KCA Conference 2013 Highlights

Counselor of the Year Awards

KCA Service Award Winner - Penny Nolen (KCA Secretary from 2004-2013)

Bill Braden "Behind the Scenes" Award - Tamara Hurst, LPCA

(Photo not available)

Graduate Student/New Counselor Award - Shana Goggins (KMHCA Secretary)

Alumni Volunteer of the Year - Kathy Davis, KY Counseling Alumni Association

Counselor Educator of the Year - Dr. Jason Bluemlein, LIndsey Wilson College

Mental Health Counselor of the Year - Christopher Griffith, LPCC, Christian Appalachian Project

School Counselor of the Year - Michelle Sircy, JCPS

KCA Lifetime Achievement Award - Frances Prater

   Frances actually began her career as a math teacher but soon transitioned into her life’s calling, a school counselor.  Always looking for ways to strengthen her skills and develop new competencies, she soon became involved with the leadership of KCA.  She successfully moved up the officer track, making innovations along the way that helped KCA become an even better organization.  After serving many years as an officer – she gave 20 more years to KCA as an administrative assistant.  That’s double service counting her husband’s time as amazingly, Frances and Dillard contributed a combined equivalent of 40 years of service to the Kentucky Counseling Association.

In her role, Frances donated countless hours to make sure the conference included highly qualified presenters and Keynoters and to meet the professional development and training needs of the membership.  She made sure we had opportunities to have fun too!  Her attention to detail is legendary.

Frances Prater led KCA’s transition into the electronic era and helped establish a tradition of excellence that won many awards from ACA for membership services.  Throughout Southern Region she was the “go-to-person” for many years on ways to improve your conference and is still remembered for her leadership skills.  She, along with Dr. Bill Braden, helped mentor numerous emerging leaders and KCA officers.  All the while she was a faithful advocate for the counselors in her region and supporter of all KCA activities.  She and Dillard are also known for their “happy feet” even after long hours of coordinating the conferences.

We could never name all the ways that Frances has contributed to the success of KCA, but she certainly is deserving of the KCA Lifetime Achievement Award.

Kearney Campbell Award 

“Dr. Kearney Campbell was Director of the Division of Guidance Services from 1960 – 1971.  He was known as an outstanding educator, counselor and friend.  His leadership was recognized not only in Kentucky but throughout the nation.  Each year at the Annual conference, KCA presents the Kearney Campbell Memorial Plaque to a member of the organization who has been selected as making the greatest contribution to the promotion of counseling in the Commonwealth of Kentucky.  Other criteria considered includes: length of active service, professionalism and familiarity to the current membership.  The Selection Committee is made up of the KCA Division Presidents and the immediate past recipient of the award who serves as chairperson.  

2013 Kearney Campbell Award Winner - Dr. Daya Sandhu (file photo)

   Dr. Sandhu has truly established an ongoing, career commitment to Counselor Education in the role of a faculty member at the state, national, and international levels.  He has consistently made professional presentations at KCA for the last 20 years and his unselfish dedication to our association and profession is truly praiseworthy. Furthermore, in January 2008, Dr. Sandhu was appointed to the Kentucky Board of Licensed Professional Clinical Counselors and is presently serving his second term as reappointed by the Governor, which represents another prime example of his service to the profession of counseling. To say that Dr. Sandhu is a prolific, outstanding researcher, a creative scholar, and a great professor dedicated to teaching and quality education is an understatement. He is one of the national leaders and experts on several subjects including multicultural counseling and has published 12 textbooks, 70 book chapters, and more than 50 journal articles. The varied content areas of Dr. Sandhu's publications reflect the depth and breadth of his knowledge, creativity, and diversity. His recognition as an icon in the field of multicultural counseling has taken him to a number of places in the United States and many other countries around the world to share his knowledge, skills, and expertise through professional presentations. He has delivered over 250 local, regional, national, and international presentations. Teaching is an important part of Dr. Sandhu's professional life and he takes it with utmost sincerity and seriousness. He brings many specialties to his teaching to include: multicultural counseling, school counseling, and career counseling. It is these three areas that have become a focus of Dr. Sandhu's major interest, both in teaching and research. Regarding professional service and leadership, Dr. Sandhu has held active membership in over 20 state, national, and international professional association, six of which are divisions of the American Counseling Association. He has served on its Human Rights and is International and Inter-professional Committees, served as board member of the Council for Accreditation of Counseling and Related Educational Programs (CACREP)and has held a variety of additional offices in other professional organizations of which he is a member. Dr. Sandhu has served on the editorial board of eight professional journals in the field, and guest editor for three. He has served as the National Chair of the Research and Knowledge Committee of the American Counseling Association. He also served as the National President of the Association for Multicultural Counseling and Development from 2009-2010. In one of his articles, Dr. Sandhu emphasized that "Above all, proactive counselors are highly innovative, conscientious, results-oriented, well-organized, willing to learn and are always eager to launch new initiatives to help their clients".  In reality, Dr. Sandhu himself reflects the very essence of this quote both personally and professionally. He has committed himself to strengthening, expanding, enhancing, improving, and extending the horizons of knowledge in the profession as exemplified by his outstanding body of work, his national and international activities, his reputation in the field, and the number of future professionals that he has trained. He is genuinely committed to serving the profession with strong dedication and exceptional achievement. He exceeds all demands placed upon him in an exemplary fashion and epitomizes the ideal "professional" that we all wish to become. Dr. Sandhu is certainly a worthy recipient of the KCA Kearney Campbell Award.

Conference Photos

                Susan Patterson and Helen Benningfield at Registration Desk                                

Pictured is Kaci Boyd, intern through Lindsey Wilson College, Mr. Mojo, Ms. Jade Maddox, supervisor,

and Sami Stapleton, intern through Morehead State University.

KCA President-elect Dawn Rowe and Dr. Bill Braden            Solution-Focused Brief Counseling/Dr. Jerry Sklare           Workshop led by ACA Past-President Dr. Brad Erford 

Private Practice Workshop led by Norm Dasenbrook            Jeri Harrell, Gary Steinhilber, Barry Adams and Helen      Dr. Carol Montgomery, Dr. Brad Erford and Karen Cook

                                                                                                                  Chocolate Fountain at President's Reception

Gift Share with Naomi Brahim and Renee Powell           Carol Johnson and Barry Adams with Dr. Erford        View of Audience at the General Session

             Crowd Participation at General Session                      Gift for Dr. Brad Erford from Vice-President Brahim                     Good food and fellowship at the luncheons

      Conference is a great place to renew friendships!            Joe Dell accepts certificate for ACT's sponsorship             Jade Maddox and Amy Holsinger in exhibit hall

  Dr. Wesley accepts certificate for Univ of the Cumberlands            Keynoter Gary Griesser                    First timers Sami Stapleton and Kaci Boyd with Jade

President’s Reflections of our 56^th KCA Annual Conference – Dr. Carol Montgomery

What a great time of learning and fellowship we had at our Fall Conference, October 23-25.  With a theme of “Counseling in a World of Need:  Providing Hope and Help,” we met together to attend workshop sessions, hear dynamic speakers, and to learn from each other.  Many new skills were added to our toolkits and many memories were made as friendships grew stronger and networks were forged.

A BIG THANKS to our Executive Director, Karen Cook, and Administrative Assistant, Helen Benningfield, Conference Chair and Past-President, Susan Patterson, and their Conference Committee for all their many hours of hard work for another EXCELLENT KCA Annual Conference!! 

Program Chair’s Conference Reflections – Susan Patterson, KCA Past President

A heartfelt thank you is extended to the many presenters, co-presenters, facilitators, exhibitors, sponsors, and volunteers, because without your contributions our event would not have been possible. 

Karen Cook, KCA Executive Director

Based on the conference evaluations, we count the 2013 KCA Conference a Big Success!  Special thanks to all that attended the conference and benefited from the outstanding programming and to our faithful sponsors who helped make the conference possible.  Meeting the needs of our members is very important to us!  Please check out the KCA Leader "Lines" section in this eNews to read more about the conference.

Special thanks to all our exhibitors for providing a wonderful addition to our conference.  The exhibit area provided a great place to learn about products and services and gain useful information as well as do some shopping.  Congratulations to Sue Floyd of Sue's Accessories and Gifts for winning the 2013 KCA Best of Show Exhibitor Award.

Bill Braden, KCA Associate Director

MILITARY  COUNSELING  ACADEMY: Yet another very timely innovation !!!! The counseling profession faces myriad challenges following an unprecedented decade of war that has put soldiers at risk for suicide. Further, total families are impacted by PTSD in virtually every community of the State. The Academy was an excellent beginning of preparation and provided contributions to our Online Resource Center on KYCA.org.

GRADUATE STUDENT SERVICES ACADEMY: The second year of this innovation produced an unimagined number and variation of all types at the K C A Conference.

Further, the first ever Graduate Student and New Counselor Service Center was provided in the reception area of the exhibit hall. Also, because of a great happenstance of sequence in the same session room – a partnership was formed to develop a mentoring service for graduate students and new counselors.

Jade Maddox, KCA Secretary

Kaci Boyd and Sami Stapleton were counseling interns that attended the conference as “First Timers” and were also “First Time Facilitators” with Leslie Dunn’s Aging With Attitude Workshop.  Kaci is interning through Lindsey Wilson College and Sami through Morehead State University.  The interns are from Ashland, Kentucky and are doing their internship hours with Jade Maddox, LPCC, NCC.

According to Jade, "It was great to see many familiar faces and friends at the conference where it is always great to get re-acquainted."

NOTE: Amy and Jade are featured in the photo gallery above.  Amy was an LPCA under Jade’ s Supervision and is now an LPCC and Play Therapist.

K  U  D  O  S

Ms. Shana Goggins, KMHCA Secretary, for excellence in planning and delivering the graduate student and new counselors service center;

Dr. Mary Bemker and Mr. Ric Holladay for consenting to assist in the development of mentoring services for graduate students and new counselors;

Dr. Michael Freville, former K C A Officer, and Ms Tamara Hurst, K C A Emerging Leader for developing the extensive Military Counseling Academy;

Ms. Shana Goggins and M. Panos Markopoulous for their excellent leadership of the Graduate Student Team for earning national recognition from Chi Sigma Iota’s: Exemplar Article; and ACA’s: Counseling Today’s next issue.

Silent auction contributors and participants for helping raise funds to assist emerging leaders in 2014.

All the chapters and divisions that contributed items for the Gift Share at the General Session.