A little outside the scope of this forum I know - but....

[mshields]

There must be alot of fellow LEED AP's out there. I'm wondering if any of you have found the continuing education requirements to stay accredited ridiculously complicated. For my PE's, I take what ever on line courses I need and voila. For LEED, one nees x number of hours in course work, x number of hours for online seminars, etc. etc. etc.

I've learned that much of these things can be found for free, but it just doesn't seem very straight forward to me. I'd be interested in your feedback!

 

[charlie b]

I must have gotten two dozen emails (perhaps four dozen) from the USGBC, informing me that my window of opportunity to enroll in their program of specialty accreditations was running out. Yesterday's email told me that I only had three days left. That is the program I think you are discussing, and yes it would bring continuing education requirements to the table. I have no intention of enrolling. I recognize that that means that if I ever changed my mind, I would have to retake the test. That gives me a good reason not to change my mind. Once I read through enough of their program descriptions to discover that I may forever keep the title of LEED AP, without paying any additional fees, and without dealing with CE credits, and that the only thing this would cost me is the ability to claim an area of specialization within the LEED program, I immediately decided not to play their game.

 

[DetroitEE]

I registered as LEED AP BD+C when I was first able to in October 2009. In hindsight I should've waited...it hasn't benefitted me at all in the last 21 months. That being said, this is something that my firm expects me to do, especially as a younger engineer. I think our firm has less expectations for the senior engineers, though I'm sure it's still encouraged. I suppose its for marketing purposes.

I was intimidated at first as well, until I actually dug into the requirements. There are a ton of free online courses that you can take, and there are no limits to how many you can use to obtain your 30 hours. Schneider Electric has something called Energy University which has over 20 courses which qualify for the LEED CMP. I just did one this morning...they are just videos. You could technically open the video and just let it run in your background...though I have a feeling that's not what LEED has in mind

Here's a link to the USGBC course catalog: https://www.usgbc.org/CourseCatalog/CourseCatalog.aspx?CMSPageID=2115

This will list the courses you can take, whether or not they are free, who provides them, etc. It's pretty useful overall. Note that not all of these courses qualify as continuing education for the LEED CMP. You have to look at the course to find out.

I also found this website, which has links to a few sites (including schneider electric) that provide free online classes which qualify for the LEED CMP.
http://www.reallifeleed.com/2010/05/95-free-online-leed-cmp-continuing.html

Yes, it's a pain to do, but it can be done in a relatively short amount of time, and at no additional cost.

As for whether or not people think it is worth it to enroll as a LEED AP with specialty, that is totally up to you or your company.