From our CEO

The lessons we learned in the first year of the pandemic have helped us with designing the future. And despite the lockdowns and border closures, we have continued to grow and innovate. As we’ve grown accustomed to our new normal, we have been introducing changes, fresh processes and beginning new journeys. Our comprehensive program of accreditation of education providers continued, both in-person and virtually, and we have continued offering remote live proctoring of some of our exams. Due to new ways of working we capably managed increased demands on our services from overseas trained pharmacists, including those from the addition of pharmacists to Priority Migration Skilled Occupations List and the Migration Skills Incentive program.

It wasn’t just business as usual for us in our work this year. We made great progress on our project to embed cultural safety into pharmacy education and on our joint project with the Pharmacy Board of Australia (PharmBA) to support assessments during the internship year. We were excited to launch our first batch of Workplace-based assessment tools for intern pharmacists in early 2021. These tools were developed over two years, with assistance and support of the Pharmacy Board of Australia and our staff, consultants and an esteemed Technical Working Group.

Launching our Leaders in Indigenous Pharmacy Profession Education (LIPPE) Network, which we did in May this year, has been a huge highlight for me personally. This is a partnership between APC and the Council of Pharmacy Schools (CPS) and is the brainchild of our Board Director and Wiradjuri yinaa Professor Faye McMillan. Faye’s vision, along with our Indigenous Health Strategy Group members, has given us the platform to make a real difference in eliminating racism in our health professions and embedding cultural safety in pharmacy education. I wrote some reflections on this topic. At this point, I need to make a special mention here of the work of the late Dr Erica Sainsbury, who sadly passed away in December 2021. Erica was an extraordinary pharmacist and person, and her contributions to our APC work in Workplace Assessment, Accreditation and Cultural safety have left a huge legacy for our profession. Read our Tribute to Dr Erica Jane Sainsbury.

August saw the announcement of appointees to the new Independent Accreditation Committee. This Committee was set up by Health Ministers to provide independent and expert advice on accreditation reform and other National Scheme accreditation. We welcomed the new Committee and its Chair, Professor Andrew Wilson. We have been invited to provide materials and information to this committee and look forward to continuing to work closely with them to continue to improve accreditation within the National Scheme.

In July I completed my 2 terms as Chair of the Health Professions Accreditation Collaborative (HPAC) Forum. It was a privilege to lead the 15 accreditation authorities during this time, and I am grateful to each of them for their support. I continue to sit on the HPAC Forum as a member, and am proud to be leading a team with a research project on Interprofessional Education for the Forum. I have also recently been appointed to the National Scheme Interprofessional Statement of intent working group.

I need to thank our key partners, the Pharmacy Board of Australia (PharmBA) and the Council of Pharmacy Schools (CPS). To publicly acknowledge our complementary roles and collaborations, this past year I gave joint presentations with their leaders at international and national events; with Brett Simmonds (PharmBA Chair) at the CLEAR Education conference, and with Debra Rowett (CPS President) at the Universities Australia Health Professions Education Standing Group (HPESG) Workshop.

I am delighted that our A/Prof Sue Kirsa was reappointed to our APC Board and re-elected as Chair for a further term earlier this year. Prof Sarah Roberts-Thomson was also re-elected as Deputy Chair and, I thank them both and the whole Board for their support of me and my team. We are very lucky to have such a skilled and committed Board leading APC. We have set an exciting new set of Strategic Directions under their guidance which will set us up well for the future. We are also so blessed to have so many wonderful pharmacists, subject matter experts, consultants, community members and allies who contribute to our committees, assessment panels, exam writing and working groups. Without you we could not do what we do.

Finally, I want to thank my amazing APC team, who are an absolute pleasure to work with. I am so grateful to each of them and having successfully been able to surround myself with such capable people, we have achieved so much. I also want to acknowledge the fantastic work of two of my team who left this year; Jeanne Edwards who after 6 years as my Executive Officer has taken a well-earned retirement, and Gabrielle Sutton, who had worked for me in APC in two stints over the past 9 years.

Our 40th anniversary is this year and I am so proud to have been able to part of APC for a part of this. My first connections were back as a New Zealand nominee to the Accreditation Committee nearly 20 years ago, so I am looking forward to connecting with our APC “pharmily” at our celebrations in November. It is important for us to honour our past as we look forward, and I am confident that APC will continue to have a bright future.