ASHA CE's Consultative Approach to Supporting Providers

ASHA CE adopted a more consultative and collaborative approach to supporting our Provider’s adherence to the ASHA CE Provider Standards on March 1, 2022. Under this approach, your Provider Management team (Provider Manager and Accounts Manager) will reach out to discuss issues with registration or reporting, assess the circumstances surrounding missed deadlines or policies, and collaboratively work with you to ensure the Standards and Policies are satisfied moving forward.

The Details

So, how does the approach work? This consultation workflow [PDF] provides a good introduction of what happens when a Standard or Policy isn’t met. Here’s a description of how the new approach will work:

You’ll have a discussion with your Provider Manager and/or Accounts Manager to explore what happened.
The purpose of this initial conversation is to identify the cause of the issue and determine the best course of action. If a similar issue hasn’t occurred multiple times within your current 5-year review period, we’ll talk through the issue, provide support, and consider the issue to be resolved. In instances like these it’s unlikely the same problem will occur again.
If we find that the issue is systemic (if a similar issue has occurred within your current 5-year review period), then
We’ll set up a meeting with you and your team and formulate a plan to ensure the same issue doesn’t happen again.
During this meeting, you and your Provider Management team will create and document a plan. Together, you’ll set a timeframe to resolve the issue.

From this point, one of the following will happen:

If the plan is successful, then we’ll consider the issue resolved and provide support as needed.
If the plan doesn’t address the issue within the established timeframe, you’ll meet with your Provider Management team again to adjust the plan until the issue is successfully resolved.

The overall goal in our interactions with Providers when reviewing course registrations and processing reporting is twofold:

Confirming course planning, marketing and delivery meets best practice goals through adherence to the Standards. This ensures that participants are receiving high quality courses, and that the important course details are clearly communicated to them.
Making sure participants who attended courses and requested ASHA CEUs receive their ASHA CEUs in a timely manner.

How will this impact your course registrations?

When we review your course and offering registrations, we’ll focus on elements of the registration that affect the quality of the course planning, marketing, and delivery, as well as the timeliness of registration. The following course elements will be of particular importance in our review:

Learning outcomes
The agenda/course structure, which informs the ASHA CEU amount
Satisfactory completion requirements
ASHA CE Brand Block and Course Information (ASHA CEU amount and Instructional level)
Disclosures
Course and offering registration deadlines

When a course is registered, it’s important to review the registration confirmation and submit any changes using the Course Registration Information Change Form. You can find the registration confirmation on the Course Profile in the CE Provider Portal. One reason to review the registration confirmation is that ASHA CE will no longer provide feedback on the course title and description. While your review should not be limited to these items, it’s essential to pay careful attention to the course title and description as they appear on ASHA CE Registry users’ transcripts, which are reviewed by state regulatory agencies. It is incumbent upon the Provider to confirm course titles and descriptions contain no grammatical errors, avoid marketing language, and communicate what your course participants should expect to learn. For additional information on how to write effective course titles and descriptions, check out the Course Details section of the CEA Tutorial.

How will this impact your course offering reporting?

When your Accounts Manager reviews course offering reporting they’ll focus on the accuracy of course and participant information and timeliness of the reporting. This ensures that Participants receive their ASHA CEUs without delay once they complete a course and that staff errors are corrected in a timely manner.

The issues of particular importance in our review of the initial reporting are:

Reporting that arrives after the 45-day deadline
ASHA CE is unable to identify the course number indicated in the reporting
ASHA CE is unable to identify the offering number indicated in the reporting
There are issues with the data in the reporting file that prevent it from being processed
The offering dates provided in the reporting don’t match what is registered
The reporting cannot be processed due to formatting errors
There are discrepancies between the ASHA CEU amount indicated in the reporting and what was indicated in the registration
Participant information is missing, and the record can’t be posted

The issues of particular importance after the initial reporting has been processed are: