2017 Exam Guidelines Released...

[PJW]

Think we all can accept the institution is small and run mostly by volunteers. Time is precious, the Institution works hard.

However, many of the timescales seem ludicrously long. Need to apply by January to gain membership to sit an exam in October! Potentially, can we see benefit in putting a short white paper together where exam candidates have a special membership committee that also vets exam applications far closer to a "reasonable" deadline, i.e. end of July? Accept expression of interest before then to get an idea of scale and to be considered for inclusion in the "special" meeting and be given the full application pack. Also, a prescriptive set of dates of what/when candidates need to do as well as when the IRSE will notify, i.e. acceptance onto the exam, results being issued...

Some of this is in place. Some not. Comments?

Jerry

Personally I don't have an issue about needing to have applied for membership at the beginning of the year to sit an exam in October- hardly seems an imposition and given that access to study material becomes available makes a lot of sense.

Neither does a June exam registration.
  
It is the SDF deadline that seems both 

• an excessive time before the end of June deadline (I can't see why it shouldn't be 2 weeks rather than 2 months- we are only talking about say 100 people doing an average of 2 modules each and that would mean only having to process around 10 forms a day and even at a generous 30mins each it is less than one person's workload and anyway could be planned for as it won't be unexpected), and
  
• an insufficient time after the results are published and the previous year's exam review held.
  

I do agree that, volunteer organisation or not, there ought to be some committment from the IRSE to the candidates. It is not just the speed of the exam results, it is the notice given of the time and place for the exam; it is often very late.  Certainly for those needing accommodation or hopeful of getting reasonably priced rail tickets, or even knowing whether they will be free to do something else that day to fit in with friends and family, finding out those details only one or two weeks prior to the day when the committment to to sit was nearly 3 months earlier doesn't seem fair.  There are a huge number of organisations largely or totally dependent on volunteers that are able to commit to provide some sort of service, be it religious, scout troop, sports club, charity, National Trust, heritage railway.....