OBU and CPD

An interesting question- unfortunately though my answer will disappoint as you cannot use the BSc degree for any ACCA CPD. The reason for this is because in order to qualify for the degree you have to have passed (or been exempted from) ACCA papers F4-F9 / their new equivalents and the average mark of these will mostly dictate your class of degree. So in effect it would be like double- counting the ACCA exams if the degree then qualified for CPD recognition.

Hello Gillian,

Do you happen to have a link or reference to where the ACCA have stated that the OBU BSc. does not count as CPD?

As I understand it, verifiable CPD is any learning activity that:

1. Is relevant to your career.
2. You can explain how you have applied that learning to your work place.
3. You can provide evidence that the learning took place.

So provided that you can demonstrate these three criteria, which is certainly possible with the BSc., then I would be confident in claiming it as CPD. Particularly as I’ve not seen anything anywere on the ACCA site nor OBU specifically excluding it (I’m happy to stand corrected here).

I’ll concede that your exam results in the early exams count towards part of it, but you still have to write the 9,500 words for the RAP. The RAP is not part of your assessment for the ACCA qualification, ergo I maintain that it is a seperate learning activity.

__________

@ftloose (great name), I’m certainly interested to see if you or Gillian can find anything definitive on this, but if not, then frankly I’d suggest you count it as CPD (provided you feel you can demonstrate the three criteria required of all CPD). It is certainly within the spirit of what CPD is supposed to be.

Full disclosure: I have claimed my BSc. as CPD, but have not been the subject of a review to test whether or not it was accepted as such. If I am reviewed and told that it does not count, then I shall argue my case with the ACCA.

Hi Gillian,

I would respectfully disagree that one must prove that any CPD is valid beyond the three criteria mentioned. If the ACCA have a stipulation that a given project such as the RAP, that otherwise meets those criteria, should be excluded from being CPD in any way then they should explicitly state that. If they choose not to, then they certainly have no business retrospectively censuring members who have undertaken the BSc. in good faith but then not met their annual CPD requirement as a result.

To assume something is valid based on named criteria without any statement to the contrary is in my view perfectly reasonable. The first I have seen any such statement is in your response to @ftloose, and I have sought to determine whether you have an established fact that you are basing your statement on or whether you yourself are making an assumption. I’ve found nothing on the ACCA site, nor the OBU site, but again welcome any links that anyone reading this post can find.

In life it can sometimes be good advice to let sleeping dogs lie. And until someone provides a definitive statement from the horse’s mouth that it is not valid CPD, then I have no intention of even going near the horse’s field. If the ACCA review my CPD, decide that the BSc. is not valid, and demand that I make up a shortfall they have then created, then I’ll cross that bridge when I come to it.

@ftloose, good luck with your RAP and CPD should you choose to claim it. You also may find better value Mentors out there if you have a scout around.

All the best to you both,

O.

I am sorry -I misread your post and thought you were having a side-swipe at me (as others have). Once I recognised the error I removed my post and am now making this public apology (as do newspapers when they fall foul of the standards expected).

Yes you are right a mentoring fee of GBP500 takes some justification if it is not to be viewed as exploitation!

I actually have made it a policy by introducing an ‘Early Bird’ rate to try to make my fees as affordable as possible. I was both saddened but heartened by a comment from a resubmitting African student who told me he had had to work all month to get together the GBP245 I was charging for mentoring (a sobering thought for those of us who might blow half this amount on a single night out !). He is probably not alone but my rates mean I am not precluding a large group of students and about half of my quota are from we patronising term ‘the developing nations’

I know from my marking days, pass rates in some parts of the world are often low and the need for affordable good mentorship is high. Brookes offers some help in cases of extreme hardship but the likes of Kaplan and other UK mentors could do more on this front and use the excess fees charged to subsidise some keen and able students who are excluded merely on the grounds of inability to pay.

However I will get off my soapbox now and I apologise again for misconstruing your earlier comment

Best wishes
Gillian

Hi All,

I haven’t read all of the comments above but I called the ACCA last week and asked this question and they said that completion of the RAP fulfils your VERIFIABLE CPD requirement for TWO years!

Hope this helps!

Hello @rebecca1991

That is both excellent and interesting news. I estimated my RAP at 36 hours or so, and along with some other CPD I’d already done had 42 hours for 2018, therefore essentially fulfilling my requirement for 2019 too.

Whilst your mentor sounds expensive, it is true that they are not really able to give you answers. They are a mentor, not a tutor, and their job is to challenge and question your assumptions; rather than tell you the direction to go in, ask you why you chose that direction over others etc.

It can be frustrating while you are going through the process, but ultimately it ensures that it is all your own work, and it will be your achievement.