We began the update for ITFAS with an in-person JTR during 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 (3hrs 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, and we are awaiting the final JTR report from our consultant. The entire JTR step from beginning to end took 2 months (includes the Validation Survey time) because of the in-person workshop versus about 5-6 months if done virtually.
The Item Writing/Review for Level II began in January 2024 and was completed March 2024. A Standard setting was required for Level II and completed in May 2024. Item Writing/Review for Level I began in April 2024 and completed in June 2024. Updated exams were sent for publishing on August 16, 2024, and released on Oct 7, 2024. The entire process took approximately one year.
The primary standards for 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.
IB-PSC was newly launched in 2022 starting with Level I and Design, and Levels II and III following in 2023. Since NICET conducted the IB-PASC JTA in January of 2020, two new references were established. The first was NFPA 1225: Standard for Emergency Services Communications. NICET IB-PSC references NFPA 1221 which is now obsolete. The second is the Complete ERCES Handbook.
Beginning in May 2024, NICET reviewed the entire item bank to determine the scope of an update focused on questions that were no longer relevant based on the new reference material. NICET concluded the effort to update affected questions was feasible and with the assistance of SMEs completed the update. Updated exams are available as of December 2, 2024.