Examples of On-going Professional Development (OPD)
You must keep your knowledge and skills up-to-date as well as your practice and experience.
Professional bodies have, for some time, encouraged members to take part in and record activities related to their On-going Professional Development (OPD). OPD comprises knowledge, skills, practice and experience maintenance. The Institute supports this and has included it as an essential requirement of gaining and maintaining of Certified Practicing (CP) status.
The Institute’s Professional Development Program includes some courses that will allow people to fulfill their OPD needs. This is particularly so in the area of knowledge and skills maintenance. Practice or experience maintenance is also required.
There are, of course, some grey areas in determining on-going professional development so the CP Board may need to exercise its discretion. For example, someone who attends a week-long shotfiring course that involves two days of fieldwork might wonder if they should split the course into three days of knowledge and skills maintenance and two days of practice or experience maintenance. In this particular example, you might have to decide whether you attended primarily in order to gain experience or primarily to gain knowledge and skills, and allocate the five days accordingly – i.e. don’t try to split courses.
Whatever you choose, the CP Board may query your choice or exercise its own discretion.
For an example of maintenance of knowledge and skills click here
For an example of maintenance of practice and experience click here