Please note that this questionnaire is entirely voluntary and no answer will have any bearing whatsoever on your application. We are simply seeking honest and accurate information so we can assess the position of the profession as a whole. Feel free to expand on your answers on separate paper, and also feel free to answer only those items you wish or you can answer this entire questionnaire on-line.

YOUR PRACTICE

What “brand” of Structural Integration do you practice, or what is your school affiliation?

How many years have you practiced SI, and what was your profession before?

How many clients, approximately, have you taken through a ten-session series?

How many sessions constitute your basic series, if not 10?

Do you take photos or perform any other structural documentation?

How many SI sessions do you provide per average month, and what is your charge?

What percentage of your practice is 3rd party payment (reimbursed by insurance)?

Do you identify yourself to the public primarily as an SI practitioner, or through another modality?

Are you nationally certified through NCBTMB? Does your state/country require licensing?

Do you teach structural bodywork or SI? If so, where and in what capacity?

YOUR TRAINING

Primary teacher(s) and number of hours of training:

In what areas do you feel your training was strong? Lacking?

Does your school/program offer continuing professional support?

ETHICS/PROFESSIONAL BEHAVIOR

Have you ever had a formal complaint lodged against you for unethical behavior?

Has your license/certification ever been revoked?

Do you feel confident in handling ethical/professional issues that arise in an SI practice?

YOUR FEELINGS ABOUT SI WORK

What separates SI from other forms of bodywork/intervention?

Is SI primarily a medical / psychotherapeutic / spiritual healing / educational modality for you?

What future would you like to see for SI?

MEMBERSHIP INTERESTS

What types of services would you like to see IASI offer?

What are your concerns about IASI?

If IASI held a profession-wide symposium, meeting in late 2005, would you:

____Definitely attend ___Might attend ___Unlikely attend ___Definitely not be interested

Are you willing to help get IASI started by joining a working group?

Tony Zimkowski, Ph.D.: President of the Board, Chair of the Ethics Committee. Tony is taking applications for Ethics Committee

Tom Myers: Vice President of the Board, Chair of the Certification Exam Committee. The committee is composed of Jeff Linn (GSI), Cornelia Rossi (RI), Henry Kagey III (IPSB), Barbara Drummond (RI), Garry Genna (CORE), Karen Bolesky (SOMA), Mark Gray (Hellerwork®), and Sol Peterson (Mana).

Marilyn Beech: Secretary/Treasurer of the Board, CEO. Contact Marilyn for information about IASI, general input, membership problems, questions, volunteer positions.

Buddy Frank: Board Member, Chair of the Continuing Education committee. Buddy is looking for volunteers to sit on the committee. Please contact him or call the IASI toll-free line for more information.

Charles Dangler: Board Member, Chair of Legislation/Licensing Committee.

Sara Uckun: IASI secretary.

Michael Vilain: Webmaster.

Libby Eason-Sener: General support, newsletter production.

Jim Arkison: Contact person for the International Membership. Get ahold of Jim if you have questions, concerns or input for how IASI can be of service to non-US members.

Patrick Wroblewski: Chair of the Research/Education Committee. Contact Patrick if you have ideas on a research project or outreach education.

Questions, Answered
(continued from Page 1)

On a practical level, IASI membership offers access to liability insurance, to a wide spectrum of continuing and advanced education courses, and to a variety of opportunities for becoming better informed about the history and new developments in your chosen field. These include regular newsletters, yearly symposia, yearbooks, and access to historical archives. Being listed with IASI will also bring you referrals from other practitioners and interested consumers who access the IASI directory.

I just invested thousands of dollars and many months to get certified by my school’s program—why should I spend more money and submit myself to a credentialing process to gain yet one more piece of paper?

Good question! You have earned your school’s certification —and no one can take that away from you. IASI membership is, in one sense, a voluntary ‘extra’. On the other hand, IASI membership links you to the larger field — not just the graduates from your particular school, but the wider profession as a whole. Only IASI represents this larger group —and by joining, you align yourself with dedicated professionals who want to see Structural Integration succeed and develop.

Most professions have ‘boards’—credentialing processes that are independently administered to provide competency assurance and accountability. Doctors, lawyers, accountants, nurses, PT’s, and countless other professions establish associations designed to assure basic skills, monitor continuing education compliance, and promote ethical practice. If Structural Integration practitioners wish to be taken seriously by other professionals, regulators, researchers, employers, and insurance companies, and take our rightful place at the table of healing arts, we need to do the same.

What do I have to do to join IASI?

In these early years of IASI, the credentialing process is designed to be ‘user friendly’. The process is designed to assure you, your peers, and the public that you have successfully absorbed the knowledge and the skills necessary to enter a practice of Structural Integration. It is not designed to be tricky or exclusive, but essentially to answer the question “Would I feel comfortable referring clients to this person?” At the heart of this process is ‘peer review’—that a current IASI member answers this question in the affirmative.

There are three parts to the process:

(1) Application: Once your education / certification is complete, forward a copy of your school certification along with the IASI application, which you can do on-line with a credit card, print out a copy from this newsletter, or call the IASI office, 877-THE-IASI.

(2) Written portion: Download or request mailing of a list of essay questions. You may choose from among the many questions available which questions to complete according to the instructions that come with the essays. Submitted essays will be assessed by IASI evaluators. Creative thinking, the use of illustrations, and imaginative responses are all encouraged in these ‘open book’ essays.

(3) Peer review: This is designed as an educational and helpful process, as well as an evaluative one. To complete the peer review, you must visit with a current IASI member (mentor), paying for his or her time for one or several sessions.

During this time, you may work on the practitioner, be worked on by them, and work under their supervision on a model that either you or they might provide. The mentor will be assessing your skills in SI technique, strategizing sessions, client communication, and other factors necessary to the practice of SI. The mentor will write up their findings on a form provided by IASI, which they will forward to the IASI office. For candidates who are geographically or otherwise unable to access an IASI member, there is a video option where two sessions may be submitted via video for temporary membership pending a face-to-face peer review.

What if I fail the test?

If your schooling is in some way deficient for IASI requirements, you will be given specifics as to what you must do to qualify for membership. If any section of your written essays are not adequate (and two evaluators will have to agree on this), you will be given specific feedback as to why they were turned down, and you may resubmit revised essays at any time. If you are turned down in the peer review, you will again be given specific feedback as to why, which we hope will be helpful. You are welcome to try again, with that or another practitioner.

How do I access IASI?

Toll-free phone: 877-THE-IASI (843-4274)
Web: http://www.theiasi.org
Email: [email protected] or [email protected]
Mail: IASI, P.O. Box 8664, Missoula, MT 59807 USA

• For 2003, membership in IASI is open to all practitioners who can demonstrate certification training at the Rolf Institute^®, GSI, Hellerwork®, Soma, IPSB, Core, Mana, KMI, Zentherapy or other, similar 10-session recipe programs. Beginning in June 2004, evaluation will be required.
• IASI can provide a diverse array of continuing education opportunities, cross-fertilization among practitioners and teachers from differing schools, and concerted action on behalf of Structural Integration practitioners everywhere.
• Insurance: IASI now provides liability insurance for North American practitioners through the ABMP. For information on insurance, visit the ABMP’s site, or call 1-800-458-2267.

• Members Update: The on-line library is now up and running. In the Members area of the website, select Articles & Research for an index to articles about Structural Integration.
• Members can now go to their listing in the Members section and update their profiles with CE courses and whatever specialties they may have. A “More Details” link appears on the right hand side of their listing when there’s additional information.
• For the general public: The Find a Practitioner list is now operating. It can search on NAME, CITY, STATE, and/or COUNTRY. It shows a list of practitioners, where and when they graduated, and any contact information.

IASI was incorporated in January, 2002, as a non-profit membership organization (501c6), for the following purposes:

1. To link all practitioners of Structural Integration into a professional membership organization.
2. To establish and administer a professional certification process that will foster high standards of practice and provide a means for government licensure in those states and countries that require it.
3. To provide venues for exchange and dissemination of ideas, research, and explorations between practitioners, schools and philosophies.

Why Should I Join?

Structural Integration is well established in the field of bodywork, with practitioners across the world. While the schools do a commendable job in teaching Structural Integration, there has never been an organization dedicated to representing the interests of the practitioners of SI. IASI was formed to do just that. The time is ripe to establish our identity as a distinct industry. We are at a crossroads with the massage industry—a place where we either establish Structural Integration as a distinct modality of work, like acupuncture or chiropractic, or face becoming simply a sub-set of massage therapy. What do we want our profession to look like in twenty years? As practitioners of Structural Integration, we ask our clients and ourselves to commit to a long-term vision of change for the human structure. We should do the same for our profession with an international organization.

The field of Structural Integration has enjoyed a reputation for high standards of education and practice. IASI is dedicated to maintaining these standards, and for this reason we are developing a certification process that will establish basic guidelines for beginning practitioners. Also in keeping with this goal, approximately 3 days a year of continuing education classes will be required of current members. To allow members time to comply this requirement will not become effective until 2005. We are currently working on ethics and grievance procedures which will inform practitioners and provide assurance to the public.

IASI is developing a forum suitable for the diversity of its members facilitating the free flow of ideas and teachings previously unavailable to other groups. IASI needs and values your input as a practitioner.

First of all, let us ease some fears by assuring all members are grandfathered in without taking the exam. After the grandfathering period, which will extend through 2003, new members will be required to take an exam. We will probably ask you to take the exam as an experiment to test its fairness, but your membership will not rest on the result in any way. Rather, your feedback will help refine the exam process.

As we think about the exam / proficiency demonstration process, please remember that within a couple of years, we will be testing, almost exclusively,

practitioners who have just graduated. So the question is, what is the proficiency level we need to see in someone just getting started—as opposed to what we would like to see in the experienced practitioner.

We would like to create an examination process that includes hands-on evaluation. We are working with several formats that can accomplish this and be workable for the examinees. There are so many advantages to this type of examination process that we are dedicated to finding a way to make it work.

The following six areas are being considered for testing:

1. Knowledge of the recipe and anatomy / basic physiology / contraindications
2. The ability to bodyread structural and movement patterns
3. The ability to construct a reasonable session strategy
4. A wide vocabulary of touch styles and SI techniques
5. Quality of contact and rapport
6. Professional demeanor and basic command of psychosomatic and transference/ countertransference issues

There will be a couple of years of refining the test until it is an accurate reflection of the skills required as a basic Structural Integrator. To be as fair and objective as possible each of these areas needs to be broken out into specific behaviors or skill sets that we want to see. As these are developed they will be published so that all is out in the open.

We hope you will be involved in this process by reviewing the requirements as they come out, and helping to ‘test the test’ when it is available. Any ideas you have about how this test procedure should proceed may be forwarded to: [email protected]

Application for Membership

Name_________________________________________________________

Address_______________________________________________________

Phone
(business)________________(home)______________(fax)______________

Email____________________________Website________________________

Structural Integration Training Confirmation

1. Please attach a photocopy of your certification in Structural Integration.
2. Please include current contact information for your school, teacher, or program.
   All education will be independently confirmed.
3. Please additionally fill in the following:

School or program where you trained in SI___________________________________________

Location and dates of your training_________________________________________________

Date and year of certification______________________________________________________

Advanced training or continuing education___________________________________________

____________________________________________________________________________

Category of Membership

• Professional (requires confirmation of SI training completion)
  $150/year (US, UK, Europe)
  $100/year (Austrialia, New Zealand, Canada, and Japan)
  $75/year (South and Central America)
• Student (provide name of current SI training program)
  $50/year
• Friend of IASI (interest in SI but not a practitioner)
  $50/year

____________Amount paid with first donation
(you may deduct this from you first year membership)

____________Extra donation (please help with whatever you can)

____________Total Enclosed

Method of Payment

On-Line Application Form   ____Check/Cheque (payable to IASI)   ____VISA/Mastercard

Please fill out the following information for credit card payments:

Name on card (please print):________________________________________________________

Address for card:_________________________________________________________________

Card #________________________________Expiration Date:______________________

Signature_________________________________________