NAP Connections
Helping Candidates Succeed with the New RP Credentialing System A Bit of History Before any of us had heard of COVID-19, the NAP Commission on Credentialing was holding one of its periodic marathon meetings in Las Vegas. At one meeting, a major part of the agenda was about perfecting the questions on the new RP assessments using sophisticated data analysis. This analysis compared the test results of the Alpha testers (PRP volunteers) and Beta testers (actual candidates). At this meeting, President Allen joined us for a very important and fruitful conversation about how to make this new system the best it could be. According to the bylaw amendment that created the commission, commissioners are forbidden to do any teaching since the special committee that proposed it found that the accepted standards for credentialing bodies require that they be separate and independent from those who provide education in the knowledge and skills to be recognized by a credential. However, since this new process is radically different from the 1200 question legacy exam, the candidates were often confused about how to prepare for this new system. The data analysis confirmed that asking candidates to teach themselves or find someone to help them was inadequate for many without other options. Conversation between President Darlene Allen and 40
National Parliamentarian • Spring 2021
Commission Chair Burke Balch resulted in Commission Vice-chair Gail Knapp resigning from the commission in order to chair a new Special Committee on RP Education. This committee was created by the NAP Board last November. The other members appointed by the board to the special committee are Steve Glanstein, Dave Mezzera, and Mary Remson. What the Committee Has Been Doing Since its creation, the committee has held weekly meetings on Zoom, with members writing educational materials between the meetings. After initially agreeing on the format that this education would take, and with support and help from President Allen, the committee decided to produce a complete set of educational materials that cover everything the candidate is required to know for all three steps in the new process. This material would teach the rules that each assessment would test, and it would provide examples of how they are applied. As of this writing, the committee has completed PowerPoint lessons on the first three parts of step one and is working on part 4. By the time you read this article, many more lessons will have been finished. The committee also created a Lesson Zero that explains the whole new process, and gives hints for being successful as a
