A: Yes! The Track and Sign Certification is an excellent training tool, and serves as both a springboard for beginners and a stepping-stone for advanced trackers. The certification process is always best treated as a learning experience; there is of course an assessment component that may stir up “test anxiety,” but the process fundamentally emphasizes learning and becoming a better tracker. Be easy on yourself and enjoy the experience. We suggest you familiarize yourself with the various animals that occur in your region, and the tracks and sign they create, though it is not an absolute necessity—you’ll leave the weekend with far more knowledge and experience regardless.
FAQ
A: No—the best way to prepare for the depth and variety of questions asked during a certification is to participate in a certification! We encourage people with no experience to undergo the process, so if you’ve done some tracking you are definitely ready. Certifications are designed to venture into unexplored areas in a tracking practice, reinforce strengths, and increase knowledge across a wider range of species, sign, and animal behavior. Learning to track is an endlessly developing skill set–with this in mind we can leave our egos behind and thoroughly enjoy the process of learning in the field.
A: You might not receive a certificate on your first certification, but your tracking knowledge and know-how will be greatly enhanced—as will your chances of being certified on your next certification. This is an international standard for measuring wildlife tracking skill, and therefore a demanding and rigorous process. Because of that, though, the educational component is phenomenal! The certification is best viewed as an intensive training and the opportunity to become a better tracker, and a process that clearly facilitates and marks progress over time. Regardless of certifying or not on the first try, the two-days are highly engaging, entertaining, and participants leave with new confidence and a measurable increase in skill.
A: Maybe. Unlike the Track and Sign Certification, there is no instruction during the Trailing Certification other than the feedback you receive at the end, and that which you glean from watching fellow participants (spending two days on-trail observing the process is indeed very insightful for beginners and transforms their future practice). Trailing Certificaitons are demanding in that they lean completely on the participant to demonstrate their skill while following a trail. To get the most out of this process, we encourage you to put in some time in the field beforehand. Read the contents of the trailing section of this website to gain a sense of what skills are assessed during the certification process, and we’d encourage you to read “Practical Tracking” (Liebenberg et al. 2010, Stackpole Books.) to gain a better understanding of what we mean by trailing and the skills of competent trackers.
A: Participating in the certification process in your home region will give you the most accurate reflection of your skill level. However, you may live in a location where certifications aren’t occurring yet. Participating in a certification in other parts of the country is always a great option—you will no doubt encounter species familiar to your region, learn about new species, and of course be exposed to the universal fundamentals of tracking, applicable anywhere. Try to generate interest among your local trackers, tracking clubs/schools, environmental organizations, state agencies etc—we’ll happily come to you. Check out “hosting a certification” for details.
A: The track and sign certification process is typically not a physically demanding experience, just mentally. The landscapes and weather conditions of North America are diverse, however, and we’ve offered evaluations in areas ranging from flat coastal dunes to mountainous terrain, and in sunshine, rain, and snow. If you have particular questions or concerns, contact us to explore the nature of a particular evaluation. We’re happy to help.
Trailing certification, however, can be extremely physically demanding. It requires two days of walking where animals travel, which may include steep, wooded slopes, windfall, swamps, thickets and numerous other areas we might typically avoid. That said, the pace is generally moderate. Contact us with any questions or concerns and we’d happily better describe the physical demands of a particular venue.
A: In short, the Specialist Certification is comprised only of “very complex” questions (highly challenging), with no component of “easy” questions. These certifications are rarer, and reserved for participants with a lot of experience and field time. While there is less field instruction than on Standard certifications, discussions still cover in great detail the nuances required to make accurate assessments of a featured question. The same way a Standard Certification changes the way one sees a landscape and its wildlife, so too does the Specialist Certification—it’s an entirely different requirement for demonstrating field skill.