ABSTRACT
Thank you for inviting me to speak to you at the start of this conference. We have all been through a period of intense change and turbulence in the field of clinical education and development. The only thing that is certain is that there is no immediate prospect of reaching equilibrium or stasis. Change has become a way of life and we must learn to live with it, even thrive on it. Unfortunately change tends to be accompanied these days by a disparaging of history, a feeling that we have nothing to learn from the past except per haps excuses for not being more enthusiastic about the future. The corporate memory of the system is also being lost. This is important because the conti nuity that you all represent is one repository of corporate memory. The past cannot tell us about the future, but learning from it can prevent us repeating the same mistakes.
