The intent of the continuing education requirement may be good but I have observed that these requirements actually cost time and money without actually achieving the goal, in many cases. This is due to the fact that very few courses add value and are often taught and taken simply to satisfy the requirements.

In reality, as professionals, we are required to stay abreast of the latest developments, whether mandated by regulations or not. Many of us accomplish this through professional organizations, internal training through our companies, external training through seminars, and distance learning. Those of us that do this are continuously improving our performance and those that do not tend to lag behind in career progression. In professional practice, the same sort of natural selection process applies.

I guess we need to think about what we are trying to accomplish with this continuing education requirement. If there is a public safety issue or similar problem that we are trying to address, and this is the only we to do it, then OK. If, however, we are creating a regulation because we think it is necessary for self improvement or to promote a cottage industry for servicing the regulatory requirement, then we need to re-evaluate this.