Results From a Survey of CIPP Listserv Members

(Recently, there was an informal survey of CIPP listserv members, below are the results. Marc A. Williams administrated  the survey. Jeff Peachey)

 

Here are your collective thoughts on the CIPP survey posted on SurveyMonkey.  The free version of SurveyMonkey only allows 100 responses, then closes the survey automatically.  I was required to clear the data in order to re-initiate the survey.  Thus, I have aggregated the two runs of the survey in the table following.  I used the total survey respondents to calculate percentages, including the “skipped question” responses.  SurveyMonkey does not include “skipped question” in their calculations, so their figures will be different.  I will send the SurveyMonkey data from both runs of the survey in a later email, as it is rather long.

 

Overall, there were 111 responses, including 110 CIPP members and 1 non-member (who completed the survey anyway even though requested not to do so).  This represents approximately 44% of CIPP members on the list serve, and approximately 30% of all CIPP members (there are conflicting numbers of total members, so this percentage is rough).

 

In summary, given four “certification” options (question 2), 80.1% chose remaining only with the existing PA and Fellow designations without certification, either as they are (39.6%) or in a strengthened version (40.5%).  18.9% chose currently proposed certification, either co-existing with the PA/Fellow designations (11.7%) or replacing PA/Fellow (7.2%).  If limited only to two options (question 3), 76.6% chose existing PA/Fellow as they currently are without certification, and 20.7% chose existing PA/Fellow as they currently are with certification added.  This question is effectively the same as “do you favor the current certification model – yes or no.”  Question 4 asked if it was determined to be legally acceptable to require PA/Fellow as a certification prerequisite, would this be the preferred alternative?  35.1% said yes, and 59.5% said no. 

 

Marc

 

Mark van Gelder’s Suggestions

I understand that the criteria for who can take a certification exam and who might pass that exam can be different, and I understand the legal reasoning behind the concept that everyone should at least be offered a chance to take the exam.

 

However, my concern is that the currently proposed model for certification seriously confuses and undermines the general understanding of what it means to be a recognized professional member of the professional trade organization known as AIC, by creating a basic membership category of “Certified Member”, which is open, (for legal reasons), to those who have not even gone through the process of becoming Professional Associate members, the established, peer-reviewed, voting core of our membership.

 

I see this as quite a significant flaw in the basic design, a flaw which will be difficult to later remedy if it turns out to cause more problems for AIC than it solves, since it arises from a compromise solution to a legal problem for us with this separate exam approach to certification in the first place.  I don’t think we would otherwise choose to intentionally design a certification program for the professional conservators in AIC this way.

 

Because of this problem, I now find myself, like Paul, inclined toward the alternate solution of approaching the certification issue from the perspective of applying some of its basic elements to the strengthening of the existing professional membership categories in AIC.  There are certainly a number of other ways to legally achieve similar goals and potential benefits for our profession by working within rather than confounding our existing membership structure.

 

-Mark van Gelder

 Art Conservation Services of Austin

Paul Himmelstein’s Proposal

While it is true that the restraint of trade complaint brought by the 

US government against AIC had nothing to do with certification, it 

did indeed cost a considerable amount of money (and time) to resolve 

the problem.  AIC has retained legal counsel to advise it on issue 

such as restraint of trade.  Our counsel has apparently given us his 

best advice on the problem of using pre-qualifications such as 

requiring PA status before applying for certification.  While we may 

not like (or agree) with his opinion, it clearly serves no purpose to 

argue the point here.  The AIC Board has a duty to protect the 

organization, based on such advice, and we could well find ourselves 

in very deep trouble if we ignored the advice.  If members disagree 

with the advice, then they should raise the issue directly with the 

Board and perhaps ask for a second opinion.  (Who should pay for that 

would one of my immediate questions.)  Personally, I believe we would 

do better trying to use PA (perhaps upgraded) and Fellow as 

qualifications, and drop certification all together. The enormous 

cost to AIC of certification seems inappropriate at a time when some 

members may find it increasingly difficult just to pay their dues. 

Until the economic climate improves, I think we should table the 

entire proposed program!

 

Paul Himmelstein

Evaluating the English System of Certification

The new issue of “The Conservator, Vol. 31, 2008” has a very relevant article (Stan Lester, “Putting conservation’s professional qualification in context”) evaluating the United Kingdoms PACR accreditation process, since it has been in place for the last eight years.  In the context of discussing the purpose behind the PACR, “There was a strong view that it needed to be assessed through means that were both valid for the kinds of work that conservators do (not, for instance, using a paper-based portfolio, a written examination or a contrived project) and robust enough to withstand external scrutiny” (p. 6)

It is interesting that Dr. Lester specifically rules out a written examination as being a valid and defendable  measure of a conservators competence, since it is the only option AIC seems to be considering.

Jeff Peachey