The Change AGEnt Summit

Creatively Building Purpose, Belonging and Inclusion Into Our New Longevity

8:00am – 4:15pm Augusta Civic Center, ME

Program Agenda

8:00-8:45 Doors Open, Pre-Event Networking – Visit our Exhibitors!

8:45-8:50 Welcoming of the Day
Cyril Francis, Passamaquoddy Elder, Culture Language Advisor, Wabanaki Public Health and Wellness
Lauren Stevens, Passamaquoddy, Division Director of Community Healing, Wabanaki Public Health and Wellness

8:50-9:00 Welcome & Opening Remarks
Jess Maurer, Executive Director, Maine Council on Aging

9:00-9:40 Panel: Honoring the Gift of Longevity
Fran Seeley, Senior Foster Grandparent Volunteer, AmeriCorps
Shirl Weaver, MT (ASCP), MA, PhD, Board Member, No Place Like Home
Franklin Brooks, MSW, PhD, LCSW, Clinical Social Worker and Retired Assistant Professor of Social Work
Nancy Peckenham,  Editor & Publisher, Crow’s Feet: Life As We Age
Moderator: Jess Maurer, Executive Director, Maine Council on Aging

9:40-10:20 Keynote Panel:  Building an Age-Positive Maine One Action at a Time
Panel Discussion with Leadership Exchange on Ageism Leaders
Tabatha Caso, LSW, Executive Director, Eastern Area Agency on Aging
Shiva Darbandi, Diversity, Equity, Inclusion and Belonging Specialist, Maine Department of Administrative and Financial Services
David Greenham, Executive Director, Maine Arts Commission
Leslie Hill, Harward Center Faculty Fellow and Professor Emeritus of Politics; Bates College
Garrett Martin, President and CEO, Maine Center for Economic Policy
Moderator: Don Harden, Power in Aging Project Manager
Androscoggin Home Healthcare + Hospice, Exclusive Keynote Sponsor

10:20-10:35 Table Conversations

10:35-10:55 Break – Visit our Exhibitors!

10:55-11:55 Breakout Sessions A

12:00-1:00 Lunch, Awards, & Creative Aging
UnitedHealthcare, Exclusive Awards Sponsor

1:00-2:15 Building Longevity-Ready Communities in Maine: Setting the Pathway Forward
A Conversation with the Governor’s Office of Policy Innovation and the Future & Cabinet on Aging
Androscoggin Home Healthcare + Hospice, Exclusive Keynote Sponsor
Hannah Pingree, Director, Governor’s Office of Policy Innovation and the Future
Commissioner Jeanne Lambrew, Ph.D., Department of Health & Human Services, Cabinet on Aging Co-Chair
Commissioner Laura Fortman, Department of Labor, Cabinet on Aging Co-Chair
Dan Brennan, Director, MaineHousing
Amanda Rector, Maine State Economist, Department of Administrative and Financial Services
Moderator: Elizabeth Gattine, Cabinet on Aging Coordinator

2:15-2:25 Break – Visit our Exhibitors!

2:25-3:25 Breakout Sessions B

3:30-4:15 Visioning Session: What Would an Age Positive Maine Look Like?
Live Graphic Illustration by Kate Crary, Project Director, IHPP, UNH
Facilitator: Valerie Jackson, Senior Program Manager, MCD

4:15 Closing

Breakout Sessions Information:

Breakout Sessions A: 10:55-11:55am
Breakout Sessions B: 2:25-3:25pm 

The New Map of Life challenges us to be creative – to think outside of simply adding more years to the end of our lives, but instead, adding more quality years across our lifespan. But, as we know, change is hard, particularly when change means seeing the biases we hold. Our breakout sessions ask where is there room for change on this new map of life and how do we get there?

Breakout Sessions A

Flipping the Script to Age Positive
Can you imagine?  How we think about aging and older people actually can impact our health and well-being, as well as those around us.  We can be our own worst enemy, saying demeaning things about ourselves “having a senior moment” or about others “he’s a dinosaur” that are against our own self-interests.  In the moment, it’s sometimes hard to think of what to say to counteract the negative messages and jokes we hear.  This session will explore tools you can use to “flip the script” when you hear age-demeaning language and help shift our culture to age-positive.

Celebrating Adaptation
We will all need to make some adaptations as we move into later life.  We can fear the day we need to use a cane or embrace Nordic Walking poles and use them year-round to walk with safety!  We need to not only highlight, but celebrate the fact that technology has made it possible for us to keep hiking, farming, or just getting around the house without assistance longer. This interactive workshop will feature new technologies that make disabilities workable, and offer ideas on how we can flip the script on our own fears of disability. 

Aging BIPOC
Join this session for a discussion led by and for Black, Indigenous, and People of Color (BIPOC) about the challenges of growing old in Maine and identify ways older BIPOC people can be more intentionally included in all aspects of aging policy, advocacy and services.

Healthy Aging Through Community Engagement
Maine’s Parks and Recreation programs could help all residents live healthier, longer lives by creating environments that embrace positive aging, intentionally engage in purpose building, and ensuring that all programming is inclusive and lets everyone know they are welcome.  This session will explore the opportunities we have right in our communities to strengthen healthy aging initiatives.

No, this isn’t “normal aging!”
Everyone has a story about a healthcare professional who dismissed a complaint as “normal aging” or who didn’t listen to an older patient.  Ageism in healthcare costs us $63 billion a year just for the 8th most expensive health conditions.  This session will explore the impact of ageism in healthcare, including when it intersects with racism, homophobia or transphobia, and how we can disrupt it to ensure our new longevity isn’t cut short by ageism. 

Community Nursing – An Old Idea with New Potential
Community nursing has a big role to play in creating longevity ready rural communities.  As our emergency management systems are challenged to stay adequately staffed to meet ongoing demand for emergency services in rural communities, there’s never been a better time to consider community nursing.  Community nursing provides a holistic approach to supporting the health of a community and its residents.  Community Nurses help older community members stay healthy and connected, and help prevent unnecessary ambulance runs and hospitalizations.  Join this conversation to learn how Community Nurses are transforming communities into places that meet the needs of all people – including people in their 80s, 90s and 100s!

Dementia Friendly Communities
In large and small ways, Maine’s lifelong communities have been including dementia-friendly initiatives and concepts in their programming.  From caregiver respite to dementia-friendly activities, find out how you can make your community initiative more dementia-friendly.  

Making Maine Age-Friendly for Solo Agers
Join us for a facilitated conversation about solo agers, a population that is increasing in size as the baby boom generation ages. What are some of the particular challenges that solo agers experience as they age? What strategies are available for addressing these challenges? How can we make Maine a more age-friendly place for those who are aging solo? The facilitators for this discussion are both Maine solo agers.

Transition Planning
This is a visioning session intended specifically for volunteer coordinators and HR directors focusing on the best way to help employees and volunteers transition to what’s next – understanding that purpose and a plan are critical components to healthy aging.  

Building an Age Friendly Public Health System in Maine
We all want more healthy years, not just more years of living!  To accomplish this, we must shift our mindset from seeing aging as inevitable decline to seeing it as an opportunity for a richer, healthier life.  This is a vision session.  What if our public health system promoted age positive beliefs as a means to inspiring healthy aging habits?  Join this facilitated conversation with public health professionals from Maine about the ways we can intentionally include age positivity programming and messaging in Maine’s public health infrastructure.  

What’s Next in Housing
Join this conversation about what’s new in housing, especially around home sharing, home repair and homeless response activities.  There is a new trend in Maine with older people becoming homeless for the first time later in life.  Hear what resources exist to support the new housing needs of older people.  

Keys to Creating a Successful Multi-generational Workforce
This session will explore the benefits of intentionally building a culture that supports a multi-generational workforce.  It’s not just employing people of different ages, but building a mutual culture of respect, of mirrored benefits, and mirrored flexibility.  Hear how employers are getting it right!

Breakout Sessions B

Elderspeak to Elderspark
Speaking to older people like they are children is not only remarkably common, it’s embarrassing for the person, and potentially harmful.  Most importantly, it could snuff out that special spark we all have when we don’t feel seen or heard.  This session will explore what Elderspeak is, how it operates and how taking steps to really know the person helps grow the spark within. 

Building Age-Positive Communities – Start the Conversation
The MCOA has created a toolkit for community groups to use to host conversations about ageism and how it holds us back from building longevity-ready age-positive communities that work for people of all ages.  Come to the session, participate in a mini-conversation, and then learn how to use the toolkit to host a conversation yourself!

A New View of Work
As we live longer, we will work longer, but with more flexibility and breaks over our work life.  This session will explore how current Maine employers are thinking differently about work over a longer life, including leisure breaks, sabbaticals, shutdowns, gap years, and 4-day workweeks for 5-days of work.

Aging LGBTQ+
Join this session for a discussion led by and for LGBTQ+ people to discuss the challenges of growing old in Maine and to identify ways older Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Trans and Questioning (LGBTQ) people can be more intentionally included in all aspects of aging policy, advocacy and services.

Learning into the Future
We will explore how our colleges and universities are actively engaging people to get degrees later in life and coming back to school after traditional retirement.  Join in a conversation about how we can use lifelong learning opportunities to bring older workers back into the workforce in new careers.

Embracing Older Workers
As you might know, Maine is well into its 10 Year Economic Development Plan and its Comprehensive Workforce and Talent Strategy. Since the inception of these two plans, we have endured a global pandemic. This has caused many objectives in the plans to shift, while others have remained the same.
As workforce development & talent attraction are foundational to both plans, the State Workforce Board (SWB) and Department of Economic and Community Development (DECD) are embarking on an effort to check in with our communities & key stakeholders to gather input & feedback on the work that has been done to date and inform the work we will be doing together over the next 3 ½ years.
Older workers play a critical role in Maine’s workforce. During this session, we will seek input on how the State’s planning efforts can elevate & address systemic challenges within the older worker community and advance shared goals.

Healthy Aging in Community – Why Data & Values Matter
The Municipal Data Dashboard Initiative created community-specific data dashboards to help municipalities make data-informed decisions that support healthy aging.  In this session, we’ll share the data points that are helpful in understanding how well older community members are doing, an easy-to-use modified dashboard, and the kinds of actions a municipality can take to support older residents.  We’ll also explore the concept of “age equity” and how communities can consider a value-based approach to building “longevity ready” communities.

Maine Senior College
For Older Adults, Senior College, is a lifelong learning resource that helps keep us engaged throughout our longer lives. Courses zero in on topics that are relevant to this life stage. The stimulation of group discussions and the friendships gained enhance healthspan. At this session, you can lean in with curiosity to learn from Senior College teachers and students more about what Senior College does, and how to access this resource.

Ending Hunger in Maine
Maine has a plan for Ending Hunger by 2030.  Join this conversation to find out where older people can help and how we can overcome barriers to ensure older people are not going hungry.  

New Transit Solutions Key to Healthy Aging
For rural communities to retain residents across their lifespan, they will need to innovate and grow transit options.  If you cannot drive, you cannot access food, socialization or healthcare – three key pieces of healthy aging.  Across Maine, transportation is identified as a growing need, especially for older Mainers.  From community vans, volunteer driver programs and ride-sharing to autonomous vehicles, there are multiple innovative solutions to Maine’s transportation challenges and creative ways to stretch resources. Come hear what’s already happening and share your ideas for future solutions.

What if I want to become a Carpenter at 70?  Skill Building Throughout Life
How can Maine’s vocational technical centers be used not only to train young people in trades, but to engage older people leaving trades as mentors and teachers, and be used to bring middle-aged and older people into trades from more traditional work settings?