GISP Certification: What is it, Where did it come from and where is it going?

So, hello everyone. Welcome again

to another video from EGIS Associates.

Today, we're going to continue on with the last video we did

and talk more about GIS certification.

Specifically, we're going to look at the GISP certification,

talk about: what is it?

Where did it come from? What direction is it going?

And those kind of things, to really help you

make a better choice on, you know,

is this a certification you want to pursue?

So what is GISP?

What is the GIS Professional Certification?

Well, as we talked about in the last video,

we mentioned there were two types of certification.

You had professional certification and technical certification.

Well, GISP is a professional certification.

It is managed by the GIS Certification Institute,

or "GISCI," which you can find out more at their website,

www.gisci.org and this was first developed,

the certification itself, was developed in 2003 by URISA:

the Urban and Regional Information Systems Association.

They had been working on creating

a professional certification for the GIS industry

for several years, going back into the late 90s,

and trying to determine,

how do you certify somebody in a field

that has such a wide breadth of reach?

And it took many years for them to come up with

what is now the GISP.

URISA, however, didn't want it just to be a URISA certification.

While many people still call the GISP the "URISA certification,"

or think it belongs to URISA, it doesn't.

URISA spun off the GISP cert

and worked to create the GISCI in 2004,

so that the GISP would be a true industry certification

and not just linked to a single professional body.

So, what they did with a form of GISCI

is invited multiple professional organizations

to be part of that body,

so that you wouldn't have competing certifications in the field,

which would dilute the GISP,

also cause confusion within the industry, and so on,

and what URISA originally developed

was a portfolio-based certification,

meaning that there wasn't an exam.

You just had to show certain amounts of experience,

education, and professional contributions

in order to achieve that exam.

Since the GISCI has taken over

and been managing this since 2004,

they have very recently implemented

an exam onto that certification.

So who is the GISCI?

What are these other bodies that are part of

the GIS Certification Institute?

Well, of course, URISA is one of the founding members,

so it is part of GISCI.

We also have the Association of American Geographers, or AAG.

We have the University Consortium

of Geographic Information Science, or UCGIS.

We have the Geospatial

Information and Technology Association, GITA,

and the National States Geographic Information Council,

or NSGIC, are all members of GISCI.

So all of these various GIS-related professional organizations

have come together to manage,

promote, and grow

the GISP certification,

so that we don't have all these competing certifications

from the various organizations.

So what that means is, since the GISP was first introduced,

we now have over 6800 active GISPs.

That was as of August, 1, 2018.

With the new exam cycle just getting started,

or probably finishing up, actually,

we're going to see that number continue to grow,

and GISP is not just a US-centric certification.

It actually is an international certification.

We have GISPs, of course, in the US,

but we also have them up in Canada,

in Australia, in India,

throughout countries in Europe and even into Africa.

So, really, you can find GISPs worldwide.

So what are the requirements? If you wanted to get your GISP,

what do you have to do?

Well, first, because it is a professional certification,

you must have four years of full-time equivalent experience,

meaning you have to have worked in the profession

doing GIS work, for at least four years of full time equivalency.

Now, that doesn't mean you just have to do it in four years.

You can spread that out. So if you only work part-time

doing GIS, maybe you're a planner,

Well, then, it might take you eight years

to reach the four year full time equivalency,

but it is still possible.

You can also count in any internships

and things where you're working again,

maybe in a part-time basis,

towards that full time equivalency.

It's just got to be an equivalent of four years

of working full-time on GIS related activities.

The second component of that is the portfolio.

So you have to complete a portfolio

that shows that you have achieved

a certain minimal amount of education,

a certain minimal amount of experience,

and made professional contributions,

and we do that on a points scheme.

So you have to have achieved a total of 150 points

spread out across those three areas,

and in future videos,

we'll talk more about those specifics in those three areas

and what you need to do to meet those requirements,

but that will be coming later.

You also have to agree to follow a code of ethics

and a rules of conduct.

So these are guiding documents that kind of explain

what you can and can't do as a GIS professional

and as of 2015, you also have to pass an exam.

So you'll have to go and take that exam.

It's somewhere around typ-- I think, 180 questions.

You get something like four hours to complete it, and so on,

and again, we'll talk more about the exam in a future video.

So to actually go through that process,

you're going to go to the GISCI website and register.

So you go there; you create a user account.

There is no cost to do that.

There is no worries.

You just go on; you create your user account,

and that allows you to begin capturing information

about your career progress, right?

So you can go ahead and start entering in

information on your education.

Did you get a degree?

Did you go take a GIS workshop?

Those kind of things.

You can start putting in your experience.

You know, I was a GIS technician at ACME engineers,

or something like that.

Again, begin that process of filling out the portfolio

and just filling that stuff out.

Again, costs you no money.

It doesn't start any sort of time ticker

on when you have to finish things.

Just by putting that in,

you're just getting it-- yourself started, right?

But it doesn't--

There's no cost.

No worried about, "Oh, I've got a--

"I've started my-- my account.

Now I only have the six years to complete the process."

No, that that's not-- You can go in and start now.

In 10 years from now, if you think you're ready,

and you want to start the actual process,

that's when you do it, right? You can start doing it.

Now, once you start the process

of actually getting certified,

this is where you pay the application fee,

that $100 fee, and then you either go to take the exam

or you submit your portfolio for review.

That starts a clock,

a six year window

in which you have to complete the entire process.

So what we expect,

or what I think is probably going to happen?

For those people just getting into the GIS field,

you know, they're coming out of school with a degree,

so they're probably going to go and take that exam first.

They're going to go ahead,

while all that knowledge and theory

that they learned in college is still fresh in their mind,

they're going to go pay that $250 fee to go take the exam.

Then they have six years from the time they take that exam

to go ahead and get the portfolio done,

getting those four years of FTE completed,

getting the other educational-- professional contributions,

all of those things that are required, finished,

and in six years that should be more than sufficient

to accomplish all that without a problem.

So once they've done that, once they have completed the exam,

and you've completed the portfolio,

and you've done it in that six year window,

then you're certified.

You have earned your GISP certification.

Of course, once you get it, you still have to maintain it,

and there'll be an annual renewal fee of $95 per year.

The first year you get certified,

you don't have to pay the $95.

It's just every year after that

and then every three years

you actually have to update your portfolio

to show that you've met the ongoing education requirements,

experience requirements, and professional contribution requirements.

There's no fee for that recertification,

because you're paying the annual fee for renewal,

but that's just to recertify, to verify

that you are keeping your credential up, right?

That you're making sure that you're staying up

on industry trends, new technologies,

and those kind of things, right?

As part of being a professional,

that's what you have to do.

So that's the general process of earning your certification.

As I said, in future videos,

we'll talk in greater detail about all the specific parts,

like the education requirement

and experience and professional contributions

as well as the exam, but that's just the basic process for you.

What GISCI is now working towards is accreditation for the GISP.

When GISP was first developed in the late 90s, early 2000s,

there wasn't a whole lot of standardization

or best practices on how you create a certification.

You kind of took your best stab at it

and did the best you could and had your certification.

Well, since GISP has come along,

there's actually been published best practices

on how you develop a certification.

How do you grow the certification?

How do you maintain the certification,

from several bodies such as

the National Commission for Certifying Agencies

or the Institute for Credentialing Excellence.

Of course, ANSI and ISO also have published guidelines

along those-- are for certification,

and GISCI has been working diligently to align

the GISP certification with the criteria

and the best practices of these bodies

and so their next step for GISP is to get it accredited

by one or more of these bodies,

which then should add further value and acceptance

of the GISP certification.

So hopefully, we'll be hearing from GISCI very soon

on the status of the accreditation

and achieving the accreditation for GISP,

but said they're working on that,

and it was something that did not exist

at the time GISP was first created.

So there you have it.

That's pretty much the basics of the GISP in a nutshell.

So hopefully you found some good information from this.

As I said, we'll have future videos with more information

about the GISP as well as other certifications going forward,

and of course, remember EGIS Associates.

We're here to really help you consume that power of place,

to make use of spatial technologies

within your business practices,

with analysis, and so on, right?

So we're here. You need help

with your enterprise implementation?

We can do that for you.

You need systems integration with other solutions?

We can help with that. Strategic planning?

You know, with Arc Pro coming down the pike,

I know a lot of folks are trying to figure out

how they're going to implement Arc Pro.

How does that impact their current data,

storage, and workflows?

So we can certainly help you with that.

If you need rent-a-tech services for onsite or remote staff,

we can do that for you.

Of course, training and support.

We're always here to help.

Well, if you have any questions about the GISP certification

or other GIS related certifications,

please feel free to reach out to us. Leave a comment down below.

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So hope you've had a good one.

We look forward to seeing you in the next video.