Designing Supportive Environments

Change in Certification Scoring and Deadlines
by Sali Taylor, Chair, Certification Committee
www.realsolutions.com

Nina East, Barbra Sundquist, Karen Van Cleve and myself have been certifying together for over a year now. Based on our experience as certifiers and in response to your feedback as members, we have the following announcements:

Dropping One Year Deadline for Step Two

The Certification Committee would like to announce that the deadline of one year from taking Step One to taking Step Two will be eliminated. We want you to know we are listening to your concerns. Some people have been feeling the pressure to submit tapes to meet the deadline even though they are not perhaps quite ready yet. In an effort to uphold the highest standards and to support our community of coaches and clients, there will be no specified time limit to complete Step Two under the current standards.

Therefore, the deadline of one year from taking Step One to taking Step Two will be eliminated immediately.

Clarification of 15 Proficiencies vs. New Certification Standard

As announced before, the IAC is in the process of developing a new certification standard based on its own IP (Intellectual Property).
Because we recognize that many of you have invested considerable time and resources in preparing for certification based on the original 15 Proficiencies, we want to allow a generous transition period. The new certification standard has not yet been released, but when it is you will have a choice whether to be certified under the new standard or the original 15 Proficiencies. Should you choose to be certified under the
15 Proficiencies, you will have a year from the date that the new process is up and running to complete your certification under the old system.

Scoring Change

In accordance with our ongoing mission to further the interests of coaching clients and in fairness to coach certification candidates, the IAC Board is very pleased to announce a modification in the scoring for Step Two of the Certification Process.. This change was recommended by the Certification Committee after a careful evaluation of the IAC certification process based on our actual experience certifying candidates over the past year and our recent involvement as certifiers at the Live Intensive Certification events conducted by Coachville, LLC. Together with Coachville, we have come to an agreed-upon measure of strong and consistent coaching – an essential assurance for coaching clients.

What does this mean for IAC members seeking Certification?

As before, you will continue to submit recordings (MP3's, CD's or tapes) of two 30-minute coaching sessions. Your individual score on each recording must be at least 80% and you must achieve a minimum score a 4 out of 5 on each proficiency at least once over the course of the two coaching sessions. In rare instances, one score of 3 may be permitted at the certifiers' discretion. If this occurs, you will be interviewed regarding that proficiency to assure that you fully understand the proficiency and are able to use it appropriately. The change to require a minimum score of 4 on every proficiency is in response to our experience, which shows that between two demonstration coaching sessions, there are opportunities to demonstrate all of the 15 proficiencies.

This new scoring system will go into effect Sept 1st. Any recordings submitted after that date will be evaluated using this new standard.

Introducing the Newest Member of our Certification Team

We are delighted to announce the addition of Natalie Tucker Miller (www.unparenting.com) to our IAC Certifiers team. Natalie brings her knowledge of the Proficiencies from her experience as Community Coach and Certifier for Coachville. Natalie has a wonderfully supportive style. Her experience and perspective will be assets to the certifying team and to the candidates.

Natalie's Bio: Teaching early education, parenting education and personal development since 1989, Natalie Tucker Miller has called Vermont home since 1985. Growing up in Long Island, NY, she graduated from Five Towns College, then continued her education in the pastoral setting of northern NY at SUNY Potsdam. There she met Paul, to whom she's been married since 1982.

In addition to consulting parents and teachers, presenting parenting and teaching materials in workshop and keynote settings, she home educated her two daughters, who are now successfully fulfilling their own dreams.
She concludes, "The most valuable experience I've gained is through the lessons taught to me by the hundreds of people I've had the good fortune of being involved with over the years. And most notably, the two I call my daughters."

Natalie holds certifications for coaching through the IAC and Coachville, where she is an instructor, community coach and certifying examiner.