We began the Job Task Review (JTR) process virtually in October 2022 and completed it in March 2023. The JTR report was presented to and approved by the NICET BoG in April 2023.
Item Writing/Review & Form Assembly for Levels I-II have been completed. Currently, Item writing/review is ongoing for Level III. The Standard Setting for Level III is tentatively scheduled for March/April 2024. In the meantime, Item Writing/Review for Level IV will begin in early 2024.
The update/maintenance for ITFAS began with an in-person JTR in September 2023. 11 SMEs attended this workshop at the NICET office in Alexandria, VA and this was the first in-person event that NICET hosted since the pandemic. It was a huge success, and the timeline of the workshop was greatly reduced from 6-7 weekly calls (3 hours every week) to just 2 days. The final call with the SMEs to discuss the results of the Validation Survey was held on November 17.
The next step of Item Writing/Review for ITFAS will begin during the first quarter of 2024. Since ITFAS has only two levels, it is anticipated that this task will be completed sooner as compared to the other programs.
The primary standards for FAS, ITFAS and WBSL (NFPA 72 and NFPA 13 respectively) are on the same 3-year revision cycle with the latest edition being 2022. NICET’s exams for these programs are based on the 2016 edition. To meet industry expectations, NICET will update these exams directly to the 2022 editions, skipping the update to the 2019 editions that was originally scheduled to begin in 2020.
The update/maintenance for ITWBS began with an in-person JTR held Nov 8-9, 2023. 11 SMEs attended this workshop at the NICET office in Alexandria, VA. The Validation Survey was distributed in December. The JTR panel will meet again in Jan 2024 to discuss the results of the Validation Survey and finalize the exam blueprint.
The next step of Item Writing/Review is expected to begin in March-April 2024.
In addition, the test development schedule includes the update and maintenance of NICET’s civil program - Highway Construction Inspection. This will begin with performing a health check of the current exams and a JTR will be scheduled mid to late 2024.