Membership FAQ.
Membership applications
An application is only valid for 6 months after it’s been submitted. After that, you may use the same application again, but you must pay another $50 application fee. To arrange this, please contact Membership Services.
If you are using the same application months later, applicants are encouraged to review their applications to ensure they contain the most up-to-date information, especially in the work history tab.
A reference is only valid for 6 months after it’s been submitted. After that, you will need a new reference, even if you are still using the same referee.
Yes. Not only does your reference need to be from a member, but it also needs to be from a current CAA Avalanche Professional who has held that level of membership for at least 12 months.
You may use the same person as a reference for your application, but they will need to complete a new reference form. All of our reference forms ask different questions and assess different competencies to different levels. We require a more detailed reference to join the CAA than we do to attend a course.
The reference page is only accessible to Avalanche Professionals; you will not be able to view it. Right-click on the link to copy it and send it to your reference; they will be able to view it so long as they are logged in as an Avalanche Professional.
We only accept references from current Avalanche Professionals. Most Avalanche Operations in Canada should have an Avalanche Professional on staff or at least involved in the operation, so if you’ve been working in Canada, you should have come across one. A reference should be familiar with your work.
If you have not yet worked with an Avalanche Professional, you may need to seek out work experience with one to obtain a reference. Our Member Directory lists all active Avalanche Professionals.
If you have resigned your membership, or your membership has lapsed AND it is within three membership years of that date, then you may apply to be reinstated. To be reinstated, you must:
- Provide documentation that demonstrates compliance with our CPD policy for the past three (3) years
- Documentation must include the CPD Tracking Sheet and all applicable evidence
- CPD points must be in accordance with your membership category
- Pay the $125 non-refundable reinstatement fee at the time of form submission
- Complete the reinstatement form
If it has been more than three years since you resigned your membership or let it lapse, you will need to reapply for membership.
To find out how to apply for membership, head to the page for the membership type you’d like to apply for.
No. The CAA does not regularly accept any external courses in place of parts of our curriculum (exception: NZ ARM L6 before 2019). If you wish, you can apply for a Prior Learning Assessment (PLA) to have a course equivalency granted. All information on PLA’s can be found here.
You may also apply for a waive of a prerequisite for a course, but the CAA does not accept waives for membership applications.
The CAA has streamlined membership application options for members of the CSGA, ACMG, and CMBGA. You can find all the information on streamlined membership application options on the membership page for each membership type.
The CAA does not have streamlined membership application options with any other association, including IFMGA or the AAA.
As an association, we require our members to remain current, and we don’t allow opting in and out as they see fit unless they’re on a career recess due to injury or life events. We require that members pay their dues for the year, regardless of how late in the year they are; otherwise, members will enter ‘Not in good standing’ 30 days after the invoice is issued. To get back in good standing, members are required to pay their outstanding dues. That said, we do appreciate that getting qualified and staying current in the industry is expensive, and we don’t enforce these rules without a need to.
If it is past the halfway point in the year, you will only be charged half dues.
Yes, anyone can apply, and CAA membership is recognized internationally. However, you must still meet all the requirements. CAA courses are required for all membership levels. If you have not taken CAA courses, certificates from non-Canadian courses are not accepted in the membership application process; you must first obtain a PLA Equivalency for any required courses.
A reference from at least one current CAA Avalanche Professional who is familiar with your work is also required, which may be difficult to obtain if you have not been working in Canada. If you are applying for Professional Membership, you will need references from two current CAA Avalanche Professionals. All references must have been a Professional Member for at least 12 months.
Because you’ve already paid your membership dues for the year, that amount will be credited toward your new membership dues. You will only need to pay the difference in membership dues for the remainder of the year.
Please note that if you move to a membership with lower dues, we will not refund you the difference.
If you want to move to a higher membership level, you will need to complete the application process. You can find the different membership levels on the Membership page.
If you would like to move to a lower membership level, you can find the steps for each membership type on the Changing Membership Categories page.
Yes, a single evidence file can often prove more than one competency.
For example: a route map that shows hazards, safe stationary sites, work objectives and your travel route can demonstrate these competencies as well as your ability to use technology.
Yes. Although your goal is to prove your competencies as concisely as possible, in order to provide proof for all of the competencies required, it is not unusual for a particular competency to be addressed by multiple evidence files. Additionally, if you feel your proficiency level is best shown using more than one example, it is fine to supply more than one evidence file for that competency. Be sure to list all evidence files you want the assessment team to review in the appropriate cells of the competency portfolio.
Ideally yes. The purpose of evidence is to provide proof for the experience you have described. We do understand, however, that sometimes it is difficult to provide evidence for an experience. In this case, you should add a note to the bottom of your “best” experience explaining that you do not have evidence for it. Then provide a second (brief) experience for which you can provide evidence.
If you don’t have access to reports, briefs, or other pieces of potential evidence, a letter from a supervisor can stand in its place. Please make sure these letters list the specific competencies and are signed, ideally by a CAA Avalanche Professional. If you have any questions or concerns about obtaining evidence, please contact Membership Services.
There are no modified competency portfolios for Apprentice Guides or CSGA Level 1 or 2 guides applying for Professional Membership. With these qualifications, you can use a modified competency portfolio to apply for Practitioner Membership or complete the full Professional Membership application process.
Yes, if you meet the criteria for 2 equivalency tables, you can review both and address only the competencies not met by either qualification. Remember, you will need to upload proof of these qualifications as part of your application.
No, you only need to address the competencies in the Competency Portfolio document. The Competency Portfolio document is customized for each membership category and recognized equivalent qualification from a partner association.
Make every effort to minimize the number of experience and evidence files required for your portfolio. Ideally, you do not need more upload slots than are provided. If, however, you do need to upload more evidence files than the application form allows, you may upload a zip file with more than one file in it. Regardless of how you deliver the files, be sure to name and number them appropriately.
No. If you are already a member and have paid dues for the year and change categories midway through the year, you only need to pay the difference between membership dues. If you are working on an application or waiting for a response from the membership committee, you should pay your dues for your current category to avoid entering not in good standing and membership services will adjust your invoice if you are approved.
Applicants should do their best to describe how they meet competencies through work in an avalanche-related field. If needed, to strengthen their testimonial, applicants may provide experiences and evidence showing how they strongly meet or exceed the required proficiency through other non-avalanche work. The Membership Committee will take this into account when assessing a portfolio; however, meeting a competency in a non-avalanche field is not automatically considered a substitute for proficiency in the avalanche field.
CPD / Audits
The limits are there to ensure members are getting points from different categories and maintaining currency from various sources. Over 3 years you should be obtaining points from at least 4 of the 7 different categories.
The points limits are not intended to be restrictive. The more you do, the better, but what you can claim each year is limited to just ensure your experience is well rounded.
No you do not. With the new form, either you can just copy the tabs from the old form and add them in. In this case though, the formulas won’t work for the carry-over and totals tracking, so you would need to do that manually. Alternatively, you can copy the information into tabs in the new sheet using ‘values only paste’ into the new sheets and it will calculate as demonstrated in the CPD webinar.
Yes! It is easier to gather evidence as you go. It will make an audit much smoother that way. Every time you do something, take a picture or screenshot and save your evidence in a folder so it is all in one central location. One of the larger reasons for CPD is to prove currency if an incident occurs and an investigation is launched. Therefore, keeping your evidence as you go along will support you in this case too and avoid additional unnecessary stress at a very challenging time.
If you are audited, you are only required to provide evidence for the minimum number of points you have to meet for your membership category over the 3 year period.
You can use the receipt from registration.
If the CAA has to confirm you are a member in good standing, evidence helps prove that you have been meeting your CPD to the required level. As the CAA moves towards self-regulation, accurate and detailed record keeping is vital.
- If you are teaching a course this is professional practice.
- If you are attending a course with formal curriculum from a recognized institution, this counts as formal/structured learning. You will need to provide the course certificate and or final evaluation as evidence.
- If you are providing staff training, this is professional practice.
- If you are attending organized staff training, this is Formal/Structured learning.
- If you are attending webinars or any other training that is not part of a formal curriculum or certification, this would fall into informal/Self-Directed learning.
The CPD requirements for BAEs are relatively new – the Membership Committee tried to find a balance between maintaining currency and not being too restrictive. The point of CPD is to keep currency so BAEs can deliver high-quality training to the public. The CPD points are there to ensure that even if they aren’t teaching much, they are still up to date with the avalanche industry enough to teach courses.
The CAA has done extensive work with these organizations to standardize the points claimed from partner organizations’ courses. We continue to discuss how we can make CPD tracking across the different organizations easier for members.
The idea is to encourage members to have points from a variety of categories. In the past, people tried to claim multiple points for the same activity. As such, we have had to clearly assign an activity to a category. We appreciate that sometimes members are doing a presentation during their working day, or mentoring someone at work. Members must choose which points they are claiming for this and be clear that they are not “double dipping” on those points. Members can choose how they assign a day that they were doing their job and mentoring someone. This can help maximize the points you are claiming without double dipping. If you take someone out to mentor them for a day of work, and are looking to maximize your CPD points, we recommend you use this as Participation and Mentorship as you would get 1 point per hour that you are mentoring someone, whereas professional practice is 1 point per day.
In this case we would accept a letter from an Avalanche Professional that is familiar with your work. See the CAA template [link] that you can download and send to an Avalanche Professional to complete.
Mentorship should be in a professional setting, but it does not have to be a CAA member. So long as the mentee is working or volunteering in the avalanche industry and the mentorship is based on avalanche-related work (snow profiles, InfoEx submissions, terrain recognition and management, AvSAR, etc)
A list of accepted evidence is listed here [link]. If you are not able to provide the listed evidence, or are unsure about how you can prove your CPD activity, please reach out to membership@avalancheassociation.ca
If you are not able to maximize points in Professional Practice and Formal/Certified learning, you can make up for it in other categories:
- Informal/Self-Directed learning has 10 points available in a variety of formats
- Attending staff training can see you get up to 30 points in Formal/Structured
- Providing mentorship to someone for 3-4 days or 30 hours over a season can gain up to 30 points
- Presenting at a conference, or to the public at an avalanche-related event is a great way to share your knowledge and earn up to 20 points
Either you need to explore gaining points from other activity categories, or you can move to one of the Avalanche Educator categories. These categories are specifically designed for those only wanting to teach recreational avalanche courses such as AST and have lower CPD requirements.
Yes, in Formal/Certified Learning activities, the following list is provided:
- 1-day refresher: 4 points
- 2-day: 6 points
- 3-day: 8 points
- 4-day: 10 points
- 5-day (40-hour) course: 12 points
- 10+day (80+hour) course: 16 points
Avalanche Educators
Once you’ve joined the CAA as an educator you will have the scope to instruct AST courses. Basic Avalanche Educators can instruct AST level 1 and Crevasse Rescue Courses. Advanced Avalanche Educators can instruct those courses as well as AST level 2 and Managing Avalanche Terrain courses. You are still required to follow the Avalanche Canada Provider Licensing Agreement to deliver courses.
The Avalanche Skills Training (AST) program is owned and administered by Avalanche Canada (AvCan). The AST curriculum was created and continues to be updated by AvCan. AvCan is responsible for licensing, communication, and shipping AST materials. AvCan licenses AST Providers, whether it be organizations or individuals. Please visit their website on how to be an AST instructor.
One requirement of being an AST instructor is to be a CAA member in good standing. Learn more about CAA membership.
New Avalanche Educators should work as an AST Instructor under a licensed provider first and gain competence as an instructor before becoming a provider.
Our Avalanche Educator roles were developed solely for those looking to teach Avalanche Canada Courses. These roles do not permit any other scope in the Avalanche Industry such as patrolling, avalanche control, tail guiding.
If you hold other certifications that give you scope to perform other duties in avalanche terrain, such as guiding, you are welcome to operate within the scope of those qualifications.
Our Avalanche Educator membership categories were developed solely for those looking to teach Avalanche Canada Courses. These roles do not permit any other scope in the Avalanche Industry such as patrolling, avalanche control, tail guiding. The Scope of Practice for Avalanche Educators can be found here.
If you hold other certifications that give you scope to perform other duties in avalanche terrain, such as guiding, you are welcome to operate within the scope of those qualifications.
All Avalanche Educators must adhere to Guidelines for Instruction in Avalanche Terrain (GIAT). GIAT provides best-practice guidance and expectations for recreational and professional field-based avalanche course instruction in Canada by members of the CAA. These guidelines encompass all types of travel undertaken in or adjacent to avalanche terrain, including walking, snowshoeing, snowmobiling, ice climbing, skiing, snowboarding, mountaineering, automobile, snowcat driving, etc.
We also have the following resources for our members on our website:
- Terrain catalogue Template
- Avalanche Safety Plan Template
- Emergency Response Plan Template
- AM Trip Plan
No, your Avalanche Educator membership and qualifications do not qualify you to instruct skiing.
No, you cannot teach courses for the CAA Industry Training Program. All instructors for the ITP are required to be highly experienced Avalanche Professionals. For information on how to become an ITP instructor, see our Instructor Hiring Requirements
Avalanche Educators are only permitted to instruct Avalanche Canada Training Courses. Specifically Basic Avalanche Educators can instruct:
- Avalanche Skills Training Level
- Crevasse Rescue Courses
Advanced Avalanche Educators can instruct:
- Avalanche Skills Training Level 1
- Crevasse Rescue Courses
- Avalanche Skills Training Level 2
- Managing Avalanche Terrain
Avalanche Educators are not permitted to instruct any other avalanche education programs.
Avalanche Canada developed, maintain, and facilitate the delivery of the Avalanche Canada Training courses. The courses are designed by Avalanche Canada to suit the needs of recreationists and delivered by independent third-party providers, who are licensed by Avalanche Canada.
As an Avalanche Professional you are already qualified to instruct all the Avalanche Canada Training Courses. You do not need to change membership to do so.
If you can no longer meet the CPD obligations of an Avalanche Professional and would like to move to an Educator membership with less CPD requirements you may do so here. Please be aware that as an Avalanche Educator you will not have scope to deliver any other avalanche services. If you change membership categories, you can apply for reinstatement to your original category within three years. After three years, you need to reapply.
The CPD requirements for BAEs are new – the Membership Committee tried to find a balance between maintaining currency and not being too restrictive. The point of CPD is to keep currency so BAEs can deliver high quality training to the public. The CPD points are there to ensure that even if they aren’t teaching much, they are still up to date with the avalanche industry enough to teach courses.
If you’d like to become a Basic Avalanche Educator, at the minimum you need to complete:
- Avalanche Operations Level 1
- Professionalism in the Avalanche Industry
- Instructing in Avalanche Terrain – Foundations
After meeting those requirements there are three paths to Basic Avalanche Educator membership:
- Complete Instructing in Avalanche Terrain – Basic
- Provide proof of membership with the ACMG, CSGA, CMBGA*, or proof of completion of Avalanche Operations Level 2
- Complete a competency portfolio
All the details of applying for Basic Avalanche Educator membership can be found here. *Only certain memberships with the ACMG, CSGA and the CMBGA are recognized for this membership. Our recognized certifications can be found here.
If you’d like to become a Basic Avalanche Educator, at the minimum you need to complete:
- Avalanche Operations Level 2
- Professionalism in the Avalanche Industry
- Instructing in Avalanche Terrain – Foundations
After meeting those requirements there are three paths to Basic Avalanche Educator membership:
- Complete Instructing in Avalanche Terrain – Advanced
- Provide proof of membership with the ACMG, CSGA, CMBGA*
- Complete a competency portfolio
All the details of applying for Advanced Avalanche Educator membership can be found here.
*Only certain memberships with the ACMG, CSGA and the CMBGA are recognized for this membership. Our recognized certifications can be found here.
Either you need to explore gaining points form other activity categories, or you can move to one of the Avalanche Educator categories. These categories are specifically designed for those only wanting to teach AST courses and have lower CPD requirements.
Avalanche Educators without a Guiding Certification are not permitted to teach in National Parks. To operate in a national park the organization you’re working for is required to have a Guided Business License from Parks Canada.
Competency Portfolio
Yes, a single evidence file can often prove more than one competency.
For example: a route map that shows hazards, safe stationary sites, work objectives and your travel route can demonstrate these competencies as well as your ability to use technology.
Yes. Although your goal is to prove your competencies as concisely as possible, in order to provide proof for all of the competencies required, it is not unusual for a particular competency to be addressed by multiple evidence files. Additionally, if you feel your proficiency level is best shown using more than one example, it is fine to supply more than one evidence file for that competency. Be sure to list all evidence files you want the assessment team to review in the appropriate cells of the competency portfolio.
Ideally yes. The purpose of evidence is to provide proof for the experience you have described. We do understand, however, that sometimes it is difficult to provide evidence for an experience. In this case, you should add a note to the bottom of your “best” experience explaining that you do not have evidence for it. Then provide a second (brief) experience for which you can provide evidence.
If you don’t have access to reports, briefs, or other pieces of potential evidence, a letter from a supervisor can stand in its place. Please make sure these letters list the specific competencies and are signed, ideally by a CAA Avalanche Professional. If you have any questions or concerns about obtaining evidence, please contact Membership Services.
There are no modified competency portfolios for Apprentice Guides or CSGA Level 1 or 2 guides applying for Professional Membership. With these qualifications, you can use a modified competency portfolio to apply for Practitioner Membership or complete the full Professional Membership application process.
Yes, if you meet the criteria for 2 equivalency tables, you can review both and address only the competencies not met by either qualification. Remember, you will need to upload proof of these qualifications as part of your application.
No, you only need to address the competencies in the Competency Portfolio document. The Competency Portfolio document is customized for each membership category and recognized equivalent qualification from a partner association.
Make every effort to minimize the number of experience and evidence files required for your portfolio. Ideally, you do not need more upload slots than are provided. If, however, you do need to upload more evidence files than the application form allows, you may upload a zip file with more than one file in it. Regardless of how you deliver the files, be sure to name and number them appropriately.
No. If you are already a member and have paid dues for the year and change categories midway through the year, you only need to pay the difference between membership dues. If you are working on an application or waiting for a response from the membership committee, you should pay your dues for your current category to avoid entering not in good standing and membership services will adjust your invoice if you are approved.
Applicants should do their best to describe how they meet competencies through work in an avalanche-related field. If needed, to strengthen their testimonial, applicants may provide experiences and evidence showing how they strongly meet or exceed the required proficiency through other non-avalanche work. The Membership Committee will take this into account when assessing a portfolio; however, meeting a competency in a non-avalanche field is not automatically considered a substitute for proficiency in the avalanche field.
AST Insurance
Best estimates based on previous experience are acceptable. Instructors will be required to submit their gross revenue to Kaerus at the end of the season. If there is a significant difference in revenue, this may warrant an additional premium.
Yes. While some variance is acceptable, coverage may be void in the event of a loss if material information is misrepresented. At the end of your season, you will be asked to submit your gross receipts to make sure they are in line with what you estimated.
Some instructors who fall under other policies may find those circumstances more economical, but for AST Instructors for whom this is their only avalanche work-related policy, the policy is excellent value.
AST instructors can be added midway through the policy term; however, the minimum premium would still apply to each member. Once underwriters confirm the addition of a new subscriber, Kaerus will issue a certificate of insurance evidencing coverage. Please note that coverage cannot be backdated to the policy inception date for members added mid-term.
Please contact Avalanche Canada regarding AST curriculum; for insurance inquiries, please contact Kaerus Insurance
