ATTACHMENT NETWORK OF MANITOBA

8TH ANNUAL GENERAL MEETING

THURSDAY, MAY 12, 2016

Present: Leslie Johnston (co-chair), Joanne Brown (co-chair, minutes); Jan Ranson (Board, incoming Treasurer). Rest of Board send regrets: Glenys Wirch, Kylee Hurl, Jennifer Theule, Lisa Dveris, Sayma Malik, Rosanne Papadopoulos. Members present: Michelle Kowalchuk, Kathleen McDonald, Cathy Seitz, Jennifer Oakley, Robynne Kazina, Jennifer Barnes, Julia Wellwood, Bonnie Snow, Dawn Warkentin, Laurie McPherson, Gerrie Stolz, Enid Britton.

1. Call to order 1:33pm2. Roundtable introductions3. Approval of 2014 minutes. Moved by Bonnie, seconded by Katie. Passed4. Approval of Today’s Agenda with the following exception. Lorraine Mocarski

has decided to resign from the Board and will not stand for re-election. Moved to approve: Jan, seconded by Julia. Passed.

5. Chairperson’s Message- Leslie informed that the DVD’s and brochures continue to sell with the theme of a child letting the parent know their needs. We hosted a Making the Connection Training and Jan Ranson is now a certified master trainer. We are striving for a bigger presence on Facebook. We hosted Kent Hoffman with the Core Sensitivities Training in the fall which was excellent. We hope to now have support groups for those who have taken the Circle of Security training to keep them moving ahead. Our next

conference is this fall with Dr. Mary Claire Heffron on Infancy Matters, which really speaks to those difficult to soothe babies and how important it is to help parents through those harder moments. We launched Attachment 101 and have offered it once now. Last year we discussed our role in advocating, at the AGM, and during the recent provincial election we reached out to all 4 major parties with specific questions around their plans to provide service to children in various settings and received one brief reply from only 1 party. We need to sadly say good-bye to Karen Johnston, our outgoing Treasurer. Karen was an inaugural member of the Network and has worked tirelessly to promote the Network’s initiatives, but her workload is increasing and she has had to reluctantly step back. She will no longer remain part of the Board, and her signing authority will cease. Jan Ranson has stepped up to be Treasurer, and with Joanne Brown and Leslie Johnston, will all have signing authority now. Also, Lorraine Mocarski has stepped back from the Board. Lorraine has also given many years of service to the Network and has been instrumental in helping both lawyers and the judiciary start to understand the importance of attachment in decisions regarding children in the courts.We are always thinking ahead. We look forward to the possibility of hosting out of province webinars here so they can be shared and affordable, and we have a 15th anniversary conference to plan in 2017, so we are hoping to get some excitement going about creating something amazing! Thanks to all who attend the Network meetings, to all who attend our events, and our Board for keeping us going.

6. Public Awareness Committee- Michelle Kowalchuk went over how we have now completed the 4 Brochures, the series 10 Things Your (Baby, Toddler, School Age Child and Teenager) Want You to Know. Thanks to Leigh McKenzie, graphic artist and to Ann Krawchuk of Quantum Graphics. The committee was Michelle Kowalchuk, Leslie Johnston, Joanne Brown, Laurie Marcella, Joyce Milligan and Laurie McPherson. We are still working with Co-Element who will produce mini videos based on the 10 Baby Things which we’ll drive on social media and You Tube.

7. Facebook- Glenys Wirch is posting things from our website and our news feed. We are always hoping people with Facebook keep sharing our posts.

8. Sales- Jennifer Theule says sales of DVD’s continue to be steady but have definitely slowed, whereas the brochures are moving really well. We let go of the Amazon connection as the carrying costs were too tremendous against our sales.

9. Core Sensitivities Training- We had 66 people attend in the fall for the 3 days with Kent Hoffman. There was excellent feedback and many new people to our events. This has been only offered a few times in the world, so we were thrilled to have it here.

10.You Can’t Spoil a Baby- Through Pam Delisle, a social worker on maternity leave, we have been able to offer our brochures for baby and toddler and our fridge magnets to be given out in baskets to parents of newborns.

11.Making the Connection- Jan Ranson was sponsored by the Board to go to Toronto in June and receive training which was also sponsored by the Psychology Foundation of Canada, then Claire Watson was here in October as they offered the program to 14 people from across the North and the Prairies. We are looking at ways for this to be offered once again.

12.Attachment 101- Thanks to Jennifer Theule for developing a very introductory powerpoint presentation for parents wishing to begin to learn about attachment, which we hope to offer to community organizations. Board members will present it and we will ask for a small donation back to the Network. Recently, Sayma Malik delivered the first one.

13.Financial Report- In Karen’s absence, Jan read the report. We will be moving from the Caisse in St. Boniface to a credit union closer to Jan’s work in St. James. Karen will be off the signing authority effective May 20, 2016 and Jan, Leslie and Joanne will be on effective now. One note to change is in the list of profit/ losses, that the COS Parent Training should be Core Sensitivities Training.Jan moved to accept the Financial Report, seconded by Laurie. Passed and accepted.

14. Amendment of by law: To read: The board of directors will act as a nominating committee and will accept all applications for the board prior to the April board meeting and propose any

successful candidates based on majority vote to the membership no later than 7 days prior to the AGM. And will strike: The board of directors will act as a nomination committee and will accept all applications no later than April 15 annually” and secret ballots, keeping in show of hands.Moved by Joanne, seconded by Michelle, passed.

15. Voting returning Board members- nominated by Bonnie, seconded by Katie. Welcome back Jennifer Theule, Jan Ranson, Lisa Dveris, Rosanne Papadopoulos, Glenys Wirch

16. Voting of new member: Kathleen (Katie) McDonald. Nominated by Joanne, seconded by Jan, passed. Welcome Katie.

17. New Business*Laurie suggested we think of ways to broach attachment in diverse cultures or communities and help develop guides for those who work cross culturally. Kristine Pau has offered to do a Circle of Security focused workshop for the many foster parents of Filipino descent in Tag-lish.*Michelle asked for us to consider how to engage parents of teenage parents.*The Child Advocate recently reported about the way in which the child welfare system is not able to meet the emotional attachment needs of children. Joanne and Leslie will try to get a meeting with Darlene McDonald this year to represent this issue.*Robyn said there is a National Family Law Conference on the east coast in 2 years and she would like to see if she and Monique Gougeon could attend and present on attachment. This is a topic that has never been presented on at the Canadian conference before and is timely.

Presentation by Jenna Oakley and Cathy Seitz of Villa Rosa. Cathy has been a member of the Network since our inauguration and has worked to develop our DVD’s. They continue to make attachment an integral part of their focus in programming.

Meeting adjourned at 3:30pm