Burn It Down, Build It Better

What would you build if ASHA disappeared tomorrow? This week, we're rewriting the rules of our profession—from the dues to leadership to culture—with bold, unapologetic ideas for what a better SLP organization could look like.

We're talking transparent budgets, free CEUs, mental health access, and an end to credential gatekeeping. Dr. Jeanette Benigas. SLP and Preston Lewis, MS/SLP, pinpoint the flaws in the current system and lay out a vision for one that actually serves clinicians. From hilarious rants in nursing home closets to raw truths about burnout and bureaucracy, this episode is the rallying cry for every SLP who's ever thought, "There has to be a better way."

If you're ready to burn it down and build it better, this is the episode you share. 💥

Want to earn some PDHs or CEUs with a discount? Find our most up-to-date promo codes and discounts here.

Want to lead or join your state team? Email your name and state to [e-mail].
Become a sustaining partner to support our work.
Follow us on Instagram.
Find all our information at fixslp.com and sign up for our email list to be alerted to new episodes and content.
Email us at [e-mail].
Leave a message on our Minivan Meltdown line!

★ Support this podcast ★

Creators and Guests

Host

Jeanette Benigas, PhD/SLP

Host of Fix SLP

Host

Preston Lewis, MS/SLP

Co-host of Fix SLP

What is Fix SLP: Advocacy & Accountability in Speech-Language Pathology?

Fix SLP is an SLP Podcast by Dr. Jeanette Benigas about advocacy, autonomy, and reform in Speech-Language Pathology. This show exposes credentialing gatekeeping, dismantles CCC requirements, and helps SLPs advocate for change. Each episode equips SLPs with tools to reclaim their profession. Subscribe now and join the movement transforming speech-language pathology. Follow @fix.slp on Instagram and TikTok. Visit fixslp.com.

Jeanette Benigas 0:00
Hey, fixers. I'm Dr Jeanette Benigas, the owner of fix SLP, a grassroots advocacy firm here to challenge the status quo in speech language pathology by driving real change from insurance regulations to removing barriers that prevent full autonomy like the CCC, this podcast is your space to learn, engage and take action in the field of speech language pathology. We don't wait for change. We make it so let's Fix SLP.

Preston Lewis 0:44
Great to be in conversation again with you fixers. I'm Preston Lewis, joined by Dr Jeanette Benigas. Jeanette, we are here, and just like in true fix SLP fashion, we are coming to you from the oddest of places. I'm near the Bill and Hillary Clinton National Airport in Little Rock in a quiet spot, and you look like you're in somewhere in a bunker, in a closet, perhaps in an unknown skilled nursing facility. Should we send the help? Are you okay? Send help twice. If you're okay, yeah, send help.

Jeanette Benigas 1:15
I am in a supply closet in a nursing home in Cleveland, Ohio. First time in the building walked in. I was like, Hey guys, hey, I'm here to give you PRN, by the way, I've got a clock out for an hour to do my podcast, because that's my priority. So thankfully, they have no problem with that. They've showed me to the supply closet.

Preston Lewis 1:41
There you go. We want, that's the SLP way, right? I mean, we're who's not used to that. We do want to apologize ahead of time today, because already having some technical issues right now. Jeanette, I'm getting, like every, you know, every other word. It's a it's very cloudy, it looks very geo cities, you know, dial up internet, 1998 maybe. But we're going to try to muscle through this and pod and today we have a fantastic review. Jeanette, tell me, what have we been hearing?

Jeanette Benigas 2:08
Yeah. So this is from someone who engages with us a lot, and to geez, I don't actually know how to say her last name, so I'm probably gonna butcher this. Sorry. Sorry. Girl, uh, it's from jmirdamadi. Mirdamati? Hopefully I said that right. And she said, Thank you fixers, Jeanette and team. Thank you for all you do. I've been shouting and trying to speak about these issues over 10 plus years ago when I was trying to get my foot in the SLP realm. Keep it up. Your hard work is appreciated. Thank you for inspiring me to make a difference. Now let's fix SLP girl, thank you.! That was sweet.

Preston Lewis 2:55
Let's fix it. That's what we like to say. And today's kind of a cool day, because, you know, we talk about, what are we going to visit about every week? And it's something that a lot of SLPs we've heard from, is if we could start over and bring something new with a bold and, as I always say, a modernized Asha. But what if there was no Asha tomorrow? How would we recreate something rewrite the rules and make a new bolder, more nimble, less, as I always say, pointy headed, academic, elitist, SLP organization. And we've got a lot of great feedback from some of our listeners already on this topic, with ideas that they've got, and this is something that's kind of at the core of what we've always been talking about,

Jeanette Benigas 3:41
Yeah, so our purpose has never been to, like, tear down Asha, eliminate Asha. Our mission really is to give people choice, choice to be with ASHA, or choice to walk away. But sometimes, if you walk away, maybe there needs to be something to walk away to, and that's not necessarily our goal. We're not planning at the current time to start a new membership association, but we did think it'd be cool to dream. So we're gonna walk through five key areas that we came up with, how we'd handle dues, how leadership would be elected, what membership would actually offer, how we'd rewrite the culture, and then maybe some tongue in cheek, but totally serious ideas that maybe you'd love.

Preston Lewis 4:27
Yeah, we meant, you know, there's five key areas we're talking about, dues, the leadership. You know, how would your membership actually work? Sort of a culture change as well. That's, that's something that is big to me, because I never felt welcome in that culture. And trying to get those working class SLPs to feel more welcome to participate and not sort of feel like they're brushing up against some academians which sort of touch into some of the clinical circles, but are not necessarily you. In the, you know, the deep jungle of it sometimes that some of us are Jeanette. You're an exception. You're an academian. But you know, as I always say, Jeanette is not comfortable until she's shoving a probe down somebody's nose and watching them swallow. So you're, you're always very much in the jungle, but it's very offensive, and it always had me, for some of us that are just not in the academic vein, and when we have tried to approach Asha with questions or concerns in our profession, we just remember silence or sometimes a bit of snarky indignation. So rewriting that culture, let's get into this. And I think if anything, the first question always comes up Jeanette, the money. Hey? Must be the money today. So... let's talk about that.

Jeanette Benigas 5:46
Yeah, I think that's the thing that our fixers care most about, is their money, understandably, so you can't really have a free membership association. Obviously, there has to be dues. It has to be funded. So what would dues actually fund? That's the question. I think for us, transparency has always been key. So I think that would be something that would need to continue on. No mystery reports, mystery spreadsheets. This over like over generalized topic that you don't actually know where the money goes to. Probably, as a membership association, we publish the full budget annually down, you know, with a with a lot more transparency about where the money is actually going.

Preston Lewis 6:36
Yeah, institutions have this, you know, inherent tendency to sometimes grow and just become so big that they're leviathans. And that's where I think those of us that have gone through the crunch years of watching our paychecks just not grow, in some cases, reverse, and seeing our fields get into such trouble. We look at our institutional organization of Asha, and we think, Well, are they sort of in alignment and league with us? And, you know, are the dues going towards funding the things that matter, you know, which is mainly the legal support for our profession, the state advocacy teams, supporting the clinicians who are actually knee deep in those toxic jobs right now, and trying to make sense of this and real work dealing with burnout. Instead, at times, we see an organization with very lofty salaries at the executive level, a $60 million headquarters with not a lot of employees that are there. It sometimes it reminds me of those sayings back in the 2008 recession, where banks were said to be too big to fail. And here you've got this just massive entity with all these claws out there, but sometimes it's more, as I say, like the self looking ice cream cone. It seems to just only be interested in perpetuating itself, and not necessarily modernizing to the modern needs of our clinicians out there. And when you do try to kind of challenge that, or you make a you know, suggestion to that, then wow, the things come out. And it's we've been hearing for decades from even folks that have, you know, been down this road before, you're Asha bashing and no, this is, this is talking about, I think, an organization that can switch to living a little bit more with its means and reflect what we're seeing with its members. So that's the big thing with dues is, you know, are we? Are we an organization that's looking like our members, or are we something that is just kind of operating like business as usual?

Jeanette Benigas 8:37
I got one. How about a certification product that nobody asked for, probably would not have that as part of our

Preston Lewis 8:45
Yeah, that's the underpinning of all of it. And it's something that's, you know, we've said it before. It is a product built on this label, and it's the one thing right now that continues to prop them up. And just having a conversation about that one thing, wow, that's taken a lot of legal dollars just to get in the door.

Jeanette Benigas 9:05
In our fantasy membership association, your money would go towards building systems that support the clinician in their network, not systems that gate keep them out, knowing where their money is going in their actual state to fight for things like the Medicaid policies workload caps, something that's worth paying into. And I think that's part of the problem now, is that there's a lot of a lot of people who say, Oh, Asha does a lot behind the scenes that you don't know about. Or Asha does X, Y and Z, well, why is it a secret? Why? Why? Why is it a secret? Why is it hard to find on the website? Why? Why are things difficult to get clarification on? So you have to think about like bringing value. Like, I think our association would bring value. So. It's worth paying into and let let's be clear, we need mental health resources. We're all burnout. We all we. You know, even you know, the pandemic aside, as a young clinician, I had to once give therapy in a nursing home room to someone who was isolated with C diff, and earlier that day, his roommate had passed away. The building was full. Family was coming to say goodbye to that person who had passed and so here I am a 20 something young clinician giving therapy in a room with someone who was dead in the next bed. And, I mean, I handled it okay, but, like, I think probably on some level, that would have been really hard for people. So we deal with a lot of hard stuff, whether you're in healthcare or schools, we already deal with hard stuff. So I just think mental health resources. The another thing that we don't get in school, we there's no way we could get this in school. It's hard to get outside of school. But small business coaching, the future of this field, if we're going to survive, is starting our own businesses. It's the only way I really think we're going to make money. You're already seeing that in the pediatric sector, you know, to make money in schools, cut out the middleman. Why are we working for contract companies, contract for yourself. Cut out the middleman. Contract for yourself. Nursing homes, I think, with adult care, I think at some point down the road, speech needs to be collaborating with other professionals and trying to lobby to be able to opt out of Medicare like doctors can, so we can go to a cash practice. You know, I think that if we're going to survive, if we're going to have an ROI in our degree, that's what we need to do. But none of us have business trading. All that included in dues. But then with that Preston comes a fee that is in line with fair market value.

Preston Lewis 12:14
The fair market value is, what are you getting for? What's your return on your investment? And right now, aside from just the dues from the certificate, which is, you know, just a paper dragon. Let's face it, aside from that, you see so many fees that are collected with all the CEUs we've had that conversation and everything, you know, all roads seem to lead back to Asha, but yet, I get the sense that it's just like you said, continued business as usual. And our state associations, who are really fighting the frontline battle when it comes to Medicaid, are in many cases, desperate, desperate for dollars, but it all just gets sucked up into this giant, you know, Caribous, if you will, and that that's where this model is not like you said. It's not looking forward to things like opting out of Medicare in some situations. It's not being honest about the toxic companies that are out there making life hell for our clinicians. What about a rating system for some of these rehab companies? I'm not saying you got to get out there and, you know, throw too much shade to where it gets. You know, potentially libelous, however, you could have something that's an aggregate data set. That's when you send out these surveys to some of your clinicians out there, as far as which companies are acting in good faith, which companies are providing the benefits and the resources that we need. But instead, what do we have? We have a company. We have an organization that takes a lot of money in in the way of corporate sponsors, some of them have not always been the best actors, either. So who is benefiting? Who here, is it the organization with the 300 plus 600 plus $1,000 salaries at the executive level, or is it the companies that they have a relationships with that they're taking corporate sponsors from. It certainly doesn't look like our state associations. It certainly is not showing up in the way of reimbursements. And that attitude that you mentioned earlier of Well, we do a lot behind the scenes. That's always what a lot of really expensive over bloated executives tell you at the end of the day. They're a lot like the Wizard of Oz behind the curtain. So congratulations. You are very much part of that kind of schema, and it is certainly not dealing SLPs the results, because in the end, show me the money, right? We're not seeing it. So leadership is that's, that's where we're going. Next is leadership, no more hand picked successors or rubber stamp elections, our leaders, you know, they should be elected by the practicing SLPs, and have a nominations process that doesn't just allow us to pick one out of 14 members of the bloody board, and then they pick three people in some mysterious sort of fashion that, you know, it makes the Vatican look like an open process with the smoke coming out the chimney. I mean, hell, what are we talking. About here. And so, yeah, let's start with leadership. And you know, having an electable system that actually is open governance.

Jeanette Benigas 15:08
Maybe we'll do a pot on this. Maybe we won't. I don't know how interesting it would be, but we just wrapped up the nomination part of getting our leadership in for the next term. And I noticed that when they put out the ballot for us to vote on, I think almost every single name was uncontested. And that's a damn farce. I'm sorry it is. You cannot tell me that there was no one contesting, that these were the only people running for these positions for President. Let's just take Asha president. For example. I was nominated. I was contacted by Asha. I was nominated. I talked to our lawyer, and I chose he actually encouraged me to go through with the process. I chose not to, because I actually have zero interest in being the ASHA president and being part of the problem. I want to be part of the solution in a bigger and different way, but I can't be the only one, the only other one who was nominated. You're telling me there were no other nominations, and you're telling me through their secret vetting process that there was only one person out of all those nominations who was appropriate to be our next Asha president. It's bullshit. It's complete and utter bullshit. It's a popularity contest. So my organization would not have that.

Preston Lewis 16:41
You said it so well I'm speechless right now,

Jeanette Benigas 16:44
It would be a democratic process? I don't know. I What can you say?

Preston Lewis 16:51
One thing that is also, anytime we are given the list of recommended people that's put forward by that mysterious nominations and elections board, which they say, Well, we had to do that because no one would participate. Yeah, well, everybody's paying attention now. And so how about right now is a time for change. So always saying, well, it didn't work in the past. Well, smell my napkin. You know, sometimes things change in life, but we do look when those nominations are submitted, at the backgrounds of these folks that they're bringing forward, and too often in the past, many of them have lengthy academic credentials, but they haven't seen the clinical side of things, and sometimes 10 plus years. And that is very frustrating, particularly if you have been working since the pandemic or through the pandemic, and if you've been part of a sniff culture that's seen productivity spike, when you have somebody who can't relate to any of those things, these folks just look like kind of cogs in the big machine at that point. So yes, I have people that have had clinical experience that's that's a benefit.

Jeanette Benigas 17:56
Yeah, we're in our third round of leadership since fixed SLP started, and that first year, in 2023 we actually had a post where we took a look at the board and we broke down who they were, what type of degree they had, and if they were working. And at the time that of that board makeup, there were only four who were working, or had worked, three were in private practice, and one was retired. To me, that's a problem because you don't know what's going on in the field. It's one reason why I have continued to work clinically for my 19 years of practice as a researcher and then professor, and you have to know what's going on in the field if you're going to research solutions, and if you're going to have evidence based solutions that you're putting out for speech pathologists to be able to take and use in their own practice, in a way that's actually realistic, you have to be out there doing it. I think there's some value to just research scientists, but you have to be doing it too. And so yes, I agree. We need people from every setting, private practice, schools, hospitals, real voices, representation, and maybe even like and I don't know into this is I'm spitballing here. Every patient experience is individualized. Who were they before their stroke? Or if it's a kid who has grown up, what kind of experience did they have growing up? But maybe there's, you know, some patients as former patients, or people who had received speech therapy as part of an advisory board or something, real voices that's so important.

Preston Lewis 19:45
It's bold Jeanette, I like that because we are patient centered. I have not thought of that. I like it. And the other thing, before we get off of leadership, is town halls, actually having meetings that are open, advertised. I mean. Story back at the last convention in Seattle, where one of the biggest meetings that they could have had to talk about some of the current issues impacting the leadership and the membership of Asha was this hush hush meeting and very tightly controlled turn off your cameras. You know, we don't want any record of this, and it controls the script, and it's just fix, SLP, causing problems, and that's it. You know, we don't want to have it. We have it in a weird room down in the basement. We don't tell anybody. And it's, let's, let's go do this meeting just for show, just in front of a small group of people, and then we'll all retire to the presidential suite and have the far gua Oh, come on. You know, that's uh....

Jeanette Benigas 20:36
It's exactly exactly what happened

Preston Lewis 20:37
We've got enough of this. You know, we hear some very opulent and luxurious stories at the summertime and the living is easy if you're part of the executive team. So all right, let's get on to membership. Pert, okay, the things that will make it incentivized for folks.

Jeanette Benigas 20:54
So right now, I think in the system that we're in, membership often feels like we're paying for permission to exist, really. So I think a good membership organization would give us tools. We already have, something like, I don't want to steal it because it already exists. But you know, something like a job board with pay transparency. We've got informed jobs just blowing it up right now. So, you know, maybe we just pay them adjunctively to come on in and be a part of it. But, I mean, that's another thing, supporting our clinic, our our clinicians who are small businesses, and including them as part of the membership organization to service the needs of our our members. You know, why not support independent practitioners and business owners. So for sure, some kind of in, like you said earlier, maybe some kind of rating system for these contract therapy companies, you know, templates kind of like fixed SLPs doing right now, but on a much larger scale, because there would be money to fund this stuff. But templates for pushing back against things like wage theft or we just talked about patient abandonment. Oh my gosh, the stories I am getting behind the scenes are mind blowing. I'm actually considering, potentially, just as some of these things run the course, having some of those people on the podcast down the road, but templates for pushing back against that stuff, coaching for clinicians who want to go out on their own or who need help dealing with a situation.

Preston Lewis 22:34
I think, also giving our state associations a bigger megaphone. Sometimes it's not just about, oh, look, they went to this cutesy little presentation, and everybody made a poster. I'm sorry. I know that's triggering for some of the ASHA fan boys and girls out there, but how about instead, we had an honest sit down conversation with the President of Tisha in Texas or Archer in Arkansas. And here's their lobbyist, and these are the things that they're working on, and they need your help. If you are in Texas, please contact your state reps. That's a direct way, I think, to engage at the granular level and really fighting those Medicaid battles on the front lines, rather than that. You know, Let's all smile and go pose for the picture and we have the sit down nicety coffee in Washington, DC. Some of those things are perfunctory. You have to go through them. I get it. But we have these state associations which I think just kind of get lost in that grand umbrella, like I said, and they need us now more than ever. So there's a membership perk in itself. Use your resources. That would have been great to have seen the leader is now, let's face it, it's something that's dying because print publication is the nature of it. But rather than the snarky little pieces about crying in our cars, how about telling us how we can get involved at our state level, with our state associations, some of which already have hired lobbyists.

Jeanette Benigas 23:54
it may be even supporting more than five of them financially. I don't know if people fully understand, but state associations pay big bucks to Asha to be the one affiliated state association per state, Asha will only recognize one, and membership associations want to maintain that status because they get, they do get some support from Asha, but they have to pay for that. And it's, it's, it's a lot of money to pay to have that status. And in return, they don't get a whole lot. They do get someone who helps them yearly on planning the agenda for the next year or the next three years. I've done podcasts with several state associations. I've talked to many more state associations behind the scenes who, maybe just their board is split about coming on to the podcast, or there's only one or two who want to talk or affiliate. With us, or one or two who really push back and are against it. So I've talked to many more people quietly behind the scenes, and it does seem like the support from Asha is as good as the person that they send. So while some states have had really good experiences getting support for setting up an agenda, other states have not had good support. There's also the Council for presidents. We call it the President's Club, but they don't get to just be in that. They have to affiliate with CSAP. So that's more money. If state presidents want to be part of the President's Club CSAP, they have to pay it's not like they just have this network of presidents that meet and talk. No CSAP is another expense they have, almost like a conference or a meeting they have to register and pay to go to that. That's more money out of the state budget. So Asha is not giving them money. There's maybe five, maybe eight, grants that states can apply for, but out of 50 states, that's a very small percentage, and it's only a couple $1,000 so they don't get free emailing resources like they get to send one email a year. I think a lot of them choose to do it as it relates to the state convention. I think they do get unlimited advocacy emails. But other than that, you know, they don't have access to everything that ASHA has access to. So maybe working more in unison, what's ours is yours kind of thing that we're here to support you, because we recognize that a lot of what we want to change happens at the state level. Instead of making it this thing where you're going to pay us and pay us and pay us and pay us some more and then pay us again. And we'll just give you a little breadcrumbs. There's one more thing I think a lot of clinicians would agree that in terms of perks, we need to have free CEUs and pdhs of some kind. Maybe not all of them. People have to understand that those things do cost money to produce. They take a long time if they're done well, it's a lot, so you need to pay our educators their value to educate you, for sure, I I'm not saying that educators should be expected to work for free, to provide free CEUs and pdhs, but structure the membership fee in such a way that it helps fund that. So that would be another really good perk that I think members would love to have.

Preston Lewis 27:45
Yeah, the culture of a new organization, the first thing it's no more gatekeeping, no more CEU cartels, where, you know, big name providers get approved if your content is evidence based, then you get a seat at the table, period. It's not because you paid for some membership up front or some sort of fee, or you, you know, kiss the ass of some person that's, uh, you know, making 500 plus a year. You actually just can stand up and deliver something that's a true and proven product.

Jeanette Benigas 28:16
How about no more credential shaming? If your state license says you can practice. We say, Welcome, come on in. You're good enough for us. The state license, I think, would be enough.

Preston Lewis 28:28
Well, you've proven that you are an SLP, and you, you know, you earn that respect. You went to school, you got a state license, you passed your practice, you did some sort of the clinical experience to get there, and at that point quit shaming people over, you know, little certificates. Have a certificate if you want, make that something that has even higher rigor, that shows that you did something else in your field. There's nothing wrong with that. That's a good thing, that can be very rewarding. But to, you know, say, well, you're on this side of the line because you paid your 300 plus bucks a year, or you're 250 or however, the hell much it's going to be next year. It's being an asshole. Don't do it. Yeah, it's, it seems so simple when you break it down and you imagine it at Genesis, to try to treat everyone with respect and not so much that they're joining like a country club. That's what it feels like has for years.

Jeanette Benigas 29:23
So what you're saying is we would dismantle elitism. We would stop idolizing those letters after people's names, you know, the letters of the PhD, the slpd, and then down from there, we'd we'd stop prioritizing that over actual clinical impact, actual impact in changing the lives of the people we're serving. I know some excellent SLP, DS, who would do a great job teaching in our academic system, but can't get jobs because as. Says that the PhD is the terminal degree, and all that is, I'm sorry, I'm going to call it out right now. All it is is actual gatekeeping and job protection for those of us that have PhDs, because if we open up those seats at the table to people with slpds, there are less jobs at the table for the PhDs, and the PhDs are the ones making the decisions. I'm calling it out right now because slpds have to go to school almost as long as PhDs, and a PhD is not a teaching degree. It's a research degree. They don't teach us how to teach so an slpd That's a clinical degree, it's a clinical leadership degree. Why don't you want your clinical leaders teaching your clinicians in your program? Come on. No, not right. I hate it. It's wrong. I and I have a PhD. You guys - I have a PhD.

Preston Lewis 30:55
This may sound this may sound very simplistic to some people, but I get so tickled when I see these posters or some sort of a flyer that talks about a presentation that'll take place with ASHA and also with some state associations. I'm not going to not to throw shade at you folks, but it is humorous to me when there's going to be some discussion of some clinical topic or presentation, and there are maybe six or seven invited speakers, and everybody is just, you know, CCC, SLP, CCC, SLP. And there's this kind of boring sameness to it, as if we're all just kind of churned out of this factory. And maybe tell me something real quick about the setting that somebody works in, or, hell, I don't even care, just wherever they're from, maybe where they went to college. There's, it has sort of a bizarre kind of Orwellian kind of thing where we're all just kind of put into this column because we paid this money and we got this certificate by what the hell does it really mean? We paid our money, you know, pass the state license. It really doesn't have any meaning. So it looks strange to me when I see this thing and just this computer generated sameness. I don't know, maybe that's me. That's an observation that I have, but it you know, not only does it look bizarre, it looks boring, AF.

Jeanette Benigas 32:09
it also results in a lot of inbreeding of information. We're not opening our field and our minds up to people or experiences outside of what's happening in our own little silo. I have an interdisciplinary specialization in aging that I took as part of my doctoral program. I took 36 credit hours of coursework outside of the speech department. It was life changing, even if I would have never finished my degree, that education alone changed me as a clinician, forever, forever getting experiences outside of what we do to help grow your own knowledge is very valuable. I'm going to tell you someone else who has done that well is my friend Tara Sumter, with seeds of learning all of our peds people out there, I'm probably like, I could probably spit to her house right now. I think I'm pretty close to where she lives. I should have given her a call, but she has been educated outside of speech pathology. By the way, she doesn't have her CCC either. She has a thriving education business. She has a thriving private practice, and she and I have talked a lot of what she believes in, and the tenants of what she does in terms of executive functioning for kids is very applicable to the dementia community. So with my doctoral program, although I appear to be very heavily educated in dysphagia, I actually have way more dementia education. And so most of my dissertation focused on dementia. And so the types of treatments that I know work for that population is exactly what she's applying. And she does that because she didn't get educated in our field. And that is something that Asha does right at this point. They allow any professional development to count for renewal of their certificate product, however, it's where the states are getting it wrong. There are a lot of states that require Asha approved CEUs, which are ridiculous. States need to open up learning to any related coursework in or outside of the field, and I think that's something that in my association, I would make sure seats were doing because it is so important for us to think outside of the box and learn what other professionals are doing, because half the time we're not doing it right anyway. Okay, thick and liquids. No straw rule. I mean, this is my in my experience with my. If you know, giving them three words and asking them to repeat it back five minutes later, that doesn't fix their memory problem. That's assessment. Come on, okay, we're not doing it right anyway. Yeah, I think that's really important. That's sorry I really went off on a soapbox there, like I will take a step down.

Preston Lewis 35:19
Glad you did. I think, can we shift into, we could say tongue in cheek, but totally serious. How about the redonkulous from the realistic? Well, our new organization, the things that they maybe would do and don't do, this is going to be fun. How about, I don't know, you wouldn't pay $50 for a reprint on a, you know, something. We'll just email it to you. Maybe even, you know, send a sticker with it. I don't know.

Jeanette Benigas 35:44
I love that. You know, when people order T shirts from, not from, like the main thing, but I always order a couple extra. I'm gonna give this away. I send a sticker with the T shirts. When they order from our extra stash, they get a sticker too. So I love a good sticker in my life. Yes, they would get a we are SLPs

Preston Lewis 36:04
It's about having it's about having fun swag, Harken backs. It's because some people understand this. If you watch the show, we don't need, you know, just the same bland logos and dull crap that gets sent out that looks like lumen from severance. Come on, people have to know what I'm talking about here, because it's really, it's kind of dreary. It has this just Death Star, kind of old empire sort of feel. How about something fun, something new, something bright. Because, I mean, let's face it, it's hard right now out there, we've got a lot of folks that are suffering, so Yeah, throw in something fresh. Wave some of your petty ass fees that you've been charging. And Jeanette, I know there's something every SLP has every year that would be nice to be acknowledged. What's that?

Jeanette Benigas 36:49
A birthday!!! We'd send a cake, yeah? Maybe not. No, we wouldn't send a cake, but maybe a message or a card. Yeah? Like my insurance girl says a little postcard every year, something, it's something, a calendar, anything, you know, the men of SLP calendar. That was very sexist of me, I'm sorry.

Preston Lewis 37:15
Yeah, and we're having fun with it. But also, you know, if we mentioned it earlier in the pod, talking about mental health care right now, and putting some of us in touch with the kind of help that we can need that's out there. Maybe even partnering with some therapy providers that are out there for us rather than just crying in our car. Maybe we could call somebody and try to unburden ourselves from some of the tough stuff that we're dealing with. Yeah, that would be a really cool feature.

Jeanette Benigas 37:42
Yeah, that would be a really cool feature to have. You still have to have the licensing, you know, telepractice kind of thing happening, but having access to maybe a nationwide therapy portal where people could go on and get some therapy or mental health support in that capacity from someone licensed in their state. I don't think we could fund therapy forever and ever and ever, but giving every member so many hours per year to check in or if something happens that I think is very valuable, that's how we'd roll.

Preston Lewis 38:15
I'll get into another nitty gritty thing that goes back to convention. How about no more awards for people who haven't treated a patient in a couple of decades, because that's just basically a plastic banana. And finally, if you're going to have people that take the time to build beautiful presentations and they fly several hours to come to a convention to try to uplift your profession, don't charge them a damn admittance fee when you've got, you know, the Grand Ballroom catering going on for some of the people on the top, that's, that's so backwards thinking. It's so Marie Antoinette. Let them eat cake. Stop it. Don't do it. Our organization wouldn't do it. That's where you have to just kind of look at yourself in a mirror, and, you know, you have that moment, where am I the asshole? Yeah, you are. If you're doing stuff like that, sorry. You've got people that are putting so much great content out there, and then you're going to charge them the fee. I was in sports broadcasting that would be like I thought we're going to go cover a basketball tournament as an announcer or as a sports writer, and all of a sudden they made me buy a damn ticket. No, you're providing a service to something. You're adding to the experience by giving great profiles to something. Stop it. Don't do that. It's dumb.

Jeanette Benigas 39:22
Yeah, I would even say not so much. Dues that are income based. But we've got a population of people in this career who have babies, who physically have the babies, or are partnered with someone who has a baby, and while our dues are either pay or don't in or out, there's no criteria. There's no reinstatement fee. Perhaps when or you know, you sandwich generation, you're a care partner of people aging in your family, and you're taking time away from work, but you still want to be plugged into. The organization that brings you value, maybe, dues are 50% off for a certain amount of time, for the year, after you have a baby, or after your spouse has a baby, or your partner Mom's got some kind of something or other, or, you know, you have a child with an illness, you're not working okay, dues are 50% for for some amount of time to really recognize that membership is valuable. We value the people in our organization, and also life happens. Life happens. And so if you're not working, and truly, this is not an organization that would be charging $29 for dues, it would probably be more like two or $300 for dues. So scaling that back to 150 bucks, I think that goes a long way.

Preston Lewis 40:51
It's all about the value. And if you are providing something that's a value and your membership believes in it, then perhaps you could net something that jumps up even maybe to 500 but again, there has to be that value there. And right now it's just it. Sometimes it looks like what am I paying for? It feels dirty.

Jeanette Benigas 41:07
Hey everybody, because I was sitting in a supply closet and Preston was sitting in the rain near the airport. This is where I lost him. Thankfully, there was only 10 minutes left of unedited podcast content. There are a few things that I want to leave in, so I'm gonna go ahead and keep editing this. You're just not gonna hear Preston again. It'll make sense. Just know I didn't kick him out. He was clearly still there. I was nodding my head. I was having a full conversation. I just lost his video and audio feed. So enjoy the rest of the podcast.

One more before we start to wrap up, because I am on a time limit here. How about a podcast that tells the truth every week we already have that we're already starring in that.

And this is the part where Preston queued me up to read all of the comments that you all had left us that morning on social media about what you all would like to see in an alternative membership association.

I have it pulled up ready to go, so I'm just gonna read down. We've already covered some of these. We wrote this before. I posted this morning, and it was a last minute thought. So if you didn't see it, maybe I'll repost a lot of them, but this is what some of our fearless fixers said, successful lobbyists. Free CEUs, mentorship, availability. Free CEUs, help, advocating for higher rates and fair case loads, easy access to research and CEUs, Oh, easy access to research. That's one we didn't say. Preston a real option for those of us taking a break. I'm five years into raising my babies separate from CCC, which must be for life after no we just wouldn't have a CCC must include free CEUs, advocacy, advocacy, advocacy, with transparency, CEUs that are free with membership, transparency about lobbying efforts and how to participate free or discounted, CEUs as well as lobbyists that advocate for higher reimbursement, caseload caps, etc. Sounds like we were right on the money Preston. We know our peeps. We know, um, yeah, all right. So if this little fire in you good. It means you're ready to start fixing so fixers are already doing the work across the country. We're collaborating with many of them via the state team. So if you're interested, if you're listening, consider this your invitation to join your state team. We are slow to launch those teams, just because it takes our manpower. We're really squeezing this in at night, especially we have trouble with those west coasters. Most of us are east coasters. So if we launch a team on the West Coast, that means we are staying up really late to do it. We're very slow to do this, we take we launch one state at a time, once we're sure these states are solid, then we start launching more. So we have a list of fixers on deck with their team leaders ready to go. As soon as we have the manpower on our end, those will be launched. We have another list of fixers in their states that are ready to go, but they don't have a leader. So we're still looking for some leaders in states. And then we have states, unfortunately, that just don't have enough yet to launch a team. So we have a special email states at fix slp.com, if you're interested in getting plugged in or seeing where your state is at in process, just email your name and your state. That's all we need, and we'll get back to you and either connect you or get you on the list, or, you know, let you know where we're at and what we need. So this is it. Come join us. Come collaborate. Start a conversation. Or start asking in your state, why doesn't this exist? Why don't these things exist? Because now we've imagined it. Now it needs to be created. It's just not going to be us right now that does it? So come on. Guys, somebody go, go do this. We'll support you. But yeah, I think probably, ultimately, probably someday, there will be an alternate SLP Association. Audiologists have already done it. Physical Therapists are working on that right now. I am in their Facebook group. They've got a board. They're launching. It's been really fun to watch this alternate PT Association grow. Can't imagine. OT is far behind. So it might not be happening now, but I bet it's down the road. So we're here to support it. We support all efforts. Just because we're not collab, collaborating or leading, doesn't mean you can't do it. It's going to take all of us, you guys. So I've got to I've got to go. I got to get out of my little supply closet here and go do some paperwork. So we're just going to say, Thanks for fixing it. We'll see you next week!

Transcribed by https://otter.ai