President’s message from Dr Diana Barker – August 2023

It is an honour to have been elected President of the AVA Board and I’m looking forward to getting to know more of our members and stakeholders over the coming months.

I’d like to congratulate Dr Sally Colgan on being elected Vice President. I look forward to working closely with Sally and the rest the AVA Board to realise the vision outlined in the AVA’s Strategic Plan 2022 to 2024 and to continue to develop the AVA into a contemporary organisation.

One of our core values is ‘adaptability’. Specifically, the value states, “We embrace change and innovation, seek new ideas, look for trends and strive to adapt quickly”. And we have tried to change. Two years ago, in response to member feedback, the AVA’s advocacy team was created to increase awareness of the challenges being faced by the sector and influence public policy – something I believe has been a great success.

The advocacy function was established within the existing resources of the AVA, with the cost intended to be offset by reducing the number CPD events we hold. However, the demand for local events has continued to build, although some have had poor attendance and run at a loss.

As we all know, the veterinary CPD market in Australia is very competitive and crowded. We are working on an education strategy to ensure CPD events run by the AVA are successful, well attended and maximise the benefit to members. But to make events successful, we need to do less of them.

To help us achieve this, we have updated the Statement of Purpose for Divisions and for the first time, included the role of Branches. The new statement shifts responsibility for CPD events away from Divisions to Branches. It was approved by the AVA Board on 28 July 2023 and provides the clarity Division Committees, Branches and AVA staff need to plan and prioritise their work going forward.

I started my involvement with the Melbourne Metro Branch and have a first-hand understanding of the vital role branches play in the AVA ecosystem. The new Statement of Purpose for Divisions and Branches recognises the importance of Branches for building grassroots support for the AVA, as well as being places where we can enjoy collegiality and community. This is one of the reasons we want to focus on Branch-level CPD events.  

At the same time, with our renewed focus on advocacy for the profession and due to our federated system, we see Divisions playing a significant role in advocacy at a state level – this is already happening as demonstrated by our appearance this week at the NSW inquiry into the veterinary workplace shortage. You can read more about the changes to the role of Divisions and Branches and the NSW inquiry public hearings in this newsletter.

The AVA has outgrown the “how things used to be” model. We can’t go backward - we need to adhere to our core values and adapt to the changing CPD and workforce environment. I am proud to lead a Board which has a clear vision for the future and the will to make the changes necessary to build an even stronger, more effective AVA, so that we can continue to improve outcomes for the veterinary sector.