The Board of the Australasian College of Paramedicine held its inaugural Board meeting on Wednesday 27th November 2019 in Hobart.

All Directors were present at the first meeting - Peter Jurkovsky, Simone Haigh, Marty Nichols, Michael Smith, Dr Bronwyn Tunnage and Ryan Lovett.

The Board elected Peter Jurkovsky as the inaugural Chair and Simone Haigh as Vice Chair. The Board appointed John Bruning as the Chief Executive Officer.

The Board discussed a wide range of relevant items during the meeting with further detail provided below on a number of these. Items discussed included:

• Draft Strategic Plan for 2020
• Draft Organisational Structure
• 2019/20 Budget
• Financial, Human Resource and other organisational policies
• Audit and Risk Committee Charter and appointments
• Nomination and Selection Committee Charter and appointments
• College Logo
• Member Code of Conduct
• 2020 Conferences and Major events
• Membership structure and fees
• Member insurance
• Website and domain name
• Post nominals and abbreviation
• Social Media

Strategic Plan
The Board and CEO require a clear strategic plan to define the direction and operation of the College during this vitally important establishment and transition period. With that in mind, a 2020 Strategic Plan (which closely mirrors the strategic plans of PA and ANZCP) is being finalised by the Board and will be circulated in the coming weeks. The Board identified the importance of member input into the strategic direction of the College and will undertake a member engagement process during 2020 to help set the College’s 2021-23 Strategic Plan.

Audit and Risk Committee
The Board appointed Michael Smith (Chair), Dr Bronwyn Tunnage, Ryan Lovett and Marty Nichols to the Audit and Risk Committee. An experienced and qualified Certified Practising Accountant will be seconded to the committee to provide independent financial expertise.

College Logo
The Board has commissioned the development of a logo for the College, with two logo designs and two colour options identified for a process of member engagement and feedback that will be undertaken in the coming weeks to help select the College logo.

2020 Conferences and Events
While the plan for the major events of the College is still being finalised, tentative dates and venues for key events are provided below:

• Trauma on the Border – Tweed Heads – Friday 24 April
• Rural Outback and Remote (ROAR) – Broome – May
• Paramedic Health and Wellbeing – Brisbane – Thu 16 & Fri 17 July
• NZ ACPara Conference – Auckland – August
• ACPara International Conference 2020 – Canberra – October / November

The College also has plans for the Emergency SA Conference with our partners in Adelaide in August, the Paramedicine Research Symposium with Monash University in Melbourne (likely in July), in addition to other one-day conferences to meet the needs of members. We also will continue our wide range of local level events across all jurisdictions.

The CEO will be engaging with our student members around a structure of events for them in 2020.

Membership Structure and Fees
Life Member, Honorary Fellow – no fee
Fellow, Member, Associate – $312 / year ($12 per fortnight)
Graduate Transition – $96 / year
Volunteer – $96 / year
Retired – no fee

Student:

• $25 for 1 year ($20 for renewing members who finish their degree in late 2019 / early 2020)
• $40 for 2 years
• $55 for 3 years
• $70 for 4 years

The Student fee structure is aimed to cover the 3 years of a paramedicine degree (or the period remaining of the degree such as 2 years or 1 year for those already in a degree) plus one year where a student is seeking employment – they would then move to the Graduate Transition membership if they are yet to find employment.

The above figures are Australian dollars – we will be undertaking consultation with our NZ members around appropriate fees for our colleagues in NZ.

Website and Domain name
The Board is finalising the preferred domain name and working through implementation. A College website will be developed and will be in place by early February.

Post nominals
The Board agreed to progress with using ACPara as the basis for our member post nominals (ACP is already taken) and as an abbreviation for the College.

Social Media
The Board has secured the handles @ACParamedicine on Facebook, Twitter and Instagram. We will start using social media to communicate about the College in early December.

Please feel free to communicate with our executive team via member our feedback email (feedback@paramedics.org) if you have any comments or questions and we will continue to provide you with relevant and updated information in the near future.

Peter Jurkovsky
Chair
Australasian College of Paramedicine