Event:            ISO 9001: 2008 Internal Auditing

Dates:                   Monday, July 20, 2015 and Tuesday, July 21, 2015

Time:                    8:00 a.m. to 4:00 p.m.

Where:                MRA- the Management Association

3800 Avenue of the Cities, Suite 100

Moline, IL  61265

Cost:                      $550 MRA members / $750 nonmembers

This two-day class will have a strong emphasis on best practice techniques used to audit the American National Standard ISO 9001-2008 version. The class incorporates planning audits, performing audits, and analysis/reporting of audit observations. The materials and subsequent test is based upon the accredited certified quality auditor's examination.

To register, or for more information, go to our new website at www.mranet.org/Training-Events, or contact MRA at 309.277.4183 or heather.roberts@mranet.org.

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Event:            Supervision: The Essentials

Dates:                   Tuesday, August 18, 2015, Tuesday, August 25, 2015 Tuesday September 1, 2015

Time:                    8:00 a.m. to 4:00 p.m.

Where:                MRA- the Management Association

3800 Avenue of the Cities, Suite 100

Moline, IL  61265

Cost:  $750 MRA members / $950 nonmembers

First line/front line supervisors and managers on your team are often people who have proven they are very good at doing and now they are being asked to take on a leadership role.  At the same time, you realize leading is not the same as doing and you'd like to help them obtain ideas, concepts, and skills necessary for success in their new position. Newly acquired skills will help them become an asset and a more valuable resource for your organization. When time is tight, you can get caught up in the dilemma of how to achieve greater results with limited resources in a time-controlled, economical, and hard hitting way. MRA is pleased to offer a solution to such a dilemma - Supervision: The Essentials.

This three-day program provides your new, less experienced leaders with ideas and practices they can put to use immediately. Think of it as basic training?compact, concise, focused, and all about applicable skills - nothing but the essentials!

To register, or for more information, go to our new website at www.mranet.org/Training-Events, or contact MRA at 309.277.4183 or heather.roberts@mranet.org.

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Event:            Advanced Communication Series - The Art and Science of Excellence

Dates:                   Friday, July 10, 2015, Friday, July 17, 2015 and Friday, August 7, 2015

Time:                    8:00 a.m. to 4:00 p.m.

Where:                MRA- the Management Association

3800 Avenue of the Cities, Suite 100

Moline, IL  61265

Cost:                      $885 MRA members / $1,170 nonmembers

Push your communication skills to higher levels. In this advanced series, participants will learn how humans take in and process language and information and the ways language and information drive our thinking and behavior. This series will explore current cutting-edge science of the mind and its impact on language, behavior, understanding, and actions. This highly interactive series seeks to move information to awareness and then to action.

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Event:            Principles of Leadership Excellence Certificate Series

Dates:                   Thursday, July 9, 2015 through Thursday, December 3, 2015

Time:                    8:00 a.m. to 4:00 p.m.

Where:                MRA- the Management Association

3800 Avenue of the Cities, Suite 100

Moline, IL  61265

Cost:                      $3,080 MRA members / $4,050 nonmembers

Success in today's business environment calls for a deep and broad leadership perspective.  Managing a workforce with diverse ages, values, and thinking styles is a daily challenge.  Increasing productivity with fewer resources calls for leaders with the know-how to help employees adapt to change.  Give your leaders the skills to foster innovation with increased employee engagement, and reduce silos of knowledge that result in turf protection.

Principles of Leadership Excellence (PLX) is a comprehensive, practical program that teaches what to do and how to do it, including

·         Highly interactive training methods, proven effective for adult learners

·         Inspiring instructors with real-world experience in the office, on the plant floor, and in the field

·         Continuous skill reinforcement through online resources and support between sessions

·         Sharp focus on skills that managers can put into practice the next day

Managers who participate in the PLX program experience a refreshing approach to management training. It's not a broad-brush, lecture-type series that's quickly forgotten in the reality of day-to-day work.  Designed by MRA, your trusted expert in adult learning, PLX delves frankly and deeply into challenging issues.

Before the legislature reconvenes, Governor Bruce Rauner will travel the state outlining key elements of the Illinois Turnaround Agenda. He will visit 17 counties from Monday, April 6 to Saturday, April 11 to meet with the hard-working people of Illinois, elected officials and other key stakeholders. The governor will present details of his legislative plans, including key elements of his Economic Competitiveness and Job Growth Package; Taxpayer Protection and Property Tax Freeze Package; Transforming Government Package; and Pension Reform Package.

·         Monday, April 6

o   Cook County

o   DuPage County

o   Will County

·         Tuesday, April 7

o   Kane County

o   Lake County

·         Wednesday, April 8

o   McHenry County

o   Winnebago County

o   Rock Island County

·         Thursday, April 9

o   Adams County

o   Cass County

o   Peoria County

·         Friday, April 10

o   Sangamon County

o   St. Clair County

o   Randolph County

o   Jefferson County

·         Saturday, April 11

o   Richland County

o   Champaign County

CHICAGO - Governor Bruce Rauner announced today he has selected the Co-Chairs of the Early Learning Council in the Governor's Office of Early Childhood Development and appointed members to the Illinois Educational Labor Relations Board.

Name: Beth Purvis

Position: Co-Chair - Early Learning Council

Governor Bruce Rauner has selected his Secretary of Education, Dr. Beth Purvis, to serve as a Co-Chair of the Early Learning Council. Dr. Purvis has more than 22 years of experience in various levels of education. Most recently, Dr. Purvis was the Chief Executive Officer of the Chicago International Charter School. She was also an assistant professor of special education and associate director of the Child and Family Development Center at the University of Illinois at Chicago.

Name: Phyllis Glink

Position: Co-Chair - Early Learning Council

Governor Bruce Rauner has selected Phyllis Glink to serve as a Co-Chair of the Early Learning Council. Glink is currently the Executive Director of the Irving Harris Foundation, which focuses on investments to early-childhood education and children and family welfare, among other issues. She is an advocate for the well-being of infants, toddlers, and pregnant women, focusing on early intervention through increasing non-profit advocacy, government involvement and public understanding. Glink has also served on the Illinois Department of Human Services Advisory Council on Childcare.

Name: Andrea Waintroob

Position: Chairman - Illinois Educational Labor Relations Board

Governor Bruce Rauner has named Andrea Waintroob the chairman of the Illinois Educational Labor Relations Board. She brings more than 35 years of experience in negotiating labor contracts with private and public sector employers.

Waintroob has negotiated and settled more than 50 collective bargaining agreements for educational employers in the State of Illinois as well as cities and other public entities. She is currently Of Counsel at Franczek Radelet and was one of its founding partners. Prior to her work at Franczek Radelet, she was a partner at Vedder Price, representing public school districts in labor and employment negotiations.

In addition to her work as an attorney, she is also a lecturer at the University of Chicago in both the law and business schools. She has taught courses on public sector labor relations and government regulation of the employment relationship.

Waintroob is a graduate of Brown University and earned her law degree at the University of Chicago. She lives in Deerfield.

Name: Judy Biggert

Position: Board Member - Illinois Educational Labor Relations Board

Governor Bruce Rauner has appointed former U.S. Rep. Judy Biggert to the Illinois Educational Labor Relations Board. Her experiences in Congress and at the state and local level bring a unique perspective to the board.

Biggert represented the southwestern suburbs in Congress from 1999-2013. She served on the Education and the Workforce Committee, including subcommittees on Early Childhood, Elementary, and Secondary Education, and Higher Education and Workforce Training. She also served on the Financial Services Committee, and was the Chairwoman of the Insurance Housing and Community Opportunity Subcommittee.

Before serving in Congress, Biggert served in the Illinois House of Representatives from 1993 to 1999. She also was a member of the Hinsdale Township High School District 86 from 1978 to 1985, and served as its president from 1983 to 1985.

Biggert is an attorney and graduated from Northwestern University's School of Law. She earned her bachelor's degree from Stanford University. She lives in Hinsdale.

Name: Michael Prueter

Position: Board Member - Illinois Educational Labor Relations Board

Governor Bruce Rauner has reappointed Michael Prueter to the Illinois Educational Labor Relations Board. He has served on the board since 2010.

Prior to serving on the board, Prueter served as government liaison for a number of corporations and trade associations where he negotiated labor contracts with local and national food service vendors. He also served on a national legislative policy board in Washington, D.C. for several years.

Prueter has several years of business experience in the banking and financial services industry. He also worked as a staff member in the Illinois House and Illinois Senate.

Prueter received his bachelor's degree and an MBA from Columbia State University. He lives in Naperville.

The changes in medical care over the last five decades have been dramatic.

Technological and scientific advances gave patients access to a level of medical diagnosis and care previously undreamed of.

During this time, Medicare, Medicaid and the Affordable Care Act provided more people with the opportunity to take advantage of that care.

Yet despite all that extraordinary progress something is missing, says J. Joseph Marr, author of the book "Fall From Grace: A Physician's Retrospective on the Past Fifty Years of Medicine and the Impact of Social Change." (www.jjmarr.com)

The role of the physician as healer and patient confidant has degenerated to manager of a health care team. The personal interaction of physician and patient has largely disappeared as well.

The problem as Marr sees it is this: The entry of corporate for-profit health care destroyed the soul of medicine; it destroyed the doctor-patient relationship through its demands for brief patient encounters; and, most important, changed the focus of medicine from patient care to quarterly earnings.

"The tragedy in the past half century is that the astounding improvements in technology have cost us the human touch," he says. "That's almost completely because of corporate business practices in the health-care and insurance industries."

The system is not going to change, Marr says, but the medical community could improve it by injecting more humanity into the system.

"The interaction between a person with a medical problem and the physician who attempts to heal that person is one of the most human and personal of relationships," he says. "But it does not lend itself to accounting ledgers, quarterly earnings postings and visits per hour."

Marr says there are several ways the medical community can try to make a difference:

•  Shine the light on misinformation. Physicians can educate the public to counter direct advertising about drugs and talk show misinformation. This would require a conscious change in attitude and a rededication to the physician-patient relationship that once existed, Marr says. This attitude change would communicate itself quickly to the patient. What was once a brief, impersonal office visit would become more personal, even if still brief.

•  Create a relationship. Physicians can put that attitude change into practice with an extra question about family, some advice beyond drugs or surgical procedures, and the kinds of human inquiries that we all appreciate, but are largely absent from current patient encounters. "Physicians still are shocked by what has occurred and cowed by the pronouncements that come from the corporate philistines in charge of health care," Marr says.

•  Speak up. Most people recognize the high cost of care as a very serious problem for the country. Physicians, individually and collectively, must speak out against these costs and advocate measures to mitigate them, Marr says. A demonstration by the medical profession that it is as appalled by the changes in health care as is the general public would go far toward restoring the public trust in physicians, he says.

"Fifty years ago we physicians were accustomed to speaking out against injustice and expressing our opinions openly," Marr says. "When did we become so passive and pliable? Are we as concerned about money and perquisites as those in the corporate suites? Let us hope not and begin to behave accordingly."

About J. Joseph Marr, MD

J. Joseph Marr, MD is a retired academic physician and pharmaceutical and biotechnology executive. He earned a bachelor's degree in biology from Xavier University in Ohio, and his medical degree from the Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine. Dr. Marr has been a member of Boards of Directors of public, private, and nonprofit organizations. He is the author of more than 200 academic publications; authored and edited six books; and published short stories, essays, and poems. He lives near Denver, Colorado.