APA Community offers connections in divisions

What follows is a recap of a session in June 2024 for division leaders who were interested in learning more about division groups in the APA Community. It includes a list of the next steps for divisions who are interested in participating in the APA Community.

The APA Community will be an exclusive online destination where members can cultivate meaningful relationships. Like a social media platform, the APA Community will be a place to network, find collaborators, and exchange information. All divisions will have the opportunity to have a space within the APA Community.

The potential benefit of the APA Community to divisions include: 

• Potential for increased division member engagement that can lead to increased renewal and retention rates.
• Better visibility for the division within the larger APA membership. In this community nondivision members can see division groups but cannot be added unless they become a division member.
• Dynamic marketing: This will be a tool to harness real-time updates to your division members.
• Seamless membership participation: The community is connected to the APA membership database. The community will automatically sync with our database so new members (*see note) will automatically be granted access with no need for manual upkeep on the division’s end. *Note: this is only for those divisions that APA handles all membership processing for.  If APA only processes your division’s APA Member renewals, these are the only members who will have access to your division’s community space.

• By mid to late June, designate a division community leaderopens in new window. See more info below on the Division Community Leader role.
• Your division community leader will receive an email with information to approve/request changes to your division’s community group image and description.
• Division groups will launch in the APA Community on July 10.

To be included in the APA Community, each division will need to designate a division community leader. This role will encourage group engagement and cultivate a positive and productive community environment for their division.

Role and responsibilities

• For APA’s purposes, we will utilize your division community leader as our main point of contact to share resources, updates on the APA Community platform, and for any issues that may arise within your community group.
• For the division’s purposes, we imagine your community leader will play a critical role in engaging and encouraging participation from and among your members in the division’s community group. You may ask this person (or perhaps have them lead a team of volunteers) to help foster a vibrant and active group that is in line with APA’s Community Rulesopens in new window. Working at the outset to create activity, share content, and connect with other members will be beneficial to having your community group organically grow to become a place where members want to be and want to engage with their peers.
• APA will support community leaders with resources and best practices to help each group within the APA Community thrive.

Divisions: 1, 3, 5, 6, 7, 8, 10, 13, 15,16, 17, 18, 19, 20, 21, 22, 24, 25, 26, 28, 30, 31, 32, 33, 34, 35, 36, 37, 38, 40, 42, 43, 44, 45, 46, 47, 48, 49, 50, 51, 52, 53, 55, 56

These are the divisions for which we process all membership types, and all of your members are in our database.  Therefore, all of your members will have access to your community group, regardless of whether or not they are an APA Member.

Divisions: 2, 9, 12, 14, 27, 29, 39, 41, 54

These are the divisions where we do not process all of your membership types, and only your APA Members are in the APA database.  Therefore, only these members will have access to your community group.

If you have any questions, please contact your Division Engagement liaison.