The Council on Professional Registration (Council or CPR) extends a warm welcome to the 49 candidates who passed the Registered Quality Assurance Professional in GLP and/or GCP examinations offered in the fall of 2009.
The Council received and reviewed 177 applications for re-registration in 2009. We congratulate all RQAP-GLP registrants who maintained their professional registration through participation in professional development activities. We encourage all registrants to periodically review the requirements for re-registration. Registrants who passed the exam or re-registered last in 2007 will need to submit their re-registration applications by 31 October 2010. Applicants who meet the re-registration criteria receive seals to place on their certificates extending their registration for another three years. For more information pertaining to the re-registration process, see the RQAP Re-Registration page. The Council is currently reviewing the re-registration process, exploring ways to facilitate the process without eliminating the need for registrants to demonstrate active education in the profession.
Many of our international colleagues would like to take the RQAP exam and are unable to travel to the US to access an available testing center. In response to this interest, the Council distributed a Request for Proposals to eight professional testing vendors in early February, searching for a contract testing company with the capability of taking the RQAP program international. Watch the SQA website for future developments.
Thank you to all QA colleagues who completed the RQAP survey circulated in November 2009. The purpose of the survey was to learn how the program can best serve those who are registered, learn what prevents unregistered QA professionals from seeking RQAP registration, and collect recommendations for improvements to the program from professionals. We value your input to ensure that the RQAP program accurately represents professionalism in our industry. Summary results will be presented at the RQAP information session at the 26th SQA Annual Meeting in Cincinnati, Ohio, in April 2010, and the results will also be published in a future Quality Matters newsletter.
For those of you who are not yet RQAPs and are interested in finding out more about the registration program, you are invited to attend the RQAP information session entitled “Demystifying RQAP” at the 26th SQA Annual Meeting in Cincinnati, Ohio. The session will be given on Wednesday, 28 April 2010 at 10:30 am. Please check the meeting schedule for details. In the session, we will summarize the history behind the exams, explain the exam creation and validation process, briefly discuss the relevance of the exam study reference lists, provide guidance on how to prepare for the exam, and describe how to maintain your registration status once you have obtained it. Bring your questions to the session; representatives of the Council will be present to answer them! Look for the CPR poster to answer your questions as well.
Registrants can earn one (1) unit of re-registration credit by attending an item writing workshop in Cincinnati, Ohio, following the SQA Annual Meeting and writing ten (10) assigned items for the GLP or GCP examination. The one-day item writing workshop will take place on Friday, 30 April 2010. All participants must attend the training session presented by SQA’s current testing partner, AMP, in the morning. We encourage you to participate. Contact Barbara Randolph if you would like more information.