An FYI for Colorado licensed Professional Land Surveyors.?ÿ The state society introduced a bill in the Legislature on January 10, 2018.?ÿ It was heard by the House Committee on Business Affairs & Labor and passed the full House today.?ÿ The bill is very brief and grants the licensing board with promulgating rules for the program.?ÿ All continuing education courses must be "Board-approved" and the Board must determine that proposed continuing education courses, "maintain professional competency" prior to their approval.?ÿ I'm not sure what that may mean regarding CE taken in other states or programs like CFedS.?ÿ The usual process is that the course must be approved before the course is offered.
Here is a link to the bill and its history to date.
Colorado HB18-1038 Land Surveyors Continuing Education Requirement
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Required or not, I've attended some form of Surveying seminar for over 30yrs and found them to be full of great educational, social and meaningful rewards.
Long weekend road trip is awesome too.
Mr. Harris,
I don't disagree with your position. I've attended and given many courses over the years.?ÿ When I was the PLSC Executive Director and president of the Denver-area chapter I was in charge of putting on several conferences.?ÿ I also took the CFedS training, not because I wanted the business opportunity to survey Indian Trust Lands, but to garner a better understanding of how BLM Cadastral Surveyors are trained.?ÿ
Some states appear to have had a MCE for too long.?ÿ Several years ago, I was asked to give a presentation on mineral surveys in Pittsburg, KS at a KSLS conference.?ÿ After a little research, I found that there was only one mineral survey in all of Kansas, a salt placer that is currently submerged under a reservoir.?ÿ When I got there I found that I was only one of two speakers.?ÿ I had nearly 100 Kansas surveyors listen to my "novelty" talk because they had seen the same courses so many times that some had become bored.?ÿ One of the pleasures of being there was that I got to meet a gent named Hole Digger.?ÿ I think he goes by a different moniker now.
While there's value in continuing education, I prefer exercising my professional judgment as to when and which courses I take, not what is decided by State mandate.?ÿ I fear that surveyors are slowly but surely losing the ability to exercise their professional judgment.?ÿ An old, cynical codger might start thinking that surveying is getting so regulated and codified that it should instead be assigned to engineers.?ÿ They should be able to come up with a nice set of binders on surveying standards and codes, shouldn't they??ÿ ??ÿ
Continuing Education was a good idea when it started but with passage of time it has been turned into a money making source for to many States, I am licensed in 5 states and I need to get 16 hours a year. To fulfill my requirements of ethics and minimum standards for the various states that will pretty well cover my 16 hours. It is very sad when you attend some of these classes and you find that half the class knows more about the subject than the presenter.
Reading threads like this, makes me truly appreciate the system that we have here in Washington State. The BORPELS has the final say on what qualifies as professional development hours, but they leave it up to the PLS to decide what benefits them the most (WAC 196-16-115). Said qualifying activities are listed under WAC 196-16-120.
Seems like a lot of other state boards insist on micromanaging the continuing education process for licensees...
The Kansas approach is after-the-fact approval. ?ÿYou take in whatever classes, etc. you feel should count. ?ÿWhen they look over the class attendance data you provide to them they make a determination as to whether or not each entry is worthy of being counted. ?ÿIf they disallow enough that you fall short of the minimum requirement you are given a few months to find "worthy" make up classes. ?ÿThere is a 2-hour mandatory class for surveyors that can be taken online on the content of the current version of the State minimum standards. ?ÿTo the best of my knowledge they do not require CE providers to do any kind of pre-certification as some other states do.
I use the NCEES track and report system for continuing ed. Lucky for us in the PNW our Boards are pretty reasonable on what to accept. If any of them rejected CFedS I wiuld probably just mail back my license. ?ÿ
In Colorado there is a state statute that requires a review by the Dept. of Regulatory Agencies before a mandatory continuing education bill can be introduced in the Legislature.?ÿ A report is prepared and sent to the Legislature with DORA's recommendation as to whether the MCE is protective of the public or not.?ÿ It is a reason why Colorado is only one of a handful of states with no MCE currently.?ÿ I haven't looked lately, but a few years ago I was only aware that Arizona, and the three "C" states didn't have a requirement.
Here is the report
The most interesting parts of the report were the statements that neither the PLSC nor the folks at COPRRR (Colorado Office of Policy, Research & Regulatory Reform) could find a study, analysis or psychometric magic number crunching that showed a correlation between MCE and a reduction in licensing board enforcement actions.
Also, the PLSC did include a wish list they would like to see adopted from the board rulemaking.?ÿ I'm scratching my head as to why they didn't put them in the bill.?ÿ The wish list would include 30 MCE hours per biennium with at least 2 MCE hours in ethics.?ÿ Up to 10 hours could be in self-directed study (I don't know how that fits with board-approved curriculum with a standard for approval being the maintenance of competency) and 15 hours could carry over to the next biennium.?ÿ For thebionicman, that would mean that CFedS would only count for a maximum of 45 "contact" hours.
Here is my question for those in other states.?ÿ Have any of you seen a study that shows a causal link between MCE and a reduction in board enforcement actions??ÿ I looked carefully in 2009 and found nothing.?ÿ My follow-up this week with a few folks including a licensing board exec from one of the other states with no MCE seems to indicate that there still isn't a positive study.?ÿ I'd be a bit more open to the suggestion of a State mandate if there was tangible proof that it was protective of the public.?ÿ All I have ever seen is logic along the line of, "it can't hurt and might help".
From my observations, board enforcement actions against licensees generally fall into one of three cubbyholes.?ÿ The first is the licensee forgot to do something within a required timeframe.?ÿ For example, in Colorado the surveyor forgot to mention to the board that they had a disciplinary action against their license in another state, they forgot to file a plat within a year, or they didn't file a monument record within 6 months.?ÿ The second and third ones deal with substandard practice.?ÿ I break them out into to types.?ÿ The first is ignorance of the state statutes, board rules, boundary law, etc.?ÿ I see that MCE can help a surveyor in that case.?ÿ The other is substandard practice due to an ethical breach.?ÿ The surveyor knows what he/she is supposed to do, but purposely decides to not do what is required.?ÿ I'm not sure there is a MCE course that can "fix" an unethical professional.
Well, enough for now.?ÿ It should be interesting to see what the Board rulemaking process with require if the bill passes the Senate and gets the Governor's signature.?ÿ I turn 65 next month so it won't affect me personally.?ÿ Should I get my voice tuned up to yell, "GET OFF MY GRASS" whenever I get the urge??ÿ ??ÿ
I just hope that my C state holds firm!
Just say no to any rules that require preapproval before the course is given.
Just say no.?ÿ I don't think anyone has ever produced evidence that shows states requiring continuing education have fewer cases of incompetent surveying.
Looking on state board websites, it looks like the biggest area for discipline isn't for negligence, but for not meeting the CE requirement.
Should I get my voice tuned up to yell, "GET OFF MY GRASS" whenever I get the urge??ÿ ??ÿ
The federal old-codger manual states that "GET OFF MY LAWN" is the actual recommended terminology.?ÿ But since Colorado has some laws that make allowances for some things the the Federal Government deems illegal, I suspect that "GET OFF MY GRASS" is more apropos in your state.
I just hope that my C state holds firm!
Jim,
While I personally would like to see my state hold firm too, my real reason for posting this here is to make the land surveyors that don't belong to the PLSC aware of the bill and the potential future mandate, esp. those licensed in nearby states that may have to deal with more stringent requirements than their home state.?ÿ As everyone here knows I'm an odd duck.?ÿ I usually check the Colorado General Assembly's web site to see what's going on and that is when I saw the bill.?ÿ It took a week of calling folks at DORA to get a copy of their report.?ÿ It wasn't available because it wasn't completed until January 17, one day before the bill was heard by the House committee.
There are approx. 1750 PLS licensees in Colorado.?ÿ I gave a presentation last February at the PLSC annual conference and was told by those that know that the voting members were down to ~300.?ÿ Some folks wait to renew their memberships, which left me with the impression that a little less than 20% of the licensees are PLSC members.
I doubt that this thread will spur anyone to testify against the bill and the likely outcome is that the PLSC leaders will get their coveted MCE.?ÿ One good thing for me if that happens is I will finally have a business-related reason to keep up my CFedS CEUs.?ÿ All I'll need to do is find someone to teach me ethics and ethical behavior!?ÿ ??ÿ
I don't think the Board will approve any of my research on mineral surveys, but you can't have everything.
Should I get my voice tuned up to yell, "GET OFF MY GRASS" whenever I get the urge??ÿ ??ÿ
The federal old-codger manual states that "GET OFF MY LAWN" is the actual recommended terminology.?ÿ But since Colorado has some laws that make allowances for some things the the Federal Government deems illegal, I suspect that "GET OFF MY GRASS" is more apropos in your state.
Tom,
Geezo, wheezo!?ÿ I need to rethink my screed, esp. since Colorado has a booming green industry for recreational & medical crops.
"GET OFF MY LAWN" it is now.?ÿ Thank you for the heads up my good friend!
Speaking of one of the other "C" states, I vaguely recall reading something a year ago that California lengthened the time it took to get one's license renewed.?ÿ Prior to renewal, the licensee would have to watch/participate in a review of land surveying issues.?ÿ At the conclusion of the review they had to answer some questions.?ÿ If a licensee got one or more questions wrong they had to take extra time to hear an explanation of the correct answer(s).?ÿ There is no passing grade so everyone still gets to renew their license regardless of the test results.
A couple of questions.
Has this been implemented yet? And if so, what are your impressions?
Does the Board keep track of who failed to answer the questions correctly, or just the number of wrong answers so a state psychometrician can "play with the numbers" and recommend improvements to the "presentation"?
