"Group as a Source of Resilience and Change"

American Group Psychotherapy Association

Annual Meeting
February 28-March 5, 2011

Sheraton New York Hotel & Towers
New York City

Continuous Online Group (COG)

AGPA is pleased to announce a Continuous Online Group to be held in conjunction with its 2011 Annual Meeting.

The task of this group will be to provide experience with and learning about online large group dynamics. As indicated by its name, it will stay open "24/7" and its members will interact electronically. One unique feature of online groups is eliminating the need to be in the same place at the same time, and this group will begin before and end after the Annual Meeting, will be open to AGPA members who do not go to New York, and will not preclude attending any other Annual Meeting event. No meetings in person of this group will be convened. As in other online groups, group members will have the option of using pseudonyms and the messages they post will automatically be recorded and made available to them. Participants will also have a Member Lounge that the co-leaders will not access.

This event will consist of 3 phases: an introduction by the co-leaders on February 24, an experiential phase February 24-March 7, and a review and application phase March 8-9. During the review and application phase, the group will reflect on and try to understand the experiential phase and compare the dynamics of this group with those of other groups, both online and face-to-face. Participants who complete the event will be awarded six CE credits.

Participants will not need to be technically sophisticated. They will be able to connect using any computer on the Internet, including those in the AGPA cybercafe. Participants in previous years will need to register again.

For those who attend the 2011 Annual Meeting, registration for the COG is gratis. To register, use the meeting registration form and check the Continuous Online Group box. Registrants for the 2011 Meeting will not be charged. For those not attending the 2011 Annual Meeting, the registration fee for the COG is $90 for members and $180 for nonmembers.

The co-leaders will be:

Claudia Byram, Ph.D., CGP, a clinician in private practice who has been working with groups in the systems-centered approach since 1990 and leads systems-centered training events as well as communications training and consultation in the SAVI (System for Analyzing Verbal Interaction) model.

Robert Hsiung, M.D., a Clinical Associate of the Department of Psychiatry and Behavioral Neuroscience, a staff psychiatrist at the Student Counseling and Resource Service, and an Associate of the MacLean Center for Clinical Medical Ethics at the University of Chicago, a co-founder of the International Society for Mental Health Online, the editor of E-Therapy: Case Studies, Guiding Principles, and the Clinical Potential of the Internet (Norton, 2002), and the founder of Psycho-Babble, a large public online peer support group.

Jeffrey D. Roth, M.D., CGP, FAGPA, an addiction psychiatrist who directs Group Relations Conferences, the president of the Chicago Center for the Study of Groups and Organizations, the editor of the Journal of Groups in Addiction and Recovery, and the medical director of WorkingSobriety.com.

This is an exciting direction for AGPA. Groups are proliferating online, and while most online groups are not therapy groups, group therapists are likely to find this a stimulating experience.