This is the second blog post in a series of posts discussing some of the areas of confusion with the CAS Continuing Education (CE) Policy.
Documentation
The CAS requires all members providing actuarial services to document compliance with CE requirements. It’s not enough to simply meet the requirements; CAS members should also maintain a log of their CE activity.
There are two main aspects to documentation:
- Documenting specific activities that constitute continuing education.
- Documenting that the hours spent meet the relevant standard.
For simplicity, this post will focus on meeting the U.S. Qualification Standards (American Academy of Actuaries), but the same principles apply to meeting other relevant standards.
Documentation should describe the following aspects of each educational activity:
- When it took place.
- How much time the actuary spent at it.
- The specific topic.
- If relevant, the venue or sponsor, to distinguish organized from non-organized activities.
- The category (or categories) of the standard fulfilled by this activity.
Here are some examples of how various activities might be documented:
Attending a webinar:
| Date | Time Spent | Type of Event/Activity | Topic | Category Fulfilled | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | 3/14/12 | 90 min | Academy Webinar | US Qualification Standards | Organized Professional Education |
Attending relevant in-company events:
| 2 | 3/28/12 | 60 min | HR Presentation | Annual Review Instructions | General Business |
| 3 | 3/30/12 | 90 min | Actuarial Meeting | Corporate ERM models | Other |
Attending a class:
| 4 | 4/17/12 – 4/18/12 | 540 min | The SAS Institute | Creating and Presenting GLMs in SAS | Organized |
Attending a CAS meeting:
| 5 | 5/20/12 | 220 min | CAS Spring Meeting | Leading without Authority | Organized Business |
| 6 | 5/21/12 | 90 min | CAS Spring Meeting | CA WC and Pension Modeling | Organized |
| 7 | 5/21/12 | 90 min | CAS Spring Meeting | Optimization in Ratemaking | Organized |
| 8 | 5/22/12 | 90 min | CAS Spring Meeting | Business Communication | Organized Business |
| 9 | 5/22/12 | 90 min | CAS Spring Meeting | Innovations in Vehicle Ratemaking | Organized |
| 10 | 5/22/12 | 90 min | CAS Spring Meeting | Climate Change and Insurance | Organized |
| 11 | 5/23/12 | 90 min | CAS Spring Meeting | WC medical costs | Organized |
Performing committee work:
| 12 | 6/8/12 | 55 min | CE Compliance Committee | Discussed standards re Continuing Ed, and how to document | Professional |
Reading articles/publications:
| 13 | 7/10/12 | 80 min | Article/Publication | Read “Chain-Ladder Correlations”, Greg Taylor | Other |
| 14 | 7/17/12 | 150 min | Article/Publication | Read “Capital Allocation”, Steve D’Arcy | Other |
| 15 | 8/27/12 | 45 min | Article/Publication | Read “Note on Parameter Risk”, Gary Venter&Raj S | Other |
| 16 | 8/28/12 | 20 min | Article/Publication | Review SoP on P&C Ratemaking | |
| 17 | 1/1-8/30 | 150 min | Article/Publication | Review “Business Insurance” headlines, 5 min per week, 30 weeks | Other |
The examples above are not perfect documentation examples. They contain abbreviations and are not always complete. But they are adequate for reconstructing what the actuary counted as continuing education, and why.
In addition to documenting the individual activities, it is important to document time spent at each activity. We saw a number of personal records with incorrect subtotals, double-counted hours, or more than the maximum number of hours for general business education.
The examples above could be summarized like this:
| Minutes | CE Hours | Organized | Professional | General Business | Other than Prof/GB | |
| 1 | 90 | 1.8 | 1.8 | 1.8 | ||
| 2 | 60 | 1.2 | 1.2 | |||
| 3 | 90 | 1.8 | 1.8 | |||
| 4 | 540 | 10.8 | 10.8 | 10.8 | ||
| 5 | 220 | 4.4 | 4.4 | 4.4 | ||
| 6 | 90 | 1.8 | 1.8 | 1.8 | ||
| 7 | 90 | 1.8 | 1.8 | 1.8 | ||
| 8 | 90 | 1.8 | 1.8 | 1.8 | ||
| 9 | 90 | 1.8 | 1.8 | 1.8 | ||
| 10 | 90 | 1.8 | 1.8 | 1.8 | ||
| 11 | 90 | 1.8 | 1.8 | 1.8 | ||
| 12 | 55 | 1.1 | 1.1 | |||
| 13 | 80 | 1.6 | 1.6 | |||
| 14 | 150 | 3 | 3 | |||
| 15 | 45 | 0.9 | 0.9 | |||
| 16 | 20 | 0.4 | 0.4 | |||
| 17 | 150 | 3 | 3 |
The correct totals for activities tallied above, limiting general business education, are:
| CE Hours | Organized | Professional | General Business | Other than Prof/GB | |
| Totals: | 36.4 | 24.6 | 3.3 | 3 | 30.1 |
An actuary reporting the above activities would meet the U.S. Qualification Standards (American Academy of Actuaries) for continuing education for 2012, with at least 3 hours of professional education, at least 6 hours of organized education, and at least 30 hours of total continuing education, not to exceed 3 hours of general business education.
Need a log? The American Academy of Actuaries, Conference of Consulting Actuaries, and the Canadian Institute of Actuaries provide online recordkeeping tools that enable actuaries to self-report CE credits using a web-based system. (To access the CIA tracking tool, CIA members should log-in to the Members Site and then click on My CPD on the Quick Links menu.) In addition, the CAS has provided a sample log in PDF format in the Professional Education section of the website.
The Continuing Education Compliance Committee welcomes your feedback and comments. Please leave a reply below, or contact the Committee through its Staff Liaison, Melissa Casemier.
