology programs in higher education;
  • accredit programs in gerontology that represent appropriate standards for associate, bachelor, masters level education, as well as appropriate standards for undergraduate and graduate certificates
The Russell & Josephine Kott Memorial Charitable Trust honors the lives of Russell and Josephine Kott and provides funding each year to support a range of charitable organizations that improve the lives of individuals, with an emphasis on gerontology.   AGHE's efforts up to now have been completed on a voluntary basis by Accreditation Task Force members. A small grant was received from the AGHE Innovation Fund donated by the Retirement Research Foundation. Funding from the Russell & Josephine Kott Memorial Charitable Trust will facilitate the next steps in creating accreditation for gerontology education programs.

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What Works!
Assessment Works! Some Tips on Starting the Assessment Process 

Carrie Andreoletti, PhD
Associate Professor, Psychological Science
Coordinator of Gerontology
Central Connecticut State University
Karen Kopera-Frye Ph.D.
Biedenharn Endowed Chair and Professor, Gerontology
Department Head, Department of Gerontology
University of Louisiana at Monroe

Why assess your program?
Program assessment is essential for the continued growth and development of any gerontology program. Although assessment might seem a daunting task that can end up on the bottom of the "to do" list-especially in programs already strapped for resources-we hope we can convince you of the benefits of assessment and encourage you to develop an assessment plan today. Both the Association for Gerontology in Higher Education (AGHE) Standards and Guidelines for Gerontology and Geriatrics Education and the AGHE Gerontology Competencies for Undergraduate and Graduate Education are excellent resources for ensuring that students in your program are receiving a high quality gerontological education. Developing an assessment plan to make sure that your program aligns with the AGHE guidelines and competencies provides accountability, and can also serve as an important tool for demonstrating the value of your program to administrators in this time of dwindling budgets. But the most important reason for doing assessment is to ensure quality programming and learning for our future gerontological professionals.

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David A. Peterson Award
2015 Recipient Named

AGHE, in conjunction with Taylor and Francis, has instituted the David A. Peterson Award for the best article in the volume of Gerontology & Geriatrics Education, the official journal of AGHE. All articles accepted for publication in G&GE, beginning with Volume 26, are considered for the award. For each volume, one winner and one honorable mention will be named.

The purpose of this award is to recognize excellence in scholarship in academic gerontology. In addition to writing style, manuscripts are evaluated on innovation, the soundness of their approach, and their significance to and implications for gerontology and geriatrics education.

In naming the award after Dr. David A. Peterson, we salute his pioneering work in gerontology education and his contributions to AGHE.
  
Read more about the award here.
 
AGHE congratulates the 2015 David A. Peterson Award winner: 
Geriatric Education
New Collaborations and Models of Training Are Being Created to Enhance the Geriatrics Workforce
Jennifer Mendez, Ph.D.
Assistant Professor,
Wayne State University School of Medicine
jmendez@med.wayne.edu 
 
The Health Resources and Services Administration has funded 44 Geriatric Workforce Enhancement Programs (GWEPs) to develop and disseminate education and training programs that will create a health care workforce that maximizes patient and family engagement and improves health outcomes for older adults. A central goal of the program is to integrate geriatrics into primary care through education and training. Special emphasis is on collaborating with community partners to address gaps in health care for older adults and to promote individual, system, and population level changes. Thirty-eight of the 44 awardees are also creating Alzheimer's disease and related dementias (ADRD) training programs to educate families, caregivers, direct care workers and health professions students, faculty, and providers.
Innovations Around the Globe
Pamela Pitman Brown, PhD, CPG  
Assistant Professor of Gerontology & Gerontology Program Coordinator, Winston-Salem State University 
Chair, AGHE Membership Committee 

Weindesheim University Earns First International "Program of Merit" Designation
Congratulations to Windesheim University's Bachelor of Science in Applied Gerontology Program for designation by AGHE as a "Program of Merit." Weindesheim University (The Netherlands) is the first international institution to receive the Program of Merit designation. Read more here.

Focus on our International Members!

Swansea University is located in Wales, UK. The Centre for Innovative Ageing hosts the Older People & Ageing Research & Development Network, and the Wales Stroke Research Interest Group. Additionally, CIA has strong ties to the Wales Dementias & Neurodegenerative Diseases Research Network (NEURODEM Cymru). Swansea offers an MSc in International Gerontology & Ageing Studies, and a MSc in Gerontology & Ageing Studies. They also offer a Post-Graduate Certificate and Diploma option. For more information from Swansea, please contact their AGHE institutional representative: Dr. Paul Nash ( p.nash@swansea.ac.uk)

Fontys University of Applied Sciences in Eindhoven, The Netherlands offers a four-year undergraduate program in 'Applied Gerontology'. Society is ageing, yet governments, organizations and businesses are poorly equipped to deal with ageing people and their needs. Applied gerontologists connect governments, organizations, and businesses with older adults and each other, in order to co-create meaningful services and products that benefit the quality of life of older adults. The applied gerontologist can work in all domains that are important for older adults, ranging from care and welfare to tourism and banking. At the moment (September 2015), about 125 students are enrolled. The program has run for six years now, about thirty students have graduated. The program participates in a research center called 'Evidence Based Practice in Care and Welfare' and a knowledge lab on ICT and care. Furthermore, the program has their own line of research that studies the profession of the gerontologist and the competencies that they need. For more information from Fontys, please contact their AGHE institutional representative: Dr. Eric Schoenmakers ( e.schoenmakers@fontys.nl)

University College Odisee campuses are located in the centre of Belgium, on the axis Brussels-Aalst-Ghent-Sint-Niklaas. University College Odisee offers a bachelor-after-bachelor program in Psychosocial gerontology, a two-year program of 60 ECTS. The program focuses on students who already followed a basic bachelor program (e.g., social work, nursing, applied psychology, family sciences). The program aims to improve working with and for elderly from a holistic perspective on psychological wellbeing, competence, and social participation. The gerontology program is housed within the Higher Institute for Family Sciences. For more information from University College Odisee, please contact their AGHE institutional representative: Tanja Nuelant ( tanja.nuelant@odisee.be)

University of Manitoba is located in Winnipeg, Canada, and offer a "Graduate Specialization in Aging," which allows graduate students at either the Master's or PhD level to gain additional expertise in the aging field. For undergraduates they offer an "Interfaculty Option in Aging," in Arts, Human Ecology, Nursing, Kinesiology/Recreation Management, and Social Work. The IOA consist of 18 credit hours of aging-related coursework within their own undergraduate degree program. For more information from the University of Manitoba, please contact their AGHE institutional representative: Dr. Lorna Guse ( lorna_guse@umanitoba.ca)
K-12's Korner
Colleen R. Bennett, M.S., M.A.
Doctoral Candidate, Doctoral Program in Gerontology
University of Maryland, Baltimore County (UMBC)

The K-12 Gerontology Education Committee was busy at the 68th Gerontological Society of American Annual Scientific Meeting in Orlando, Florida. The committee collaborated with the Behavioral and Social Sciences (BSS) Section and Emerging Scholar and Professional Organization (ESPO) to host the BSS/ESPO sponsored session entitled, "The Importance of Gerontological Education Starting Early: Framing the Educational Needs of the Future." The symposium was held in the early evening on Saturday, November 21, 2015 and included papers by Candace Brown and Dr. Pamela Pitman-Brown, "Aging Awareness Through Intergenerational Gerontological Service Learning," Dr. Amanda Sokan, "Should We Catch Them Young? Views of the Young on Aging and Lessons Learned," and Colleen Bennett, "Considering and Conceptualizing Age and Aging for a Young Audience." As small but engaged audience held a lively discussion moderated by Dr. Pamela Pitman-Brown following the presentation of the papers.
In This Issue
Quick Links

Teaching & Learning
 Resources 

Gerontology & Geriatrics Education™ is the official journal of the Association for Gerontology in Higher Education, the educational unit of the Gerontological Society of America. This quarterly journal seeks to improve awareness of best practices and resources for gerontologists and gerontology and geriatrics educators. See the table of contents of the current issue here.
Congratulations to Newly Elected AGHE Officers
Five new officers will assume their roles at the close of the 2016 AGHE Annual Meeting in March :
Treasurer-Elect
Dana Bradley
Western Kentucky University
University of Louisiana at Monroe
Member-at-Large
Cynthia Hancock
University of North Carolina at Charlotte
Member-at-Large
Saint Cloud State University
Member-at-Large
Birgit Pianosi

Huntington University