What’s it for? An exploration of the functions and purpose of online Communities of Expertise in the sharing and development of knowledge in Music Therapy

The COVID-19 pandemic created a range of challenges and difficulties for the music therapy field. It has also, however, provided new opportunities for the profession to broaden how music therapists, music therapy students and service users can interact through the use of online global collaborations.This World Cafe will explore one method of bringing these groups together by investigating the function and focus of a specific Community of Practice that was initially instigated by Gustavo Gattino and Elizabeth Coombes. The Music Therapy and Autism Network, a Facebook group with over 1000 members, was created during COVID-19 in the Spring of 2020 and is currently a live platform. Membership is open to music therapists and student music therapists as well as service users. The group offers a variety of ways to connect such as regular meetings, discussion forums and the sharing of posts to enable a potential collectivization of knowledge and expertise. This World cafe seeks to explore the function of purpose of this group as perceived by its membership, using as a focus data gathered from a mixed methods online survey of group members. It is hoped this will support the development of other Communities of Practice in the music therapy profession, highlighting their potential importance for professional development and lifelong learning. The session will enable potential users of online Communities of Practice to contribute to the development of existing such groups and shape the future of these important developments for our profession, highlighting challenges and benefits of such forums.