NRRTS reflects on connection

LUBBOCK, Texas – NRRTS marks its 30th anniversary in 2022 and despite a pandemic that has basically eliminated in-person events for nearly two years, the organization and its registrants are closer knit than ever, says Weesie Walker. 

Much of that has to do with the organization creating an increasing number of opportunities for registrants to connect remotely, including through an online education program that now comprises nearly 200 sessions and articles. 

“We’re just constantly figuring out better ways to get information out there,” said Walker, executive director. 

To mark its anniversary, NRRTS is spending the first 30 weeks of the year highlighting, among other things, its accomplishments, with plans to host a virtual gala in July. 

Walker would put NRRTS’s online education program at the top of the list of its accomplishments over the past 30 years. When NRRTS began requiring 10 hours of continuing education to become a registrant, Simon Margolis, a former executive director, believed the organization could help fill that need – and the rest is history. 

“At first, they were teleseminars, where you listened in on the phone, which was not that engaging,” she said. “But then we started doing webinars and that made it more engaging. In the beginning, we had to convince people to do these webinars and now, people are honored to do them.” 

Walker would also put the CRT Supplier Certificate Program, a recent project, at the top of the list. NRRTS has crafted the program, which is specifically focused on providing the skills and knowledge necessary to be a CRT supplier, from scratch. 

“I don’t know of any other profession that doesn’t have a defined course of education that a person must take to get the basics of the roles and responsibilities they need to get started,” she said.  

In addition to highlighting its accomplishments, NRRTS will spend the first 30 weeks of the year recounting memories and celebrating the organization’s “visionaries,” including Margolis, Walker says. 

“It’s a kind of a State of the Union on NRRTS,” she said. “I think it’s a good exercise to see where NRRTS started and where we are now, and what the future might hold.”