CEA Tutorial Section 6: Cooperative Offerings

When two or more organizations work together to plan, promote, and/or conduct a course, the course is called a "cooperative offering." This section presents important information about the cooperative offering process.

Resources

What is a cooperative offering?
How do I get started?
Is there a fee?
How do I register a course with a cooperative offering?
Is it a cooperative offering if university credit is offered?

What is a cooperative offering?

A cooperative course/offering(s) is when an ASHA Approved Continuing Education (CE) Provider joins with an organization or entity that is not an ASHA Approved CE Provider to plan, deliver, and evaluate a continuing education course/offering(s) for ASHA continuing education units (CEUs), and a fee is incurred. The ASHA Continuing Education Board (CEB) considers a course/offering(s) a cooperative if another party or entity is not part of the organization approved as the ASHA Approved CE Provider as detailed in the application to become an ASHA Approved CE Provider.

A joint providership course/offering(s) is when two or more ASHA Approved CE Providers team up to jointly plan, deliver, and evaluate a course/offerings(s). One of the ASHA Approved CE Providers must take responsibility for the registration and reporting of the course/offering(s) to ASHA. There is no fee incurred or due to ASHA when two or more ASHA Approved CE Providers offer a course.

However, if multiple organizations work together to plan, conduct, deliver, and evaluate a course/offering(s), and one or more of the organizations are NOT ASHA Approved CE Providers, then this is considered a cooperative course/offering(s) and a fee is incurred.

Sponsorship is when an entity/organization provides financial and/or in-kind support for an ASHA CE course/offering(s) but is not involved in the planning, delivery, or evaluation of the course. The organization providing sponsorship has no influence over the content of the course. Financial Support is defined as money given by another organization used to pay all or part of the costs of a CE course. In-Kind Support is defined as support or contributions of things such as products, materials and equipment; volunteers; professional or other services; publicity; etc.; not money.

Promotional Wording for Sponsorship

To clarify that another organization is a sponsor of a course/offering(s) or is providing sponsorship in the form of financial or in-kind support, here are some recommended options for the wording of promotional materials:

Sponsored by...
Financial support for this course provided by...
Facilities and refreshments provided by...
Equipment/materials for use in this course provided at no cost by...
Equipment/materials for use in this course donated at no cost by...

How do I get started?

As the ASHA CE Provider, you take full responsibility for the Course/Offering registration and reporting for ASHA CEUs. You must work closely with the other party during the planning, promoting, conducting and reporting the course. However, you are not required to attend the course.

Conducting courses with other organizations requires the Provider to clearly communicate expectations and deadlines. Providers have asked ASHA CE for a sample contract, policy or guidelines to use with outside organizations. To that end, ASHA CE has created the following document:

Cooperative Course Sample Contract/Policy Template [DOC] Use this template to establish roles and responsibilities between your organization and the cooperative party.

You may also want to direct organizations interested in conducting a course cooperatively to resources that are available to non-ASHA Approved CE Providers.

Is there a fee?

A cooperative fee is due for each offering of a cooperative course.
The cooperative fee payment (either check or credit card) must be submitted when the course offering is registered.
The course offering will not be registered until payment is received by ASHA.
Co-op fee payment is nonrefundable and non-transferable.
There is no co-op fee if all parties are ASHA Approved CE Providers; for each offering, indicate whether it is a joint providership and list the Provider ID code is applicable.

How do I register a Course with a Cooperative Offering?

Verify that your organization has agreed to engage in cooperative offerings by looking up your providership in the provider listing. If you need to update this information, review the Cooperative Course and Offering Orientation and submit the Application to Engage in Cooperative Agreements.
Cooperative offering information is included in the “Registration and Cancellation” section of the CE Provider Portal.
Check "Yes" to the question "Is this a Cooperative Offering?"
Fill in the co-op organization name, contact person, phone number, and e-mail address
Include payment information at the prompt.
Cooperative offering registrations (and payments, if any) must be received by ASHA at least 30 days prior to the start date of the course.

Note: The ASHA CE Brand Block, course information (instructional level and ASHA CEU amount) and Speaker Disclosures are required (not optional) on the promotional materials. You do not have to have a representative at the course.

CEA Carmen asks: Is it a cooperative offering if university credit is offered?

That depends...

If your ASHA CE Providership is the university, it's not a co-op.

However...

If your ASHA CE Providership is for one department of a university (e.g., Communication Disorders Department), any courses with other departments would be co-ops.
If your ASHA CE Providership is not the university AND you are not approved by the university's CE Department to offer CE courses for that university, it would be a co-op.

Contact your provider manager to discuss your course if university credit will be offered in addition to ASHA CEUs.

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