A Message from the President

Hola to all of the AMCD family from Patricia Arredondo, AMCD president.

Bienvenidos (welcome) to our 240 new members. You have joined us in a milestone year -- our 25th anniversary year. Believe it or not, thanks to the marketing efforts of Dr. Canary Hogan, Membership Chair, we are closing in on our 4000 member goal.

More change!

Of course another milestone is my presidency. As the first Latina president, in a year that witnessed the election of the first Vice-President for African American Concerns and the appointment of the first Interim Vice-President for Asian American and Pacific Islander Concerns, I am honored to serve the association. We are an active and energetic organization. My theme is "Unity Through Collaborative Commitment". This has generated many shared activities and accomplishments with other ACA entities. For example:

ACES and the International Association of Marriage and Family Counseling (IAMFC) have endorsed the AMCD Multicultural Counseling Competencies.
Joint taskforces for AMCD and representatives from the other associations are collaborating to generate multicultural competencies for these two areas of counseling.
Linda Redmond, president of IAAOC has asked me to submit an article for their newsletter. The same invitation has come from Dr.Colleen Logan of AGLBIC. One of my articles appeared in the ACES Spectrum.

None of these accomplishments are those of one person, rather they are the outcome of collaboration and plain, old hard work by many dedicated AMCD members. Of course, we have many collaborators in other divisions. In particular, I would like to thank Loretta Bradley, past president of ACES, Sam Gladding, current ACES president, Sherlon Brown, AMCD past-president, Courtland Lee, ACA president-elect and Michael D'Andrea, past chair of the AMCD Professional Standards Committee for bringing about the ACES endorsement. Working with us on behalf of IAMFC is Dr. Judy Lewis, president.

More News: About Orlando

In Orlando, Drs. Sherlon Brown and Sandra Lopez-Baez will lead a two-day Professional Leadership Institute addressing the Multicultural Counseling Competencies.

Presenters include Thomas Parham, Allen Ivey and other leaders. The dates are April 23 & 30. Sign Up!

AMCD and AGLBIC are collaborating to deliver a leadership training day to ACA elected leaders. This is a first! It is a statement of unity, indicating that professionals interested in multiculturalism and gay and lesbian, bisexual and transgendered populations can work together. The training date is April 4.

A train-the-trainer (T3) institute built around the Multicultural Counseling Competencies is scheduled for April 7-9. The cost is your hotel stay and $50.00 for materials. If interested, please contact Janet Jones, Chair of the Professional Standards Committee. Her e-mail address is: JONESJI@eglin.af.mil or fax # (904) 882-9516.

Important dates:

April 4:
Welcoming Party

April 6:
25th Anniversary Celebration

April 7:
Luncheon
Keynote address by Maya Angelou
Gala (dance)

Building on our History

Now let 's turn back the clock 25 years. What was going on at the time AMCD came into being? It was 1972, the beginning of a new decade following the Civil Right Act of 1964, the Vietnam War and first space walk. I was not there when our organization came into being but have heard many a story about late-night meetings, factual challenges to the status quo (then AGPA) and numerous efforts led by President Emeritus, Samuel Johnson. It was Sam 's leadership and the desire for self-determination by our founding members that let to the establishment of an association to promote greater understanding of ethnic minority groups among members of the counseling and development profession (from the AMCD bylaws). The vision of 25 years ago is with us today, and more than ever, needs collaborative commitment and leadership from the AMCD membership.

Leading through Multiculturalism and Diversity

For years, many of us have dedicated ourselves to the advancement of cultural perspectives in counseling. Now it seems the time has come. On my way to a meeting in Orlando recently, I picked up a program from a software conference. Their conference title was "Managing Diversity Well". Health care, higher education, and other industries are addressing culture and diversity with their workforce. Everywhere I go, in high-tech or education, competencies are a commodity. Cultural competence is widely sought and AMCD has cornered the market on multicultural competencies with not one but two documents (Sue, Arredondo and McDavis, 1992 and Arredondo, Toporek, et al., 1996). We have so much to offer! Think of the training opportunities we can provide all industries and institutions through our Multicultural Counseling Competencies.

I hope that Sam Johnson and our founders will look upon AMCD today with pride. We are a maturing organization, actively collaborating with other divisions and associations, developing products, artifacts representing the association 's culture, building an inclusive membership and developing new leadership. We are in process and in the words of my abuela (grandmother), "hay que seguir adelante (we must go forward)".

Just a few Announcements

Thank you to Bernal Baca, vice-president of Latino Concerns, and Yakima Community College administration for printing 500 free copies of the Competencies monograph.

Congratulations to Canary Hogan, membership chair, upon her new status as President-Elect of ASCA.

Welcome to Dr. Daya Sandhu, CACREP Rep for the next three years.

A socio-cultural cruise to five of the Caribbean Islands is in the planning for June 22-29. Please contact Dr. Quincy Moore for more information. His e-mail: Qmoore@Felix.vca.edu or phone: (804) 828-1650.

The Newsletter

Apologies, it is late, but it is full of important information. Read it!

The Journal of Multicultural Counseling and Development

This is absolutely the best source for first class publications with a focus on multiculturalism. Use it!