Our vision for 2020 (or what’s coming up in the next few months!)

A couple of our blogs this year have been reflecting on what we did towards the end of last year, so we thought that this week we would look ahead instead, and see what we’ve got coming up over the next few months. It doesn’t cover our regular education courses or ongoing project work as this would take ages, but focuses on different events and conferences. Ready?

February

10^th (University of Worcester Arena) – Worcestershire Dementia Meeting Centres Information Meeting. An initial meeting for interested parties to find out about the £540,000 being invested in setting up new Meeting Centres across Worcestershire. You can book a free place or find out more.

12^th (Leeds) – Professor Dawn Brooker will be presenting at the Dementia Care Research Summit 2020 as part of a session on ‘Building a national network for dementia care research’.

28^th (online, 12.30-1pm) – The second Meeting Centres ‘Bring your own lunch’ webinar takes place, where you can find out about Kirriemuir Meeting Centre in Scotland. Grab your sandwiches and a headset and join us.

Ongoing – we’re reviewing The King’s Fund environmental assessment tools, so if you have experience of using them please consider taking part in a short online survey online survey to provide some feedback . You can also download the tools for free from our website

March

12^th (London) – Professor Dawn Brooker will be presenting on ‘Person-centred dementia care programmes’ at the Dementia 2020: Delivering Person-Centred, Outcome-Focused Dementia Services event.

16^th (The Commandery, Worcester) – Two of our TAnDem PhD students (Karen Gray and Ruby Swift) will be guest speaker at the ‘Suitcase Stories Symposium, which provides an opportunity to learn about and reflect on using arts and reminiscence with people living with dementia. You can find out more and book a free place.

18^th (Birmingham) – Teresa Atkinson will be presenting on ‘Environmental design for people living with dementia’ at the Dementia, Care & Nursing Home Expo.

18^th (Singapore) – Professor Dawn Brooker is delivering a one-day workshop on Meeting Centres.

19^th-21^st (Singapore) – Professor Dawn Brooker will be presenting at the Alzheimer’s Disease International conference on the Namaste Care project and with a poster about the Meeting Centres Support Programme.

24^th (Sydney, Australia) – hot on the heels of Singapore, Professor Dawn Brooker will be heading to Australia for the Dementia Australia National Symposium where she will be presenting on ‘Making Person-Centred Dementia Care a Reality for People Living with Advanced Dementia’.

25^th-1^st April (Australia) – following on from her presentation, Professor Dawn Brooker is doing a series of workshops on VIPS in Sydney, Brisbane, Melbourne, Adelaide, and Perth.

27^th (online, 12.30-1pm) – The third Meeting Centres ‘Bring your own lunch’ webinar takes place, where you can find out about Droitwich Spa Meeting Centre. Grab your sandwiches and a headset and join us (further sessions will take place each month but presenters have yet to be confirmed)

April

15^th-16^th (The Hive, Worcester) – We’re running a 2-day training session for Meeting Centre frontline staff/volunteers, exploring the elements that make up a Meeting Centre and the practicalities of implementing them. To book a free place or for further information, contact meetingcentres@worc.ac.uk or 01905 542531

28^th-29^th (University of Worcester – TBC) – A 2-day Masterclass on Implementing the New Liberty Protection Safeguards. You can find out more or book your place (please note that there is a fee for this masterclass).

University of Worcester buildings

May

7^th (Jenny Lind Building, University of Worcester) – We’re hosting a 1-day practical workshop around implementing Namaste Care, following on from the Namaste Care Intervention UK project we finished last year. You can find out more or book your place (please note that there is a fee for this workshop).

Hopefully we’ll be at the Alzheimer’s Society Annual Conference, but we need to hear if our abstract on ‘The sustainability of place-based community interventions’ has been accepted. Fingers crossed.

June

(I can’t believe that we have nothing extra going on in June. Maybe there are events that I don’t know about at the moment or things waiting to be finalised. I’m sure by the time we get to June it won’t be empty!)

July

7^th-8^th (The Hive, Worcester) – We’re running a 2-day training session for Meeting Centre frontline staff/volunteers, exploring the elements that make up a Meeting Centre and the practicalities of implementing them. To book a free place or for further information, contact meetingcentres@worc.ac.uk or 01905 542531 (further dates are planned in September and November)

Hopefully we’ll be at the British Society of Gerontology Annual Conference as we’ve submitted three abstracts, so we’re just waiting to hear.

We might also be at the Alzheimer’s Association International Conference in Amsterdam as we’ve submitted an abstract.

I think that’s enough to keep us going for a while, and we’re also still delivering our current modules for the Postgraduate Certificate and Award as well as developing the new ones which will be starting in September.

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