Our mission...
To advance the profession of Massage Therapy by educating the community on the benefits of massage and providing continuing education to members while maintaining a professional approach balancing body, mind, and spirit.
AMTA-Vermont Celebrates Its Outstanding Members! Click here for Member Awards.
Chapter History...
On August 4, 1986, the Vermont Chapter was started as a new chapter of the American Massage Therapy Association. The first meeting was located in Woodstock Vermont. It was called to order at 9:10 am by Ray Moriyasu who was the Eastern District Director of the AMTA.
Ray started by welcoming Vermont to the AMTA. He then spoke of the upcoming 4th annual New England Conference being held in Portland, Maine. He emphasized the strong educational benefits of attending the conference. It was also discussed that the chapter needs to send two delegates to this conference and the National Convention. They would usually be the President and the Secretary/Treasurer. A fundraiser was going to be planned to send our delegates.
Transfering of membership from surrounding states was next discussed. It was not necessary to do it right away, but it was recommended. The whole reason for starting the chapter was so we could meet in Vermont with other therapists.
Each state forms its own policies, so they next had to decide when and how often to meet, and when the board should get together.
Next, Officers were elected. Our first President was E. Holliday Kane of Montpelier for a 2 year term. First V-P was Pat Granger of Montpelier for 1 year, Second V-P for 1 year was Janet Van Arsdale of East Arlington, Third V-P for 1 year was Bonnie Walker of Putney, Treasurer for 1 year was Christine Clarke of Dorset, and Acting Secretary was Janet Van Arsdale. A permant secretary would be need soon.
Committees were next discussed. Vice Presidents will all chair committees and duties will be delegated by the President. If an officer can't finish a term, the other officers will move up or new ones will be appointed. Ray then presented the President and Treasurer with a start-up check of $100 and would arrange for our portions of dues to be sent to us from the other chapters that our members had once belonged.
Legislative committee was then discussed at large. The National committee at the time was Ruth Ann Hobbs of Indiana, Sherry Glover of Texas, Marlies Uhtenwoldt of Massachussetts, Eva Graf also of Massachussetts, and Shirley Hooker of New Hampshire. They wanted to immediately set up a legislative committee and were going to ask the membership that was interested to join. The business part of the meeting was then closed and Ray did an educational seminar on Sotai.