APTA Nebraska Podcast
The APTA Nebraska Podcast dives into the stories, challenges, and innovations shaping physical therapy in our state. We’re here to advance, promote, and protect the practice of physical therapy, build our community, and optimize the health and quality of life for all Nebraskans.
APTA Nebraska Podcast
E16 - Chapter Updates with President Nick Weber
A candid update on how APTA Nebraska is sharpening strategy, growing representation with an extra delegate seat, and preparing for a tough legislative session while building community through events and student engagement. We share clear ways to step in, from elections to testimony to simple member perks that help clinics thrive.
• 2026–2028 strategic plan timeline and focus
• Jingle Bell Run partnership and student rivalry energy
• Added House of Delegates seat and special election
• Mentorship for new delegates and membership growth
• Campus visits and PTA program insights from Northeast Community College
• Legislative outlook amid state budget deficit and access risks
• How member and patient stories move policymakers
• Member benefits with Dell Technologies and UPS
• Holiday schedule pause and return in the new year
Don’t forget to subscribe, share, and join the discussion
Welcome to the APTA Nebraska Podcast, where we dive into the stories, challenges, and innovations shaping physical therapy in our state. We're here to advance, promote, and protect the practice of physical therapy, optimizing the health and quality of life for all Nebraskans. Join us as we connect with experts, share insights, and build community throughout our profession.
SPEAKER_01:Welcome back to the APTA Nebraska Podcast. I'm Brad Dexter, and I'm joined by Nick Weber today. Nick, how are you doing?
SPEAKER_02:I'm good, Brad. Good to be back. How are you?
SPEAKER_01:Yeah, it's good to see you. I'm I'm doing well. Uh made it through the month of October, made it through the month of uh almost through November, I guess, as uh as we're recording this. Um, even though it's not coming out until December, that's okay. We can talk about November uh on the podcast.
SPEAKER_02:How many uh pounds of Halloween candy did you eat?
SPEAKER_01:You know, here's what happened. Um my kids always bring you know all their candy back, and they went with their cousins this year too. So they all brought it back to our house. Their cousins are younger, they sort everything out and they make their trades with their candy, right? My sister-in-law went through all of her kids' candy and basically put it into an extra bag that I was like, hey, that's great. I'll bring that in, I'll put it in my office, and I'll invite students to come enjoy the candy and maybe a little bit of conversation with me too. The students haven't yet come to get the candy, but I've definitely been eating the candy, and so have some of the other faculty around here.
SPEAKER_03:So you're not doing a very good job of pawning that off then.
SPEAKER_01:I'm not doing a very good job. No. There's there's candy in there that I haven't, you know, I haven't seen uh I haven't seen some of that like a pixie stick, right? I haven't had a pixie stick in a long time.
SPEAKER_02:Yeah. Yeah.
SPEAKER_01:Just pure sugar, right?
SPEAKER_02:Um my daughter's found a fun dip that night.
SPEAKER_01:That too.
SPEAKER_02:I haven't seen one of those in a while. Yeah.
SPEAKER_01:I've got a fun dip in in this uh in this bowl back here, and yeah, I haven't seen one of those for a long time. Stick of sugar that you can lick and dip into more sugar.
SPEAKER_02:Whenever you need that little extra energy.
SPEAKER_01:Did you dress up for Halloween?
SPEAKER_02:I not to go trick-or-treating with my daughters, but I uh I did for baseball Hoween, our event that we did at Werner Park. Um that was a fun event. Uh, we had I forget 60 pounds of candy, six 60 pounds of candy. We got through most of it. Nice. Um, I tried those new nerd clusters that everybody's uh talking about. I I see I see what you know what all the talk about. It's they're pretty good.
SPEAKER_01:Nerds. Hey, you know, for the longest time they just stuck with the hard candy, but they they've really, you know, they've upped their game quite a bit. The gummy clusters a big deal. They're onto something, yeah. Soft sugar wrapped in hard sugar. It it just brilliant. What do you know? Brilliant, yeah. Um you know what I think of it, it's just remarketing something they already had because they had they had like nerds ropes that was essentially just the licorice surrounded by nerds, and they just chopped it up into small pieces. That's all it is.
SPEAKER_02:It's like learning from a pharmaceutical company. I'll just rebrand this.
SPEAKER_01:So someone truly, someone was like, hey, we're not selling these nerds ropes that well. What if we chop them up into small pieces and stick them in a bag? Um with with the with the airtime we're giving to nerds, they should sponsor us in some way.
SPEAKER_03:I think so. We need to get, yeah. We haven't tried them, go out and try them. We'll pluck. That should pluck.
SPEAKER_01:Exactly. Yeah, if you haven't tried them, go out and try them. Um if you have any way to get us some kind of a sponsorship deal with nerds, uh, we'd be happy to welcome uh to welcome that as well. I love it. Hey, Nick, we're not here just to talk about uh nerd's gummy clusters or what we dressed up in for Halloween. Um I had a friend by the way who dressed up as a sick seven.
SPEAKER_02:I like that. You like that? Yeah, yeah.
SPEAKER_01:Uh-huh. Um, all the kids today love six seven. Uh just a mom who has boys who are always saying six seven. And she's like, I'm just gonna annoy people by dressing up like this. So she she rocked it out.
SPEAKER_03:This wasn't one of your kids you're saying. This was someone else.
SPEAKER_01:This was someone else. No, this was someone else.
SPEAKER_03:Okay.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah. Um, all right. What we're really talking about, you're giving us your presidential update, right? It's been a couple months here. Uh give us give us an update. What's going on behind the curtains of APTA Nebraska?
SPEAKER_02:Yeah, I think uh first thing that comes to mind, you know, we're kind of turning the page a little bit here at 26. And uh what that means is uh we're putting together our new strategic plan uh for 26 through 28. So um our executive team has met and kind of got our initial draft put together, um, and we'll continue to formulate that and hopefully have it ready to go um in time for the conference this year. So April time, uh we'll get that out and um make sure it's agreeable to everyone and and acceptable and then use that to guide our next three years. Additionally, um, you know, we're we got a lot of events going. It seems like this year we've had so many events going on. Uh, we like we just talked about base Balloween and and many other things. Uh our partnership with Nebraska Arthritis Foundations uh through the for the Jingle Bell run is coming up here in December. Uh so I will be putting out a call for runners and hope we'll get a good turnout for that. Uh it's always a fun event. And I've had a request to put my uh elf costume back on for the 5k again this year. So we'll see how that goes. We get a decent weather day. That's a possibility.
SPEAKER_01:What's the date on that, Nick?
SPEAKER_02:It's that first Saturday in December. I think it's the 6th. Yeah.
SPEAKER_01:We'll put a link in the show notes.
SPEAKER_02:It's it seems to be a common like uh finals weekend for a lot of students. So I always say, you know, come out, get your run-in for the morning, and then go ahead and grind the rest of the weekend and get that study in ready.
SPEAKER_01:There you go.
SPEAKER_02:So yeah, we hope we'll have a good eternal. And in fact, I think there's been a PT student that's won the event the last two for sure, maybe the last three years, if my memory serves me, right. So we've got a good little uh theme going here. We need to keep that running.
SPEAKER_01:I mean, I don't I don't know if any PT students could do it this year. I I don't know if hopefully that gets the competitive juices flowing for any that are listening to it, right?
SPEAKER_02:Yeah, and I would really hate to like, you know, put a Creighton student up against a UNMC student or something of that nature.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah, you know, I don't wanna put any titles to this, but yeah, UNMC student would definitely win that.
SPEAKER_02:Um you think so?
SPEAKER_01:Yeah.
SPEAKER_02:Create might have something to say about that, but yeah. We only know if they show up.
SPEAKER_01:So show up, sign up, show up. Let's do it. Uh so strategic plan that's coming out in April. We've had a lot of events going on. Um uh tell me about you you're saying we got an extra House of Delegates seat.
SPEAKER_02:That's right. So uh we have to have a spec that is a big deal. Uh we've been kind of this is probably not something everyone else is watching, something I watch on a on a regular basis. Uh, I'm always watching our membership numbers, and part of one of the many reasons that we want our membership numbers to grow is our parliamentary body in the summer um for House of Delegates, the number of representatives you get is based on the size of your membership pool compared to the national data. And while we have been kind of steadily growing, um, not by leaps and bounds by any means, but other states have you know been losing members, unfortunately. So uh with the with the report out for 2026, we gained another seat for House of Delegates. So we're gonna have a special election in April, and uh we hope to get that seat filled with someone that's passionate about it and interested, and then they will uh represent us for two years uh starting the summer already. So uh excited to to get that message out and speak to those that are interested about the role. Uh it is, I mean, I don't want to sugarcoat it. It's you know, it's not like nerd clusters, it it's got some work to it. Uh, but it's a it's a really rewarding job, I think. I've done it a couple times and uh it's an opportunity to be to be informed and to have a voice uh and represent our our association. So I'm hoping we'll get a a lot of applicants for it and nominee nominations and then see how the election falls.
SPEAKER_01:That's great. Um it's always it's nice to have a voice in House of Delegates. Certainly the more delegates you have, larger voice too, correct?
SPEAKER_02:Absolutely. Yeah. Yeah. It's just uh uh we've got some fo you know, our chief delegate has been in in his role for a long time. So people that are very familiar with with just the parliamentary process and how it goes. And so we've got good mentors for this role, um, and uh and an opportunity to, like I said, kind of have a strong voice as a state with just and hopefully this continues to happen. You know, continue to work on gaining seats by growing our membership.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah, absolutely. Uh, listeners, if you want to learn more about the House of Delegates, um uh we actually did a podcast with our chief delegate uh this summer. So go back uh to one of those earlier episodes and you can kind of get a behind-the-scenes look at what happens in House of Delegates um from Bobby and from Ian uh in that podcast. So uh go listen to it. It's it really is great. I learned a ton from them. Um, and then have you been traveling? I know fall is kind of like your get across the state time, unless you are are teaching, right? Um have you been able to get out and about, visit any programs, clinics, communities?
SPEAKER_02:For sure. Yeah, I did. I got out and did my uh road show, August maybe that was, and um I think we've chatted about that a little bit, but then also um got an invite from uh the PTA program at Northeast Community College and got the opportunity to go spend some time with them in November. Uh loved the opportunity, got to speak with both classes, and uh it's just always kind of reinvigorating to see the next generation of providers come up and um you know be able to answer their questions and got to speak a lot about the association and just keep them informed as to what's going on, but also kind of what we're about and you know where I think we're headed uh and what opportunities they have to be leaders and kind of steer us going forward as well. So uh just fun just to see the interest and um and also to kind of get away from Omaha and Lincoln and see a different part of the state and just continue to see uh kind of the need for our profession. Uh and see big classes. I was I was very impressed with the size of of the the numbers of those classes. So uh good to see that there's a continued interest in our profession.
SPEAKER_01:I love it. Well, anything else on the top of your mind today?
SPEAKER_02:Uh I guess you know, we always got to talk legislation when I come on here, don't we?
SPEAKER_01:We do, yes.
SPEAKER_02:Yeah. Uh so I guess the update on that front is just that um, you know, the the 26th session starts that first week in January. Um, we're having discussions with our lobbyist and our legislative committee as well as um other associations to see, you know, where opportunities are. I think everyone's very aware of the budget deficit that Nebraska faces. And so, you know, we hope not to lose any services and be able to maintain current access. Uh, but I think we got to be ready to adapt and to speak up. And so um while I don't know if we'll have any major initiatives ourselves that will that will be on the forefront, we have to be ready to speak up um and and make sure our voice is not lost as things come about, because uh with the size of this deficit, you just never know what um proposals will be out there to try to erase it. And while it might sound like a good idea to others, it might lead to lack of access to our profession, and that's absolutely not what we want. So we're gonna keep a close eye on it. And then you know, as always, if we put a call out, um whatever the need is, you know, we hope that we'll get good responses and that people will offer to come, share their voice and share how certain legislation might impact their job, their patience, their access, all those things.
SPEAKER_01:I know you've talked about this previously, but those individual stories really matter in that context. And um just to reinforce that, having the ability to show up, if you can do that, if you can share a story when when called upon, uh, it's invaluable. And um just a sense of being tied to a collective group, right? Um community of PTs, being able to support one another uh through doing something like that. So yeah, that's a it's a good reminder, Nick.
SPEAKER_02:And also I would add to that, Brad, just you know, if there's a if there's a certain patient you're working with that who's being directly impacted by some decision, um, if if they would be willing to come share their personal story, we would be happy to help facilitate that in any way that we can help. So uh there's a lot of advocates out there for us. We just need to get connected and get them to the right place at the right time.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah. All right. Well, thank you. I have a couple um member vet benefits for the month. Um, so if you are an APTA member, I hope you are if you're listening. Uh, you can always go through the APTA member benefits to see all of the benefits that are provided to us through the APTA. But a couple just to highlight uh this month, since we're coming up upon the holidays, um uh Dell Technologies, you can save even more on Dell's already discounted prices with the APTA membership member benefits program. There's special pricing on laptops, accessories, and more through Dell Technologies. And another one that's appropriate for the holiday season, UPS. If you're running a clinic or managing personal shipments, your APTA membership benefits can help you save with UPS. You can get up to 65% off on domestic next day and deferred services and 42% off ground commercial and residential shipping. And there's even more uh holiday savings to go along with that. So again, if you don't do it usually, um check it out now. After you've heard this, go check out the APTA member benefits and check out everything that is provided there. Well, Nick, uh, as always, thanks for the conversation. Uh listeners, thanks for listening in and appreciate you supporting the podcast. And um we're gonna take a little bit of time off for the holidays coming up here, so it may be another month before you hear from us, but we will be back after the new year. So I hope you tune in again.
SPEAKER_00:Thanks for tuning in to the APTA Nebraska podcast. Stay connected with us for more conversations that elevate our profession and improve the lives of Nebraskans. Don't forget to subscribe, share, and join the discussion. Because together, we're driving the future of physical therapy forward.
