MnCAT Step 4 – Recertification: Instructions
Updated 11/14/24
Purpose
Provide instructions and guidance on the requirements for MnCHOICES Certified Assessor Training (MnCAT) Step 4, which is the recertification of certified assessors as required by Minn. Stat. §256B.0911, Subd. 2c.
Background
DHS certifies assessors for three years. At the end of three years, the certification expires. An assessor must complete recertification before or during the same month in which they were certified during their third year of certification. In developing the requirements for certification, DHS accounted for the ongoing training requirements for social workers and registered nurses. DHS blended the two sets of requirements, and modified them slightly, to create the recertification requirements for MnCHOICES certified assessors.
Importance of continued learning
Participating in continued learning activities should be meaningful to assessors and enhance their professional knowledge and skills in a way that improves their practice as a MnCHOICES certified assessor. The main responsibilities of a certified assessor are to:
- Conduct person-centered needs assessment interviews
- Develop person-centered support plans
- Participate in a multidisciplinary team.
It is essential that they continue to grow in their knowledge, skill and ability to perform their primary job responsibilities.
Continued learning units (CLUs)
DHS encourages certified assessors to use a variety of ways to improve their knowledge, skills and abilities. To be recertified, assessors must acquire 45 CLUs during the three-year certification period.
Definition
A continued learning unit:
- Improves the practice of a MnCHOICES certified assessor.
- Enhances the assessor’s knowledge, skill or ability to:
- Enriches the assessor’s capacity to participate as a valued member of the agency’s multidisciplinary team.
Topics
Topic areas for CLUs are unlimited, but keep in mind that the activity must improve the practice of a MnCHOICES certified assessor. DHS encourages assessors to consider the following areas as vital to professional development and include them in each three-year recertification period:
Communication and interviewing style, including:
- How to do perception checking to prevent misunderstanding
- Reading body language
- Understanding cultural differences (age, disability, social role, etc.).
Expanding knowledge about different long-term service and support populations, including:
- Learning about a specific diagnosis, such as diabetes, hearing loss, multiple sclerosis, depression, autism, etc., and how it affects daily living
- Learning about aging, brain injury, developmental disability, being medically fragile, adults with disabilities, children with special needs, etc.
Command of resources for targeted referrals, including:
- Financial resources such as Medical Assistance, Alternative Care, Family Support Grant, Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, Social Security, veteran’s benefits, etc.
- Community resources such as Lions clubs, food shelf, transportation, Salvation Army, Bridging Inc., relocation/transition services, online resources, etc.
- Further evaluation and assessment, such as Rule 185, mental health, physical therapy, occupational therapy, special education, etc.
Building person-centered practitioner skills, including:
- Understanding the role of traditions and routines
- Addressing health and safety needs while supporting individual choice and control
- Using person-centered practices in support planning.
Person-centered practice
During the three-year recertification period, at least 12 of the 45 CLUs must improve the ability of the assessor to practice in a person-centered way. The University of Minnesota’s Institute for Community Integration (ICI) does a lot of work to help people, providers, practitioners and administrators build their understanding of person-centered thinking and planning. Note that neither the title of the activity nor its content is required to contain the phrase “person-centered” to meet the criteria of improving a person-centered practice.
A person-centered practice is not a just a phrase. It is a way of completing an assessment and/or support plan that helps people with disabilities or people who are aging to:
- Share their desires and goals
- Learn about and consider different options for support
- Provide meaningful input
- Make informed choices.
This means certified assessors should reflect on a learning activity to consider if it meets the requirements to improve their person-centered approach at work. The CLU may do this by helping the assessor to:
- Make it easier for people to visualize and share their desires and goals.
- Know about many potential resources and options for each person’s situation.
- Put people at ease when engaged in difficult conversations.
- Feel confident that when a person makes a choice, they really understand all aspects of the decision.
There is a decision tree to help determine if a particular learning activity meets the test for a CLU. Go to the document at PartnerLink – MnCHOICES.
Unit length
A CLU is one hour (60 minutes) in length. If a qualifying learning unit is shorter or longer than an hour, credit is calculated to the nearest quarter hour. For example, if a learning session is 15 minutes long, it can be counted as .25 CLUs. Similarly, if a session is 20 minutes long it is also counted as .25 units. Credit for one college semester equals 15 CLU hours, and credit for one college quarter equals 10 CLU hours.
Types of learning activities
Each assessor is responsible to determine if an activity meets the CLU requirements. We recommend certified assessors use a variety of learning activities during each three-year recertification period. The list below is not all-inclusive, but gives examples of learning activities:
- Participate in an in-person or virtual training provided by a person qualified to teach the subject matter.
- Complete on-line training provided by a recognized organization such as DHS, trade associations, institutes of higher learning, etc.
- Develop and present a training session on assessment/support planning, long-term services and supports, specific diagnosis, etc.
- Publish an article/book or deliver a professional paper.
- Participate in a work-related quality-improvement project, like a focus group with people who need/use long-term services and supports.
- Participate in a data-analysis/research project about assessment/support planning for long-term services and supports.
- Coach a qualified candidate or new certified assessor and share important strategies that will help them through training/certification or beginning their career as a certified assessor.
- Self-study through reading books, online resources, journal articles and other professional publications.
Documentation
Assessors need to document each learning activity and maintain their records for at least three years following recertification. The information on record will vary, depending on the type of CLU that is completed.
Certified assessor tasks
Prerequisite — Review online training module about how to use TrainLink to record CLUs: MnCHOICES Step 4: Recertification - MNCH8020.
- Complete one or more CLUs and record CLU information in TrainLink.
- CLUs must be within the current certificate’s start and end date.
- Develop portfolio to save supporting documents.
- When an assessor records 45 or more CLUs in TrainLink, features like the total CLUs earned in the current recertification period will turn to bright green (make sure at least 12 CLUs are connected to improving person-centered practice).
- Select save all activities.
- Print a transcript for yourself and/or your supervisor and close the document.
- Follow the instructions to obtain a new certificate.
- Present recertification portfolio to lead agency administrator for final approval:
Lead agency supervisor/manager
Review the assessor certification status report in the MnCHOICES application each month to monitor assessors to make sure their certification has not lapsed. Each night, assessor certification data is sent to MnCHOICES from the assessor credential database. When an assessor generates their certificate in TrainLink their data is updated in the database.
- DHS recommends that during annual performance evaluations, supervisors review individual assessor’s strengths and areas for growth. Together with the assessor, develop an annual professional-development plan, including recommending CLU topics and activities to pursue.
- Check that recertification materials are presented by assessor (list, portfolio, certificate).
- Determine if there are at least 45 CLUs to meet the requirements for recertification, including the required person-centered practice CLUs noted above.
- If an assessor meets all requirements, co-sign the newly issued certificate and return it to the assessor and communicate the decision to approve or not.
- If the assessor has met the requirements, you may want to acknowledge CLUs you believe were significant to their growth as a MnCHOICES certified assessor.
- If the lead agency administrator determines the portfolio does not contain 45 qualifying CLUs or the required person-centered practice CLUs noted above:
Audit
Lapsed assessor protocol and audit: DHS will pull a quarterly report of completed assessments reviewing it for assessments completed while an assessor is lapsed according to this protocol.
- Recertification CLU records are subject to audit by DHS and must be maintained for at least three years following recertification. DHS will develop an audit protocol and communicate it to lead agencies.
Record content
MnCHOICES certified assessors must document and maintain records that include information, like:
- Dates, times and locations of training events and college courses, including the name and qualifications of the presenter, agendas and learning objectives.
- Names of online courses, learning objectives, length of time to complete learning module, including dates and organization that provided the course. If possible, include the URL.
- Copy of the training/instruction or job tools/aids they developed, including why, time spent and dates.
- Copy of published articles/books, including why they wrote them, intended audiences, time spent and dates.
- Copy of professional papers delivered, why they wrote them, intended audiences, outcomes, time spent and dates.
- Description of quality-improvement projects in which they participated, their role in the projects, why they agreed to participate, what changed and time spent, including dates.
- Description of data-analysis/research projects, their role in the projects, why they agreed to participate, results/outcomes, time spent and dates.
- Identify topics researched/evaluated, explain why they wanted to learn more about the topics, what/how they conducted the research/evaluations, lessons learned and time spent (include dates).
- Name of the qualified candidates/certified assessors they coached, the types of information they shared, how they approached their role as an advisor, evaluations from candidates/assessors or comments about what they learned and the time spent (include dates).
- Dates and times of certified assessor community of practice meetings, approximate number of attendees, new practice information gained and practice information they shared.
- Dates and time spent, including agenda, when acting as a member of a professional board connected to long-term services and supports.
(Note: A cover sheet to help provide the information is available on PartnerLink – MnCHOICES. You are not required to use this document. It is for your convenience to help support your memory in the event of an audit. If you decide to use it, attach one to each CLU in your portfolio.
Complete recertification
TrainLink: MnCAT Step 4 Recertification (MNCH8020)
Use this course to enter all assessor recertifications CLUs and generate a new certificate. The course includes:
- Instructions (required): This module trains the assessor on completing the recertification process in this course using a corresponding set of modules.
- Recertification documentation: Where the assessor enters their certificate CLU’s, the name of the CLU activity and provides a description of the activity in the comment textbox that shows why the activity meets CLU requirements.
- Recertification certificate: This module pulls previous certificate dates from the MnCHOICES database and issues a new certificate.
Assessors must finish the recertification process before the end of the three-year period. CLUs must be completed within the current certificate’s start and end date. The assessor will receive an error message from TrainLink when the date of a CLU is not within the current certificate’s start and end dates.
- Training during the current certificate that exceeds 45 CLUs cannot be loaded into the current or next recertification module. Assessors must record these additional course work in TrainLink’s self-reported training area.
The assessor will save supporting documents and print their certificate and review their CLUs with their administrator/supervisor. If the lead agency approves the assessors CLUs, then the supervisor co-signs the certificate to make it official.
- Supervisors/mentors do not need to send in a copy of the assessor’s certificate to DHS. When an assessor prints their certificate, the information is loaded into a database with certified assessor courses numbers and dates. Also, the certificate course number and certificate start and end dates are uploaded to MnCHOICES each night and are shown in the staff members credentials section.
Completed versus documented
Situations may arise in which a certified assessor has completed the required learning activities but has not yet recorded them in TrainLink. If an assessor has not recorded the learning activities, they cannot obtain the new certification. If this happens:
- On or before the expiration date of the current certification, the assessor must organize and provide their portfolio of documentation to the designated agency administrator with a note indicating that the learning activities are complete but not yet recorded.
- The designated agency administrator will check the portfolio to determine if the assessor completed the required continued learning to maintain certification.
Recertified after certification is lost
The certification and re-certification process of MnCHOICES assessors should allow for a continuous certification from one three-year period to the next three-year period. Only certified assessors can use MnCHOICES to conduct assessments and complete assessment summaries. Lead agencies and certified assessors need a method to recover the certification for an assessor if the dates of certification become disrupted and are not continuous.
Purpose: Describe the requirements to reinstate a certified assessor if they do not become recertified in a timely manner according to the process established in MnCAT Step 4: Recertification.
Lapse: A lapse in certification occurs if there is a gap between the expiration of one certificate and the beginning date of a new certificate.
Reinstating a lapsed certification
The steps an assessor must take to be reinstated will depend on the number of days since their certification expired. Once an assessor finishes the Step 4 documentation of CLUs by entering the required information into the TrainLink module, they fall into one of these categories:
- Certification lapse up to 365 days: TrainLink will create a certificate with a start date that matches the date an assessor completes their CLUs.
- Certification lapse longer than 365 days: An assessor must retake all of MnCAT Step 1 to 3. When the assessor is ready to take the Step 3 test their mentor submits the MnCHOICES Help Desk Form noting the assessor was lapsed more than 365 days, has retaken all MnCAT Step 1 through 3 and needs to take the Step 3 test.
Certified assessors
If you are not able to complete the recertification process in a timely manner, resulting in a lapse of your certification, there are steps you need to take:
- Inform your supervisor and your mentor.
- Complete the MnCAT Step 4 process. When you have enough qualifying CLUs, follow the TrainLink instructions to obtain your certificate.
- Your certificate will be created after completing the process TrainLink provides. After you pass the test, you will be able to complete the process to issue your new certificate.
Monitoring assessor certification
Lead agencies are responsible to closely monitor the certification status of their MnCHOICES certified assessors.
Reports
Staff members with these roles can review the assessor certification status report in MnCHOICES:
- Agency reports
- Lead agency security admin
- Lead agency supervisor
- Delegate supervisor
- Contracted case management supervisor.
Go to the MnCHOICES navigation header and select reports to open the assessor certification status report. The report has two tabs:
- Summary: Has these dropdown menu filters to reduce the search results — Organization, location, user and number of days before credentials are due.
- Details: Shows the search results based on the filter selections in summary.
Hovering the mouse pointer over the upper-right corner of the table shows:
- Filter: Shows the additional filter options used to get the search results on the right-hand side of the screen.
- Focus mode: Removes all search results that do not match the selected filters. Use back to reports to get back to the main reports screen.
- Ellipsis: Provides more options for the selected data, including export, show as table, spotlight, get insights, sorting order and sort by.
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