Thank You For Your Advocacy

I am truly humbled and feeling very grateful right now…

Summary of the Social Media Advocacy Project

This month’s social media advocacy project started with a phone call last December. It was a conference call with music therapists on the Florida State Task Force…a call I wasn’t even on! Somehow the idea started to ask music therapy bloggers and podcasters to highlight advocacy for a month. We chose this month because many states begin their legislative sessions in January and we wanted to build up some support and excitement for this new legislative session.

I sent an email a couple weeks after that call to all the music therapy bloggers and podcasters I knew, outlining the project and inviting them to join. At that point, 20 jumped on board. We were excited and began planning our talking points and scheduling our podcast interviews.

The project officially launched in January. During the first week, a friend of mine, Kat who runs to fabulous blog Rhythm for Good, recommended three other music therapy bloggers to contact. I did and they jumped on board.

As the month progressed, I received inquiries from half a dozen other music therapy bloggers who wanted to participate in this project. They, too, joined.

All in all, we had 3 music therapy podcasts and 26 music therapy bloggers participate in this project who have, to date, contributed a total of 37 articles or interviews this month. That’s over one article a day!

Latest Articles to Check Out

If you haven’t already, I invite you to read the last couple of articles from this blog. A couple weeks ago, I defined and described the State Recognition Operational Plan and last week I posted a YouTube video on music therapy advocacy.

In addition, here is a round-up of the latest music therapy advocacy articles to hit the internet:

• Developing Melodies shared an article on music therapy advocacy
• Mundana Music Therapy shared Judy Simpson’s article on advocacy and government relations
• All Things Healing shared the press release about the social media advocacy project as well as writing her own article on music therapy advocacy
• Rhythmic Mind talked about advocacy from the perspective of a “new” music therapist
• Involve Me Music wrote this article about music therapy advocacy
• Soundscape Music Therapy challenged music therapists to share their story
• Kalani wrote an article about music therapy and advocacy on his Kalani Music site
• Beyond the Music MT addressed current events and how they can help with our advocacy efforts.
• More with Music shared her thoughts on “what is music therapy” as well as part one of Dena Register’s advocacy article
• Notable Musique wrote an article titled “Advocacy and Research: The Best of Friends”

Finally…Some Thanks

To all those who wrote articles…THANK YOU!

To all those who suggested other bloggers to contact…THANK YOU!

To all those who contacted me throughout the month, wanting to be involved…THANK YOU!

To all those who shared articles on Facebook and retweeted those on Twitter…THANK YOU!

And to all those who have read and followed these articles and podcast episodes (yes, that means you!)…THANK YOU!!!

Tagged as: Advocacy, Gratitude, Music Therapy