CADDAC's Annual Conference Summary

We’re just back from our 10^th annual conference which was held in Halifax this year.  As in past years the conference received an abundance of positive feedback with attendees commenting on the superb quality of speakers, organization and opportunities to interact with ADHD experts. They also told us how remarkable it was to be in a room filled with others who understood what they were going through and who “got ADHD”.

I was stopped in the halls by many people thanking us for bringing the conference to Halifax this year sharing that conferences of this caliber rarely occur on Canada’s east coast. Due to our generous sponsors, one being the Nova Scotia Ministry of Health and Wellbeing, we were able to reduce the cost of registration significantly this year, but even so, we received more requests for sponsorship than in past years. CADDAC sponsored all that asked, more than 20 attendees who we eager to attend but could not afford the fee.

In all, we had 175 attendees at the conference which is quite a good turnout especially for a smaller city. Our one regret is that only a few educators attended even though specific content for educators was included in the schedule and the conference was promoted throughout all school boards in the four east coast provinces. We were able to make some contacts during the conference which may result in our returning to Nova Scotia to provide educational sessions to individual school boards - always an added bonus.

One of the attendees was kind enough to express her feelings to me, which I think sums up many of the comments I received over the two days.  She shared that she had been a little nervous about attending a two day conference after having worked all week, worrying that she would be exhausted by Saturday night, but instead found herself energized and could not wait to return on Sunday morning to learn more. She was excited to share what she had learned and would be passing on the information with as many others as she could.

Heidi Bernhardt