Inconsistent Standards in Canada for Commercial Instructor Qualification
The Professional Truck Training Alliance of Canada (PTTAC) has surveyed the provinces and results speak for themselves.
Every province has different standards and criteria to become a commercial driving instructor.
The most concerning takeaway for PTTAC is that very few provinces recognize industry endorsed programs and courses. PTTAC is doing something about this. Jim Campbell, Chairman of PTTAC says “It is our responsibility as an industry in the education business to endorse, support and build programs that we can offer nationally to our instructors. Programs and courses that will work across Canada. If we are going improve road safety, education and training in our industry it starts with educating and certifying our trainers.” “Some of our members have terrific in-house ‘Train the Trainer’ Programs and partner with educational institutions that offer certified courses approved by industry stakeholders. Courses like the NATMI, Certified Driver Trainer Course (CDT).” said Campbell.
The PTTAC executive has unanimously approved moving forward with partnering with NATMI and Aviva Canada to offer the first NATMI, CDT in Edmonton, Alberta at one of their founding member schools, Gennaro Transport Training in October.
NATMI, the North American Transportation Management Institute, was founded in 1944. It is an organization dedicated to providing educational and certification programs for the trucking and transportation industry. Their programs, including the Certified Driver Trainer (CDT) are accredited by the University of Denver Transportation and Supply Chain Institute. “NATMI is thrilled to begin offering its driver trainer certification in Western Canada, and we can’t think of a better organization to partner with than PTTAC. We look forward to successfully launching the first programs later this year through this great partnership,” said Jeff Arnold, Executive Director of NATMI.
NATMI provides internationally recognized, university accredited training and professional certification for truck and bus fleet management professionals. NATMI is highly recognized by industry in Canada and programs are already offered in Canada by the Private Motor Truck Council of Canada (PMTC) and Trucking Human Resources Sector Council Atlantic.
All information and acceptance criteria can be found at www.natmi.org.
“There are some great programs already out there and we are going to leverage what our members and industry are already doing and has proven to work,” commented Campbell.
“As we move forward, we are working on building our own National Instructor Accreditation Program that would verify and confirm the competency of a commercial driver trainer in Canada,” he added.
PTTAC’s goals and key objectives:
Make commercial truck driving a recognized Red Seal trade in Canada;
Create nationally approved truck training instructor programs;
Remove barriers and bring accessibility to funding and tuition for truck training programs; and
Ensure truck training schools are standardized and compliant, provincially and nationally.
