Welcome Message from President Sandra S. Pimentel
It is my pleasure to welcome you to the 58th Annual Convention of the Association for Behavioral and Cognitive Therapies in the historic host city of Philadelphia, with our theme, Opening Our Doors: Inspiring Community Engagement, Advocacy, and Innovation to Advance CBT. Rich in revolutionary and civil rights history, Philadelphia welcomes us and has its own historical center of greatness in CBT clinical science, practice, and training programs: Temple University, Philadelphia College of Osteopathic Medicine, the University of Pennsylvania, Drexel University, LaSalle University, and of course, the Beck Institute. Having done my own training here (go Owls!), this feels like a homecoming to me, and I hope to you, too—with ABCT as your professional home.
Speaking of history … after 45 years serving as our Executive Director, in June Mary Jane Eimer retired from ABCT. Under her dedicated leadership, ABCT has grown in its membership, publications, scientific reach, financial stability, and global visibility. She has been a steward of our field’s history and steady hand during turbulent times. For a real history lesson please listen to the ABCT x Sanity podcast that features her! We celebrated M.J.’s retirement in June of this year (see the June edition of tBT), and we will continue with a deserving farewell at this year’s convention. Please swing by the exhibits hall to sign the gratitude card! M.J. devoted her career to ABCT, especially to its student members, and it is such a fitting tribute to her legacy that our Board of Directors approved the creation of the Mary Jane Eimer Student Convention Scholarship that will provide free registration and travel funds for 20 student members annually. I personally would like to thank Dr. David Barlow for his immense generosity and for leading this effort with past governance members to have this award reach endowed status.
And now ABCT opens its doors to Dr. Courtney White, our new Executive Director! What a joy it has been to get to know and work with Dr. White these last few months. He brings decades of experience in association leadership and health equity, and we have already felt the impact of his innovative vision. This is his first ABCT convention, so be sure to say hello!
In many ways, our change in executive leadership captures another theme I hope has been evident this year and will be at this convention—that we honor and appreciate our history, highlighting significant forebears and milestones, even as we welcome inspired ideas, progress, and modernization. Do you know Mary Cover Jones yet? This year we have been celebrating the 100th anniversary of her seminal works establishing the foundations of behavior therapy. Check this out. Dr. Jones is the “Mother of Behavior Therapy,” having received that designation 50 years ago, right here in Philadelphia at the 1st Temple University Conference in Behavior Therapy and Behavior Modification! To commemorate this inspired legacy, we established the Mary Cover Jones “Partners in the Studies of Human Lives” Award and Lecture Series—as her own life’s work was filled with incisiveness, elegant innovation, and community partnering, echoing our convention theme.
There’s more! In an extraordinarily meaningful partnership with ABCT, the team at statues.com, and the family of Dr. Mary Cover Jones, she will now be featured alongside other historically impactful women—such as Eleanor Roosevelt, Ida B. Wells, and Alice Paul (fellow Jersey girl!)— as part of the SculptHER collection. You will be able to purchase your very own Dr. Mary Cover Jones statue, with proceeds going to her named award. How cool is that? I have infinite gratitude for Dr. Anne Marie Albano who lit this initial spark of appreciation and joined forces with kindred enthusiasm to make these tributes happen.
As we appreciate our past, we also look to our future. Where are my kid people at?!? Our youth are talking about and taking charge of mental health matters in ways that “feel” different than even a generation ago. With a hearty nod to our future generations, this year’s convention will feature our inaugural Youth Community Leaders Award, where we will celebrate five inspirational young people positively impacting their communities. Please be sure to join us at the Friday-night Awards Ceremony to learn about them. Establishing and promoting this award has been a special partnership of our Local Arrangements, Program, and Dissemination, Implementation, and Community Engagement Committees, with special thanks to Dr. Abby Bailin. By distributing our nominations throughout our host cities each year, ABCT is further opening its doors as a resource to new and younger communities!
As we continue to expand ABCT’s own community engagement work and fostering meaningful connections when we descend upon our convention cities, we will be hosting our first ABCT Day of Service. This initiative, part of a collaborative effort between our program committee and CHANGE leader Elliott Weinstein, will allow members to volunteer part of their time with local organizations doing meaningful work in the Philadelphia community. Stay tuned for more details! Another group CHANGE leader project that will be featured at our Philadelphia convention is the ABCT Underrepresented Scholars Meet and Greet. Coordinated by Jasmin Brooks Stephens, alongside Derrecka Boykin and Regina Musicaro, this breakfast event will bring together diverse mentors to discuss topics that impact our underrepresented younger members. A special thank you to our immediate past president, Dr. Jill Ehrenreich-May, who has championed the CHANGE Leaders’ program with dedicated facilitators, Drs. Donte Bernard and Ana Bridges.
As the great, and my oft-cited, NY Yankees philosopher Yogi Berra would say, “You can observe a lot by watching.” Indeed, and by listening! We have been opening our doors, eyes, and our ears to you, our members, via your postconference feedback evaluations, individual meetings, and meeting with many of our SIGs. Thank you for your investment in ABCT. Here are a few direct examples of your investment: (1) we are working to redesign the layout and timing of the SIG Cocktail and Poster session to be more inviting and inclusive (thanks, Autism Spectrum and Developmental Disabilities SIG!); (2) there will be options to recycle badges and lanyards along with reducing waste and other environmentally friendly initiatives (thanks, Climate and Mental Health SIG!); (3) we are piloting a new presentation format to increase convention content for our advanced clinicians to get consultation on their most challenging cases (thanks to several clinician colleagues for speaking up!); and (4) we nearly quintupled the number of Spotlights on Research that were accepted featuring important new science for our attendees (thanks to our clinical science colleagues for speaking up!). Also—did you happen to catch our very first virtual Spring Summit, Translating Neuroscience Into CBT Practice: Current Opportunities and Future Directions? We brought together neuroscientists, clinical scientists, and clinicians for a full interactive day of dialogue, which we hope to continue in Philly (thanks, Neurocognitive Therapies/Translational Research SIG!).
I would like to highlight two very special events featured on the Thursday calendar. In partnership with the Beck Institute as it celebrates its 30th anniversary and aligned with our theme, we will be hosting a free event for community clinicians on Recovery-Oriented Cognitive Therapy for serious mental illness. This approach began with the vision of Dr. Aaron Beck and Dr. Arthur Evans, former Commissioner of the Philadelphia Department of Behavioral Health and Intellectual disAbilities Services, of bringing evidence-based care to those who most needed it. On Thursday we open our doors to local practitioners, with deep appreciation for our presenters Dr. Judy Beck, President of the Beck Institute, Dr. Arthur Evans, current Chief Executive Officer of the American Psychological Association, and Dr. Paul Grant, Director of Research, Innovation, and Practice at the Center for Recovery-Oriented Cognitive Therapy. The second Thursday event puts the Phil in Philadelphia as the Child and Adolescent Anxiety SIG will be hosting a Festschrift to honor the distinguished career of Dr. Philip Kendall, pioneer in CBT for youth anxiety disorders, clinical science innovator, ABCT past president, and beloved mentor to so, so many, including me! So, so many more Coping Cats in the world. His impact is immeasurable, and this is sure to be an extraordinary tribute.
There’s more! Our meeting will feature three keynote addresses and one extraordinary panel: (1) Dr. Cathy Cresswell, Professor of Developmental Clinical Psychology at Oxford University and, among her many vital roles, leader of the UKRI Research Network Plus initiative, Emerging Minds: Action for Child Mental Health, is an innovative scientist on the power and possibilities of digital healthcare; (2) Dr. Jennifer Havens, Chair of the Department of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry at NYU Langone, is a renowned child psychiatrist at the forefront of optimizing systems—from hospitals to statewide mental health offices—and delivers premier care for our most vulnerable youth. She is a fierce crusader sure to fire up the crowd!; (3) Dr. Stefan Hofmann, the Alexander von Humboldt Professor for Translational Clinical Psychology at the Phillips University of Marburg, Germany, and recipient of the 2023 ABCT Lifetime Achievement Award, will present his incredible body of work with scientific contributions in clinical applications of cognitive-behavioral processes, emotion research, and neuroscience; and (4) Doug Middleton, retired professional football player, will participate in a moderated discussion, “From Professional Football Player to Mental Health Champion — Doug Middleton Shares His Story of Resilience and Advocacy,” describing his powerful journey from professional athlete to mental health advocate and founder of nonprofit, Dream the Impossible, whose mission is to increase mental health awareness, reduce stigma, and to reverse the rates of death by suicide, especially in communities of color.
Are you excited yet? Along with all of this and our outstanding ticketed sessions, I invite you to our general program, which will include 134 symposia, 41 panel discussions, 23 clinical round tables, 24 mini-workshops, 3 clinical grand rounds, and 1,394 posters! (ABCT historical side note: Among our more popular offerings today, mini-workshops were added to the program several years ago following feedback from our members wanting more targeted clinical content, with a nod of thanks to Drs. Jonathan Grayson and Barbara Kamholz.) I am enormously grateful to the hundreds of program reviewers who reviewed our massive 1,863 submissions as I am to Dr. Tina Boisseau and our tireless Convention Committee, whose work on this conference began soon after the last one ended.
Speaking of tireless, our Convention Manager, Stephen Crane, is nothing short of remarkable in his expertise, organization, consideration, and responsiveness on all fronts. If you see him in Philly, hug him, high-five him, or treat him to a 100 Grand bar. Stephen’s work is characteristic of ABCT’s entire central office team, who work behind-the-scenes on so many facets of our Annual Convention and all of our operations. I am beyond grateful. In this same spirit, thank you to my dear and dedicated colleagues on the Board of Directors.
One of the perks of ABCT presidenting is getting to select a Program Chair and Associate Program Chairs. Enormous, love-you-forever thanks to Drs. Muniya Khanna, Abby Bailin, and Maria Alba for sharing this year’s vision and executing it with such a commitment to scientific rigor, inclusiveness, creativity, and professional elegance. To have such a team of smart, funny, indefatigable women with whom I got to meet regularly was such a privilege.
Welcome to Philadelphia, birthplace of democracy, bastion of public arts and murals, and most especially by its very name origin, a city of love. There is something for everyone at this convention, in our professional communities, and in this city. May I suggest the Women’s History Trail of Greater Philadelphia to learn about Harriet Tubman, Betsy Ross, and Lucretia Mott, or perhaps better yet seek out the Badass Women’s History Tour for Barbara Gittings and Ona Judge? May I suggest one of our Clinical Grand Rounds featuring three female bosses in CBT, DBT, and ACT or a research spotlight and symposia featuring some new frontiers for CBTers in climate and mental health science and advocacy? Or perhaps a more conventional but forever iconic run up the Art Museum steps with the Rocky theme playing?—may this ABCT convention be that kind of exhilarating and inspiring for you.
Sandra S. Pimentel, Ph.D.
President
