Northeast College Community Helps Nearly 40 Students Attend Annual ACA Conference

Thanks to the financial support of Northeast College of Health Sciences and its community, including alumni and corporate partners, such as the New York State Chiropractic Association, nearly 40 students attended the American Chiropractic Association annual conference Engage 2023, Jan. 25-28.

Held each year in Washington, D.C., the event welcomes leaders and experts from the chiropractic and healthcare industries from across the world for a weekend full of cutting-edge education, networking and leadership-development opportunities. Members of Northeast College’s chapter of the Student American Chiropractic Association (SACA) took the trip led by faculty members Dr. Bill Lauretti and Dr. Laura Passamonte.

Highlights of Engage 2023.

Always an exciting and engaging highlight of the event is the time students interact with legislators on Capitol Hill. This year they talked with U.S. senators and representatives about the importance of a proposed bill that would modernize coverage for chiropractic services in Medicare. Students and alumni also met with legislators and staff, with one Northeast student even being invited to have lunch with a U.S. senator.

Dr. Lauretti, who has accompanied students to national ACA events for over 15 years, said, “We are very proud of Northeast’s tradition of leadership in SACA. Six of the last ten SACA national chairs have been Northeast students, and we have had many of our students serving on the national SACA executive board consistently for the past decade. It was a real pleasure to re-connect with so many Northeast alumni currently serving in ACA leadership positions. They are successfully fulfilling Northeast’s mission of developing leaders in our profession.”

That tradition continued with the election of Northeast’s current SACA president Lexi Aruck (D.C. 24, M.S. ’23) as incoming SACA national chair. Northeast students Alan Leonard (D.C. ’23, M.S. ‘23) and Emmanuel Kambouroglos (D.C.’24, M.S. ‘24) received Standard Process scholarships.

Northeast Well Represented at Engage 2023.

Engage includes a wide variety of educational offerings (with CE credit available), presentations from respected thought leaders and panel discussions featuring the most engaging and timely topics of the profession. Among the conference speakers was Northeast alumnus Dr. James Walters (D.C. ‘19) who spoke about the treatment and management of ankle injuries.

National Student American Chiropractic Association (SACA) meetings at the conference were led by Northeast alumnae Katy Kennedy (D.C. ’22), SACA president, and Tori Uglialoro (D.C. ’22), SACA vice president. In addition to Lauretti and Passamonte, Northeast faculty to attend Engage included College President Dr. Michael Mestan, Provost Dr. Anne Killen, Vice President of Stakeholder Engagement Dr. Todd Knudsen, Assistant Vice President of Academic Affairs Dr. Jean-Nicolas Poirier and Dean of Clinical Education Dr. Wendy L. Maneri.