Application For Accreditation - Administrative Review: Fill & Download for Free

Here is a not-especially-well-kept secret: accreditation is a crock.This started out as a good concept. Establish policy standards that represented best practices in well-run agencies, then require agencies to demonstrate that they conformed to those standards. Accredited agencies were supposed to get preferred rates on liability insurance.Then some enterprising police administrators and retired administrators saw accreditation as a revenue center—for them. They could charge fees to apply for accreditation, fees to review policies, fees to appeal rejection of accreditation, fees to renew accreditation. These fees were almost always at least four figures.These fees went to CALEA itself, but the High Priests of CALEA had a way of fostering loyalty among the lesser acolytes. Each phase of the accreditation process required a “site visit” by several (up to five) assessors. These assessors were generally senior management from another accredited agency. They were given time off from work, not charged to vacation, and then flew to the applicant agency, rented cars, stayed in nice hotels, and were sucked up to for three to five days while they reviewed the agency. In addition to the nice travel bennies, they each got an “honorarium” that generally went into four figures per visit. This was on top of their regular paycheck, which was not affected by this largesse.It’s worth noting, as an aside, that many, if not most, police administrators can be away from work for a week (if they go to the FBI National Academy, ten weeks) for something that has no direct benefit to their agency, and no one seems to miss them.My agency made a feeble attempt at accreditation. They created an office that was nominally supervised by a deputy chief, and had three to five police officers assigned at any time. When they asked for cops to work there on temporary duty, I volunteered so as to do something different for a couple of weeks.The assignment was nominally Monday-Friday, 0800–1700. I got there at 0745 on the first day and waited outside for almost 45 minutes before anyone with a key to the office showed up. The deputy chief made an appearance almost every day, either at mid-morning or around 1630. He read his phone messages and chatted with the folks in the office, then left. No one knew or cared what he did the rest of the day, as he contributed nothing other than his name and title to the project.Two of the officers, the most senior ones who were more or less in charge, would disappear for hours at a time, supposedly “inspecting facilities.” One more was enrolled in an MPA grad program, and was either attending class or reading his textbooks. Another was pregnant and on limited duty. She mostly read magazines and paperback novels.I was asked to write some policies that conformed to corresponding standards in the CALEA standards book (which I was told cost $250.00). I saw there were standards I doubt we would ever meet. One required everyone on the agency’s tactical (read: SWAT) team to pass a fitness, skill proficiency, medical, and psychological exam annually. There was no such testing for the SWAT team, either for entry or retention. They just recruited the people they liked. Some of them, if sent for psychological examination, might be institutionalized afterward. A medical exam would show some to be using anabolic steroids. When I questioned this, I was told, “Oh, we’ll get a waiver for that.”Another standard required the agency to issue a sidearm and body armor to every officer, and to replace the body armor every five years. Our guys had always had to buy their sidearm and body armor, the latter being optional. I got the same “We’ll get a waiver” answer on that one.This project had been going on for the better part of a year when I got there, and it went on for another nine months or so after I left. Then, they decided that accreditation wasn’t going to happen, and abandoned the project. I estimated that this effort cost $400,000, minimum. Our coven of senior administrators had been counting on getting in on those site visit trips, too.I have read of other agencies that have full-time offices of three to five officers to ensure that accreditation standards are maintained between formal certifications.CALEA allows the agency’s cops to wear a pin on their uniforms and to place a logo on their patrol cars. For all the good it does, they might as well license logo wear from Nike or Yves Saint Laurent. That would probably be cheaper.

DM mandates all contractors and consultants in Dubai Emirates to get their lead engineers (sometimes assistant engineers also) get accredited (qualified) for each of the company trade activities the company wishes to practice in Dubai. For example a company which wishes to practice civil building works (construction), then they have to get their civil engineer take the examination conducted by DM. The process (Service in DM’s parlance) involves the following; Collection of all of the following documents first [Trade License copy, Engineer’s degree certificate (attested), Copy of Society of Engineers, UAE membership (at times obtaining this membership can also be quite a task), Experience certificate clearly mentioning the roles, responsibilities, start, finish dates, project names etc. (in case the experience is outside UAE, then the experience certificate must be attested), Passport copy, Residence visa copy, Emirates ID copy, Company letter requesting DM to conduct test for the specific engineer and specific trade activity, passport size color photograph]. All these documents have to be saved in PDF format for documents in Photos in .jpeg or .png format in as small size (without sacrificing the resolution) file as possible. Once these documents are collated and kept ready for easy uploading, then DM site to be opened using the previously registered username and password. The user must be authorised by the company administrator (the one who would have registered their company account with DM in the first place - which is a comparatively a simple process). Once logged in, search for “Request for Accreditation of Technical Staff (also caled as Interview Technical Staff” service Request for accreditation of technical staff and follow the application questionnaire and upload the document. Ensure to tick-mark the terms and conditions and submit. DM will send acknowledgement through email and SMS about application acceptance. Once their review is over (usually one to three or four days), they will either ask for missing information or approve the request. That means you will be asked to pay AED400 per candidate per exam/test. You can log-in and make payment using the credit card and then voila, DM will assign a test date. I understand this test date can be rescheduled by the concerned candidate by approaching / calling the Buildings Section - Engineers qualification dept. Once the engineer passes the test, it will be announced by the DM test committee in the web portal (we need to check our application by logging in to the DM web portal and check in the “Dash Board” section. Please take screen shot of the application and note down the application number for future references as DM (as far as I know), do not provide separate certificates or letters confirming the qualification of engineer. Once this is done, then proceed to register the qualified engineer in the Contractors Register by following another service called as Request to be registered in the contracting practitioners register. Only after this, the contracting company (Subject to the qualified engineer still under the employment of the Contracting company) is allowed to practice the trade activity. Every year, the Contractor Renewal (other than the renewal of trade license in Department of Economy, Dubai) also have to be done, if not the Contractor will be blocked in DM system and Contractor may face penalties in case if he is found to be practicing the trade without having qualified engineer and ensuring that all DM requirement are complied with.Hope this helps you get an idea. There are many posts you can search and get by googling also.

Many of the students as well as their beloved parents have this big doubt, The difference between MBA and PGDM. Even I had this doubt when I was filling my application for it. So I did my own research to get a better idea of it.MBA expands to Master of Business Administration and PGDM is post graduate diploma in management. Actually both of this are almost same. The main reason why postgraduate courses are named as PGDM is because when an Institute is an autonomous body (It means that it is not affiliated to any universities) and conducts management courses then such Institutes cannot offer MBA degree. Degrees can be offered only by universities.[wp-like-locker]Top Premier Indian Institutes like IIM, XLRI offer PGDM, not MBA. Unfortunately people say it as MBA from IIM,or MBA from XLRI OERLIKON in Italia is internationally recognized too. When an Institute acquires autonomy they design their own syllabus to be taught instead of following outdated University syllabus. The change of university syllabus is a complex process and will happen only once in 4 or 5 years because many colleges will be affiliated to a particular university and if they change syllabus frequently it will take time so as to revise the books and also for the faculties to upgrade themselves.Where as in PGDM, since the colleges are autonomous the syllabus can be updated regularly depending on the need in Industry without approval from any University. So PGDM is more industry ready and up to date compared to a MBA degree. Most PGDM courses are based on trimester system (4 months make a trimester and there will be 6 trimester) whereas MBA course follow semester system (6 months make a semester and there will be 4 semesters). Another difference is that PGDM will give you double specialization that means you can select two electives like Marketing and HR, HR and Finance, Marketing and Business Intelligence etc, whereas most MBA’s offer just a single specializationBut you have to be cautious while opting for PGDM courses. Even though AICTE have regulations for institutes offering PGDM. You have to check whether the course offered by the institute is approved by AICTE. For MBA, the institute will be affiliated to some university and the universities are controlled by University Grants Commission (UGC) and the colleges may also get accredited by AICTE, So there is nothing to worry about that.If you are planning for further studies after PGDM, You have to see whether the PGDM offered by the institute is equivalent to MBA which means that the college offering the PGDM course must have accreditation from AIU (The Association of Indian Universities). Otherwise you have to do a lot of hard work to get a doctorate ! or go for further studies.My friends ask me which has more value. In my opinion whether it be MBA or PGDM both has great value or no value at all. It purely depends upon YOU and the institution from where you took it. MBA/PGDM is offered by lot of institutions in India. You have to see the ranking, accreditation, history, exposure and also student reviews before joining any institution. MBA/PGDM is not just a degree, It’s a way of living. You can get a degree by mugging up books but you cant be a good manager.If any one have any questions feel free to ask.