When it comes to "The Workforce of Tomorrow" (5 to 10 Years Out), "replacing aging workforce / retiring Boomers" is the second most mentioned unaided workforce-related concern among Virginia business leaders. Source: 2008 Older Dominion Project Business Leaders' Study
Partners
Partner Profiles
Name: Denise Scruggs, MA, MS, ADC, CDP
Title: Director
Company/Organization: Beard Center on Aging at Lynchburg College
ODP Partner Since: December 2009
ODP Committee Affiliation: Community Readiness
Summarize your professional background relevant to Age Wave preparedness.
For over 14 years, I have worked with older adults in a variety of settings including nursing homes, continuing care retirement communities, and adult day care settings. In addition, I managed a dementia unit in a continuing care retirement community. Most of my career has been working with the frail elderly in activities and social work.
Since July 2007, I have served as Director of the Beard Center on Aging at Lynchburg College. In this position, I strive to prepare students to work and live in an aging community while providing outreach services in the community.
At the Beard Center, we provide information and referral services, and I serve as President for Region 2000’s Consortium on Aging, which is comprised of over 54 agencies and organizations committed to creating a community for all ages.
I am a public speaker and travel across the state to provide workshops on a variety of issues related to aging. My specialties are intellectual disabilities and aging, dementia, successful aging, and aging sensitivity training. I also serve as a contributing writer for the “Senior News,” a newspaper distributed to over 20,000 persons in central and southwestern Virginia.
I am a Certified Dementia Practitioner and an approved instructor for the National Council of Certified Dementia Practitioners. I am qualified to teach the Alzheimer’s disease and dementia course required for persons to become Certified Dementia Practitioners.
I serve on a number of Boards and Committees within Region 2000 including:
- Central Virginia Area Agency on Aging’s Advisory Council (Chair) and Board of Directors
- Lynchburg City Parks and Recreation’s 50 Plus Program’s Advisory Council
- Alzheimer’s Association of Central Virginia’s Regional Council
- Centra PACE’s Participant Advisory Committee
- Blue Ridge Home Health Services’ Advisory Board
- Bedford Community Health Foundation’s Advisory Council
What expertise or other strengths do you bring to the Older Dominion Partnership?
I am passionate about what I do. I love working with older adults and their caregivers. As a cancer survivor, I realize that life has a beginning and end, and I really want to make a difference while I can. I feel that I do this every day by working with older adults, their family members, and others who care for them. In many ways, I serve as a “voice” for older adults by speaking out and sharing their issues and their strengths, while urging our area to proactively prepare for the Age Wave.
I have worked both personally and professionally with aging most of my life. In addition to volunteering in a nursing home when I was 16 years old and working professionally in the field of gerontology, I assisted older family members most of my life. My mom, with the help of the rest of the family, spent over 10 years caring for my grandmother who had dementia and my dad who was chronically ill and forced to retire early. These experiences have provided me “first hand” experience with caregiving and “aging in place.”
What do you believe are the most pressing issues in Age Wave-preparedness in Virginia today?
I am concerned about the lack of interest in our communities regarding the population shift and the need to prepare for the Age Wave. It appears that people are not taking the population shift or the implications of this shift seriously. In addition, we are seeing the needs of our current older adults taking a back seat to other community issues. In some ways, our elderly are being treated like second-class citizens, and they are not being treated with the dignity and respect they deserve.
A second concern I see is the lack of interest by our youth in careers in aging. Although careers in gerontology will grow and we promote these careers, there appears to be little interest in working with older adults. We need to identify the reasons for this, decrease the “disconnect” between generations, and promote careers in gerontology.
What advice do you have for age wave planning in Virginia?
The ODP has done a wonderful job in increasing awareness about the Age Wave and the need for Age Wave Planning. I think the group should continue to do this. By offering education and information via the Web site and educational programs, this appears to have been helpful.