E9 - Insider's Guide to APTA Nebraska's Education Committee

Amber Herrington and Jen Bruursema share their journeys as physical therapists and their work with APTA Nebraska's Education Committee, working to unite Nebraska's PT community through continuing education and professional development.

• Amber owns a mobile physical therapy practice, bringing care directly to patients after 14 years in outpatient neuro rehab
• Jen specializes in geriatric PT at Innovate Rehab and Wellness, working across multiple settings to combat ageism and promote vitality in older adults
• Both co-chair the APTA Nebraska Education Committee, organizing the annual spring conference
• The committee has shifted to a "CSM model" featuring diverse two-hour sessions instead of single daylong workshops
• Speaker and poster submissions for the April 10-11, 2025 conference at UNMC's Trulson Center are due September 14, 2024
• Volunteer opportunities range from one-time conference day help to ongoing committee involvement
• Committee participation typically requires minimal time commitment—approximately one hour every other month

To get involved with the Education Committee, reach out directly to Amber or Jen through the APTA Nebraska website.

Episode Links:

Nebraska Physical Therapy Association - Education Committee

 

Nebraska Physical Therapy Association - Public Announcements

 

American Physical Therapy Association

Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:01):
Welcome to the APTA Nebraska podcast, where we dive
into the stories, challenges andinnovations shaping physical
therapy in our state.
We're here to advance, promoteand protect the practice of
physical therapy, optimizing thehealth and quality of life for
all Nebraskans.
Join us as we connect withexperts, share insights and

(00:22):
build communities throughout ourprofession.

Speaker 2 (00:24):
connect with experts, share insights and build
communities throughout ourprofession.
Welcome back to the APTANebraska podcast.
I have Amber Harrington and JenBersama with me today.
Hi ladies, how are you?
Good?
Good Thanks for joining.
So we have been trying to focusour time and our conversations
in a few different areas on thispodcast.

(00:44):
We've tried to highlight someof our membership.
People that are physicaltherapists throughout Nebraska
just try to hear about whattheir practice has been like,
where they're at, what theircommunities are like.
We've got to hear from peoplethat are on different committees
within our organization andjust the good work they're doing

(01:05):
.
And then we're trying to hearabout what's going on from an
advocacy or practice perspective, especially as Nick has given
us some of those updates alongthe way.
And today we're focusing ourtime with Amber and Jen on the
work of the Education Committee,and we'll get into some of that
specific work here in a littlebit, but before we do so, we'd

(01:26):
just love to hear a little bitabout each of you.
Where are you currently workingand can you just tell our
audience a little bit more aboutyourselves, amber, why don't
you go first?

Speaker 3 (01:36):
Yeah, my name is Amber Harrington.
I currently own my own mobilephysical therapy practice.
Currently own my own mobilephysical therapy practice.
I worked in an outpatient neurorehab setting for about 14
years and then COVID kind of hitand we saw a lot of people that
wouldn't come into the clinic,maybe for health reasons or

(01:59):
didn't feel comfortable with it,and even in my time prior there
was a lot of patients that hada lot of difficulty getting into
the clinic, and as part of mywork I also took people out into
the community for some of thegroups that we offered there,
and that was some of my favoritethings being able to work with
them kind of in the naturalsetting instead of in the clinic

(02:21):
and so I decided to open amobile practice where I go to
the patient, and so I've beendoing that now for about four
years.

Speaker 2 (02:32):
Excellent.

Speaker 4 (02:32):
Thank you, jen.
How about you?
So I'm Jen Brissima.
I work at Innovate Rehab andWellness, which is in all of the
Hillcrest Health systems, aswell as some contract locations.
My primary locations are out inBlair, nebraska, where I get to
see some rural settings,working at an assisted living,

(02:54):
working at long-term care,working in a SNF, and then I
also work down at Shadow Lakearea in Papillion and Bellevue I
help out.
So I'm kind of all over theplace, primarily working with
just the older adults andhelping them, just kind of age

(03:14):
on.

Speaker 2 (03:16):
And Jen, how long have you been practicing?

Speaker 4 (03:19):
So I have been a PT now for 15 years, but I've been
with Innovate for just over 10.

Speaker 2 (03:29):
Okay, excellent.
I'm always curious what led youguys into physical therapy in
the first place, and maybe canyou just talk about what do you
enjoy about it?

Speaker 3 (03:40):
Yeah.
So I always kind of wanted todo something in the medical
field and I think I was alwaysinvolved in sports and so
originally I kind of thought oflike orthopedic surgeon, you
know something along those lines, where I was involved with that
, exposed a little bit more toPT when I had an injury in high

(04:10):
school and just kind of saw thebenefits of with PT kind of
having a little bit more setschedule and being able to spend
more time with the patients toreally develop those connections
and kind of see them throughthe long journey versus just a
short period of time.
And you know, I always like Ijust kind of find the human body
and mind fascinating and PT waskind of a good meld of, you

(04:31):
know, anatomy and physiology andpsychology all together and so
that's kind of what drew me intothe PT profession.

Speaker 2 (04:40):
Did you recognize that the psychology piece of
that was so big early on, or didit take some time into your
career to recognize the value?

Speaker 3 (04:49):
I mean, I think I kind of saw it, you know, viewed
it from kind of like amotivational and maybe like just
coping with some of the stuffbeing with some of the stuff.
You know, I think, like I said,originally I thought sports,
but when I started doing some ofmy observations before going to
PT school, I kind of fell inlove with the neuro realm, which

(05:11):
is where I landed, and sodefinitely, I mean, either way,
you see a lot of people tryingto cope and manage, and so I do.
I did get an undergrad degreein psychology as well as biology
.

Speaker 2 (05:26):
For that reason, so you kind of had that psychology
hat on, you know real early.
Yeah, that's good.
And why do you still enjoybeing a PT?

Speaker 3 (05:39):
Again, I think it's just that getting to interact
with people and help themthrough that journey, that
getting to interact with peopleand help them through that
journey, um, you know I, youknow, sometimes they make big
improvements and get better andsometimes they don't and just
being able to be with themthrough that process, um, I
think is probably the thing thatI enjoy the most.

Speaker 2 (06:01):
Yeah, Love it Jen.
How about you?

Speaker 4 (06:04):
So I think that my first exposure to PT was was my
mom.
She had polio as a kid and postpolio syndrome since then and
just her rehab and recoveriesand total shoulders and helping
with that and and then having myown injury.
I think that's why all PTs havesome exposure is really our own

(06:25):
injuries throughout life andthen just kind of getting
interested in that.
I initially was going to dopharmacology and was just too
much sciencey math for me.
I was more into the wellnessaspect.

Speaker 2 (06:41):
Excellent, and what are you still?
Why do you still enjoy PT?
What do you enjoy about?

Speaker 4 (06:47):
it, yeah.
So for me, specializing ingeriatrics and the older adult
has really been very meaningfulto me to kind of combat ageism
from as young as we can and justfighting older adults'
ageistness against themselvesand trying to encourage them to

(07:07):
be you know, yes, you can.
You know you can do that youcan lift heavy, you can, you
know, recover.
Just because you haven't beenable to do it for so many years
doesn't mean you can't do it,and so that's really what kind
of drives me is just kind offighting those things, and which
is why I'm going to volunteerat the national senior games
here in Des Moines to do somesafe testing.

(07:30):
And then, um, I know that APTNebraska is also volunteering
for safe uh stuff in Kearney,coming up here in August too.

Speaker 2 (07:40):
Yeah, yeah, that's excellent.
There is information about thaton the APTA Nebraska website if
anyone is interested involunteering for that.
I love that idea of just youknow kind of whether it's neuro.
You know, amber, you're comingfrom this neuro background, jen,
you're coming more from thatgeriatric maybe realm.

(08:00):
But, you know, helping peoplelive their fullest life in a lot
of ways, right?
So not not allowing them tojust see what they can't do, but
what they, what they can dosome age old proverb there,
probably Absolutely, yeah, no, I, I, just, I really appreciate
that it's.
It's helping helping peoplethink beyond what their current

(08:24):
capacity is and living with morevitality too.
So really cool.
Well, both of you, as wementioned before, are involved
in the education committeewithin our organization at APTA
Nebraska.
I understand that, not.
I guess being involved insomething kind of
extracurricular is not foreveryone.

(08:46):
People are busy, there's a lotgoing on in life and everyone
has a different season of lifeor life phases that they go
through.
That maybe pulls them towarddifferent things, right, maybe
it's organizations, it's kids,it's community activity.
It's a number of differentthings that can influence what
we're doing.
But why did you guys getinvolved with APTA Nebraska and

(09:10):
how long have you been involved?

Speaker 3 (09:12):
Yeah, I think you make a good point, brad.
You know, I was always likeattended the APTA things but
wasn't always necessarilyinvolved, I think early on,
because, like you said, I washaving kids and starting
leadership roles in the place.
I was working and just didn'tknow if I had the time to commit

(09:34):
to it.
So then, once some of thosethings kind of cleared up a
little bit, then I did.
I ended up deciding to um runfor a position and so I ran for
the nominating committee it'sprobably been six or seven years
ago, cause it was right beforeCOVID, I think and um was
nominated or elected to be onthe nominating committee.

(09:56):
Um, and then after my term onthat was over, I had been kind
of starting my practice.
And so then another couple ofyears, as I got that going and
then reached back out to theeducation committee to see if
there was a need for me to beinvolved there, and so now I've
been helping on the educationcommittee and serve as a

(10:18):
co-chair on that.
But you know I just want toencourage people, serve as a
co-chair on that, but you know,I just want to encourage people.
I think sometimes you may bethinking.
You know they may be thinkingthey really don't have a chance
to get involved if they try torun for something.
But you know you think there'smore experienced people or
whatever.
But I'll tell you we are alwayslooking for more people to run

(10:40):
for positions and there's peoplethat enter you along the way.
So don't be afraid to put yourname in there.
And you know there is some timecommitment for some of those
things, but I don't think it'soutrageous and if you really
want to get involved, you canfind ways.
We'll, we'll find ways that youcan get involved that matches

(11:00):
what you have available.
So and you know some other waysthat I was able to get involved
too was I signed up to be amentor for the early
professionals, and that time youknow that can be variable, how
much time that you say you haveavailable for that sometimes

(11:21):
also and then just registeringon that APTA Engage as well,
because then you kind of canchoose some opportunities to get
involved there as well.

Speaker 2 (11:27):
Thanks, amber Jen.
How about you?

Speaker 4 (11:30):
Yeah.
So I think that when I first gotpulled in it was by the prior
president, grace Knott.
So she was a co-worker and shejust really encouraged me to get
involved and I've just kind ofbeen with it for the past six or
so years, just really fell inlove with it and I feel like the

(11:53):
time commitment isn't asintense as some, you know, one
might think.
I think that in general theeducation committee meets maybe
an hour every other month.
We sometimes it requires alittle bit extra time, sometimes
not as much on certain monthsand then, but we are welcome,

(12:17):
you know, we welcome volunteerswho can only offer the day of
the conference, you know, tooffer their time for that day.
We also have a new thing thatwe're trying to build is a sub
committee of the educationcommittee called the sponsorship

(12:37):
committee.
So just people looking to, youknow, find sponsors, exhibitors,
get the name out there for theconference and just kind of even
do email blasts or one on onecommunications with the sponsors
.
So you don't even have to be anextrovert to be involved, you
can be an introvert behind thatcomputer, just type in those

(12:58):
emails just at your leisure.
So there's all different levelsof involvement that we welcome.

Speaker 2 (13:06):
I love it.
So thanks for sharing some ofthat information too, jen, I
think those are really.
You kind of told us a littlebit about how you got involved,
how you got pulled in, and youknow, I think that's another
good point.
You know, amber, maybe yourstory is a little different of,
hey, I noticed I had some spacethat was freeing up and I it's

(13:27):
just been a part of who you are,your professional development,
that you want to kind of diveinto service.
And Jen, on your end of things,maybe it was a mentor, someone
that you worked with in GraceKnott, that said, hey, you'd be
good at this and you'd be ableto give back in this way, and so
that was an encouragement.
Obviously, there's a number ofdifferent ways to get involved
in different organizations inthose ways, but you know, jen,

(13:51):
you started kind of diving intojust some specific needs of the
education committee oropportunities to get involved.
Can you also maybe start totalk to us a little bit about
what the Education Committeedoes?
You know, is it just education?
Is there anything different andwhat does the education look

(14:14):
like?

Speaker 4 (14:16):
So primarily the Education Committee it's our
main, sole purpose is to put onthe spring conference every year
.
And you know the preparation forthat starts right after the one
happens.
So in February of this year weput on, or not.
February, march of this year weput on the conference and then

(14:38):
we have already started puttingout for the or preparing for the
next conference, you know,looking at the surveys, results
or comments from our attendeesand taking all of that into
effect and then we will haveyou'll have seen the email
blasts for speakers, for posters, that have just gone out a

(15:02):
couple weeks ago and calling fornext year.
And so we're starting thatpreparation.
And so once we get all of thosein, then the education
committee goes over.
You know, make sure it'sevidence-based practice for the
applicants, based practice forthe applicants, and we make sure

(15:27):
that we kind of stagger thetopics so that it's not all in
one area.
So we make selections in thatand then we, you know, start
organizing the locations, thefood, the.
You know we meet with the execcommittee about budget and what
we have to run with for thisconference.

Speaker 2 (15:46):
And that's like a really, really fast bullet
pointed list.
But I imagine that there's alot.
There is a lot of time thatgoes into that and a lot of
thought that goes into that foryou guys to.
You know, you've said it's nota ton of time, but it does take
adequate amounts of time for youguys to do some of that

(16:06):
planning.
Thank you for the work thatyou're doing in that space too.
Do you guys come up withspecific topics or themes for
the conference, or how do youkind of plan around some of that
?
You know, I guess, if I'mlistening and I'm interested in
maybe you know, presenting onsomething, how should I, how
should I gear that?

Speaker 4 (16:27):
I don't really think that we have themes, but I
definitely think that we like tobroaden the availability.
So you know we're not all ortho, all neuro, all peds, all
cardio.
You know we'd love to hear onall the things that are going on
in evidence and um yeaheverything.

(16:47):
Yeah.

Speaker 2 (16:48):
And I assume you mentioned you're looking through
the responses, response surveysafter a conference and there's
probably suggestions of things,or you gauge what interest
levels are on different topicsin those ways too, right.

Speaker 4 (17:03):
We do.
The hardest thing is thatbecause we switched to this kind
of CSM model of speakers cometo us and apply.
We can't necessarily seek outspeakers.
However, we do try to.
If they say, oh, we'd love tohear more on this, we do try to
pull those topics for acceptancefor the following year.

Speaker 2 (17:27):
Okay, and you know, I guess, since you brought that
up, jen, you've been on thiscommittee for six years.
Amber, you said about about ayear now, right.
So, jen, one of the big changeshas been hey, we've gone away
from bringing a speaker in forlike an eight hour course in a
day and we've gone to more ofthis CSM model where we have two

(17:48):
hour blocks with a variety ofdifferent topics and subjects.
How do you guys feel likethat's been going?
What's the feedback that you'vegotten on that?

Speaker 3 (17:56):
Yeah, I think we've had some good feedback on that.
People kind of enjoy that and Ithink it gives them an
opportunity to kind of hear whatare the emerging things coming
out, what is the new bestpractice and current knowledge,
and then you know, having thatawareness, you can start to dive

(18:17):
deeper into some of those topicareas too if you want.
But yeah, I think people likehaving the variety of topics
versus you know we have when webring in eight hour speakers we
have kind of are limited in thetopics we can choose, so this
way that we can have a largevariety that can appeal to a
wide audience too.

Speaker 2 (18:37):
Absolutely, that's great.
Um, I know that you justmentioned, uh, you know, a
couple of weeks ago, the um, thecall went out for abstracts and
for presentations for speakers.
Can you kind of just maybe walkus through the timeline of when

(18:58):
are those due?
When do you review them andnotify some of those people when
?
When are when's their contentdue, those types of things?
And, by the way, we'll have alink to all of this information.
So if you miss it inconversation, there'll be a link
, because Jen and Amber are justgoing to repeat what they

(19:19):
already have sent out too, sowhy don't you share that with
our audience?

Speaker 4 (19:24):
So the speakers and the posters are due September
14th and we will start notifying.
We'll go through all of themand gather all that and to
notify potential speakers andposters that are accepted by
October in October and then,once they've accepted, we get

(19:47):
some contracts out to them atthe end of October.
So it's about a one weekturnaround from when you're
notified that you're accepted togetting those agreements posted
and then registration should beopen beginning of 2026.
So it's usually the end of theyear to the beginning of the
year where we open for theconference where we open for the

(20:11):
conference.

Speaker 3 (20:12):
Yeah, and the conference this year.
I don't know if we talked aboutit, but the conference that
sure will be April 10th and 11that the Trulson Center at UNMC.

Speaker 2 (20:18):
Excellent, we had not talked about that, but thank
you for dropping that news inhere too.
Appreciate it.
You bet Okay.
So I want to make sure I'm notmissing anything.
I feel like we've shared quitea bit of information about what
you guys do from an educationcommittee standpoint.

(20:38):
Jen, you shared just somereally maybe easy ways to get
engaged with education committeeas well.
If there's any level ofinterest, I guess I might ask if
people are interested ingetting engaged, is it best to
just reach out to one of youguys or to use APTA Engage?
What would you guys suggest?

Speaker 3 (20:58):
I think right now the best way would probably be to
just reach out to us and, likeJen said, looking for people to
help with some of thesponsorships.
And then at the conferencewe're always looking for people
also to help with helping theexhibitors get set up, helping
us register people as they comein for the conference and

(21:19):
helping be kind of like aspeaker liaison that can kind of
introduce the speaker and makeannouncements and then help work
with it the IT people ifthere's any issues with some of
the AB stuff and I think that'sa really great networking
opportunity to get involved withsome of that too, because
you'll get to meet a lot ofpeople as they're coming in for

(21:41):
the conference and so that's agreat way to get involved.

Speaker 2 (21:45):
Jen.
Anything else you want to add,Amber, come on.

Speaker 4 (21:49):
If you do need to email us, our emails are linked
on the Education Committeewebsite.

Speaker 2 (21:58):
I'll link that in the show notes too, just so it's an
easy place for people to go to.
Well, I think that kind ofrounds out our discussion for
the day.
I appreciate you guys just kindof giving us a little insight
into what you're doing from aneducation committee standpoint,
how people can get engaged, andeven just kind of sharing the

(22:18):
general timeline, especiallyover the next couple months.
If people are interested insubmitting, I would just say you
know, amber, I was in a similarposition to you where, you know
, first maybe decade of mycareer was spent growing in
leadership within the companythat I was in and getting
engaged in some otherorganizations.

(22:39):
But, you know, as thosetimelines kind of ran out, I
found my way into APTA Nebraskatoo, and I've just, you know,
even in the last several yearsI've enjoyed getting to
reconnect with people that Ihadn't seen in a while.
I think that's one of thethings that I've enjoyed about
the membership committee too, isyou just have ways to connect
with people that you don't know,or to reconnect with people

(23:00):
that you knew 10, 15 years agoas well.
That's been really fun.
It's a great way to networkthroughout our state, to build
community within our profession,and there's been really great
content too, so you guys aredoing a phenomenal job.

Speaker 3 (23:16):
Thanks, Brad.

Speaker 2 (23:17):
Yeah, thanks again for joining the conversation.
Audience, as mentioned, take alook at those links in the show
notes and look forward togetting to see the fruition of
this conversation in April April10th and 11th.

(23:38):
So mark that on your calendarstoo.
Thanks again, you guys andaudience, look forward to
sharing our next conversationwith you as well.

Speaker 1 (23:43):
Thanks for tuning in to the APTA Nebraska podcast.
Stay connected with us for moreconversations that elevate our
profession and improve the livesof Nebraskans.
Don't forget to subscribe,share and join the discussion,
because together we're drivingthe future of physical therapy
forward.