Volume 91 - Winter 2005	Download

People Helping People by Karen Madsen Myers, MA, MT(ASCP)SC, CLS(NCA) Chair, Programs Approval Review Committee (PARC)

For all of us who are educators, imagery is a powerful tool. We use it in the classroom and the clinic daily to make what we teach more exciting, more memorable, and to help our students learn or remember what otherwise might be unmanageable.

The recent Katrina images are unforgettable. They brought to mind a long ago memory of what in my home locale has come to be known as "the flood of '55." I revisit that memory in terms of a black and white photo of my two brothers and me atop a levee, the swollen river lapping inches below and behind us. We are small and appear smaller still wrapped in layers of warm clothes and looking more akin to photos of ancestors who came on boats through Ellis Island than the Father Knows Best kids of the 50's that we surely were. Another memory tied explicitly to that black and white image is that of responding: a father who volunteered his turn to walk that same levee as part of a round-the-clock sand-bag patrol, and a mother, an RN, who went out in fog in the middle of night to serve at a Red Cross command center. The memories of Christmas presents stacked high on the top shelf of the closet and the row boat drills are dramatic, but it is my parents' giving of their time to the community that proved to be the most significant. Each of us has some wellspring from which the value of volunteerism arises. While I am sure there were other examples of giving in my early life, that is the first one from which I draw.

NAACLS, like so many other organizations in our society, is built on volunteerism. One of the most basic of values is that of people helping people and, in the process, helping themselves. A 1998 study indicates that more than 109 million people age 18 or older volunteered services in the U.S. worth more than $225 billion dollars.1 If the responsibilities of accreditation and approval are new to you and you have gone through the process of preparing for an accreditation site visit at least once, and you want to learn more, you could learn by joining the ranks of the 109 million plus and become a NAACLS volunteer. By volunteering you will come in contact with an enormous reservoir of skills, creativity, support and specialized professional knowledge. You will begin to form a professional network of colleagues who share similar responsibilities.

As a new program director, NAACLS offered me the opportunity to learn about the accreditation process by serving as a Self-Study Paper Reviewer. After I completed my first Self-Study Report and noted that the feedback I received was from a peer review team, I inquired about becoming a paper reviewer. I was paired with another more experienced reader and learned the ropes. As I provided support to other educators through a peer review process, I was learning. Later I took on the role of first reviewer. That experience was followed by serving as a site visit team member and then team coordinator of site visits. More recently, I was given the opportunity to serve NAACLS as a member of one of its review committees. At each step I have received more than I have given in terms of what I have learned, in the friends I have made, and in new experiences. Wherever you volunteer - NAACLS, your professional society, or in your own backyard - you'll be learning as you are giving, and you will also be providing a wellspring from which others can draw.

1. Independent Sector. 1999. Giving and volunteering in the United States: Findings from a national survey. 1999 edition. Washington DC. Available at: http://www.independentsector.org/GandV/default.htm. Last accessed 2-10-06.
 

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			CEO's Corner by Olive M. Kimball, PhD, EdD Chief Executive Officer
			PARC Report by Karen Madsen Myers, MA, MT(ASCP)SC, CLS(NCA) Chair, Programs Approval Review Committee (PARC)
			People Helping People by Karen Madsen Myers, MA, MT(ASCP)SC, CLS(NCA) Chair, Programs Approval Review Committee (PARC)
			President's Report by Shauna Anderson, PhD, MT(ASCP)C, CLS(NCA) President, Board of Directors
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			Coordinating Council on the Clinical Laboratory Workforce (CCCLW) Working Collaboratively to Address the Workforce Shortage by Paula Garrott, EdM, CLS(NCA) ASCLS Representative to the NAACLS Board of Directors
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			An Invitation to Nominate
			Annual Survey Coming Soon by Elizabeth Everson Computer Information Systems and Program Coordinator
			Programs to be Site Visited during Summer 2006 Cycle

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