Continuing Professional Development

Tracking Continuing Professional Development (CPD)

Professional Members must demonstrate continued development of their professional skills, engagement in their community, and service to be able to maintain their credential. They do this by tracking their Continuing Professional Development (CPD). 

CPD is the process of acquiring and maintaining the skills, knowledge, and experience of a professional. Requiring CPD to maintain the Professional Member credential ensures active participation and continued learning in the field. It also provides opportunities to actively engage in the advancement of our profession through the exchange of knowledge, ideas, and experiences.

Three Categories

We recognize Continuing Professional Development in three categories. The rationale for each of these three categories is that individuals grow as professionals when they learn, provide knowledge, and are engaged with promoting and supporting the field.

Learning and Skill Development

This category includes activities such as attending a conference, participating in a workshop or webinar, enrolling in a longer course, or undertaking an extended period of self-directed study.

Suggested Activities

  • Reading a book, article, etc. that relates to, informs, or enhances your professional practice
  • Designing a study, experiment, mock-up, etc. that relates to, informs, or enhances your professional practice
  • Attending a DEAI, Health & Safety, Sustainability, etc. training
  • Attending a professional lecture or webinar
  • Attending a professional workshop
  • Attending a professional conference
  • Completing relevant coursework
  • Developing a policy to establish standards and/or best practices
  • Consulting with a colleague or community of interest to better inform preservation/conservation/analysis approach





Teaching & Disseminating Info

This category includes teaching courses, workshops, or webinars; supervising emerging professionals; presenting at conferences; publishing; or serving as a peer reviewer.

Suggested Activities

  • Supervising a student, intern, apprentice, etc.
  • Authoring a newsletter articule, blog post, etc...in a professional context
  • Contributing to wiki content or reviewing and editing content
  • Writing/translating abstracts
  • Submitting an abstract to a professional conference
  • Presenting, authoring, or co-authoring a professional lecture, webinar, poster, etc.
  • Participating in a panel discussion
  • Chairing a conference session
  • Authoring or co-authoring a professional article
  • Serving as an editor or peer-reviewer for a professional journal
  • Developing and/or teaching an academic or professional course or workshop



Service and Outreach

This category includes activities such as service within professional organizations, oral presentations and written forms of public outreach, grant review, mentoring, and volunteering of services.

Suggested Activities

  • Presenting or sharing information that promotes conservation to the public, students, or other audiences.
  • Writing articles, blogs, op-eds, social media or website content promoting conservation.
  • Reviewing professional grant applications or assist local institutions with grant writing.
  • Mentoring or participating as a mentee; writing recommendations supporting colleagues’ or mentees’ growth.
  • Participating in or coordinating conservation clinics, community preservation projects, or cultural heritage recovery efforts.
  • Organizing conferences, symposiums, workshops, or other professional gatherings.
  • Conducting and sharing artist interviews, oral histories, or similar projects.

About Suggested Activities

We’ve listed activities in just one of the three categories based on their main purpose. We know these categories are connected, as one activity can fit into all three. For example, when you teach, you often learn and serve the profession. However, each activity should only be counted in one category.

The lists of activities are just suggestions, and each is not complete list. They are meant to serve as a guide for what activities might qualify for CPD. If a Professional Member takes part in an activity that isn’t listed but is relevant to their professional development, they can still log it.

Tracking Credits

  • Professional Members will automatically accrue a Learning and Skill Development CPD credit for each of our webinars, courses, workshops, or conferences they attend.
  • Professional Members will log additional activities in one of the three categories, providing a brief description to illustrate how this activity contributes to their professional development.
  • Professional Members earn one CPD credit for each logged activity.
  • Professional Members must earn a minimum of ten CPD credits (with at least one credit accrued in each of the three categories) within a five-year cycle.
  • Professional Members can check their progress at any time by viewing their credits in our online member portal.
  • Professional Members will need to accrue all their credits by Jul 1, 2030. After this date, we will assess the credit history of any new Professional Members on July 1 of each year. We will retroactively count any credits earned by a new Professional Member before they were a Professional Member provided it was earned within the last five years.

Member Meetup on CPD

Our October 2025 Member Meetup covered the tracking Continuing Professional Development credits.

Watch a demonstration of the credit logging tool and a Q&A with members.

Watch Recording

Frequently Asked Questions

Professional Members must report a minimum of ten CPD activities within a five-year cycle (with at least one activity in each of the three categories). In addition, Professional Members must complete an online refresher on professional ethics every five years as well.

Yes, you can count any activities that took place after January 1, 2025.

Professional Members use our member portal to log activities they have completed. Activities can be submitted as they are completed. Members are able to track their own activities throughout the five-year cycle/period.

No, Professional Members can only earn a credit for an activity in one category per cycle. 

Yes, you can log activities that are part of your work requirements.

Yes, if you receive an honorarium or stipend for your activity, you may still count it. 

Yes, you can add any activity you completed. It does not have to match an activity on the list.

Yes, you can count them towards requirements.

No one reviews your activity log to certify your entries. Staff will “spot check” a random selection of logs for completeness. They may also contact you when the number of credit appears to have been entered incorrectly.

Yes, if you want to maintain your Professional Membership designation, you must complete CPD as well.

We will have a sixty-day grace period for completing CPD. If you have not met the requirements sixty days after the five-year cycle deadline, we will remove your listing from the Find a Professional tool until you have completed their requirements. You may request an extension if extenuating circumstances prevent completion of CPD by the end of the grace period.