Dear  

I’m writing to share with you an update from our most recent Trainees’ Advisory Council (TAC) meeting.

We met for the final time this year on Thursday 31 October, with close to 30 trainee representatives from across Australia and Aotearoa New Zealand coming together virtually.

The TAC is designed as a broader body of trainee representatives from within the College as well as those from recognised external associations of trainees. It’s a forum to raise and discuss issues between trainees at all stages of training. You can read more about the TAC and access our meeting papers and minutes here.

The key topics discussed at our October meeting were:

• Providing feedback on the Australian Medical Council’s consultation on new draft model accreditation standards and procedures for accreditation, which will help inform the College’s submission.
   
• The development of two surveys about the Psychotherapy Written Case (PWC) – one for trainees, and one for supervisors and Directors of Training. The purpose of these surveys is to identify and understand the breadth of any issues about the PWC at both local and bi-national levels.
   
• Gave feedback on improving the development of an overarching Fellowship Training Program Monitoring and Evaluation Framework.
   
• Received a verbal update on advocacy relating to changes to entry requirements for the Certificate of Advanced Training in Child and Adolescent Psychiatry.
   
• Made updates to the TAC’s regulations (describing its role and function) and TAC member position descriptions of roles.

Upcoming survey via SMS

Every trainee will soon receive a short four-question survey via SMS, to gauge the understanding and impact of the Bi-national Committee for Trainees and Trainees’ Advisory Council. This is a repeat of the survey we ran in June this year and is an AMC requirement for our College. It takes just 2 minutes, and we need as many responses as possible. You’ll get a text message from the College that is genuine, safe and is not spam. Please take the survey when you receive it.
 

Here are also some new resources to share:

• We hosted our second welcome orientation webinar in August for all new first year trainees, and just launched a new resource – Getting started as a trainee.
   
• There’s a new College Facebook page – @theRANZCP. Please follow and get involved.
   
• Our thanks to the Section of Early Career Psychiatrists for hosting the webinar ‘Transition from trainee to consultant psychiatrist: adapting to a new role’ on 13 August that’s now available to view on demand.

And remember, you can always visit the TAC webpage as well as the Bi-national Committee for Trainees webpage to find out who your local representative is and how to get in touch with them.

Kind regards,

Dr Ava Carter, 
Chair, Trainees' Advisory Council