[CAUT] CAUT Certification

[Fred Sturm]

On Jun 23, 2009, at 9:04 PM, Ron Nossaman wrote:

> Daniel Rembold wrote:
>> The only thing that makes college and university work
>> distinct from any other practice of our craft, is the
>> administrative and managerial responsibilities of having
>> many pianos to prioritize and service, all for one
>> customer.
>> In my opinion, there already is a very practical national
>> certification program in place for what we do.  It's called
>> RPT.  If a separate Craftsman certification were to be
>> desired, why limit it to college and university
>> technicians?
>
> Which point I've attempted to make, talking face to face with the  
> folks trying to implement this, attempting to point out that the  
> proposed Caut qualification is a subset of "piano technician",  
> rather than a superset.
> Ron N


	I don't think we would dispute these points. The administrative areas  
are the only ones that are truly specific to cauts. There are other  
skills, beyond those tested under RPT, that are needed in order fill  
the needs of a caut job, but they are common to other piano  
technicians as well. We would be happy to incorporate other  
credentials/certifications in these broader skill categories, and only  
deal with the administrative areas, but no such things exist.
	For example, I think we can all agree that a caut needs to be able to  
do satisfactory concert work - tuning on a "concert level" (which, for  
me, means rock solid and refined unisons more than anything else),  
fine regulation and voicing, along with a broad range of prep work -  
and that these are not covered under RPT. So what should we do? Wait  
for PTG to develop a certification in these areas? Is that likely to  
happen (in our lifetimes)?
	In any case, what we have decided to propose is something that is at  
least a small step in the right direction: the "endorsee" will have  
taken an intensive three day course in those skills and passed an exam  
on those topics. If you like, this is stop gap, far less than ideal. I  
won't disagree, but I would ask what is a viable alternative.
	BTW, the ad for the caut job at Stephen Austin U was the latest of  
several I have seen which specifies "Steinway training." This is  
interesting. It is evidence that an endorsement (or diploma) might  
fill a perceived need.
	Why limit it to cauts? Not for logical, but for practical reasons.  
The caut committee and community has a long history of taking  
initiatives within the organization. The caut and pianotech lists are  
obvious examples (for those who don't know, pianotech started as  
something completely separate from PTG, hosted on the university  
server of a caut). In our discussions of how to improve things in  
cautdom, one recurring element, piece of the puzzle, has been the  
notion of some form of caut credential. We have discussed at length  
what areas such a credential ought to cover. There is a committee  
ready and willing to act.
	In a sense, this is quite logical for the organization as a whole: a  
small scale pilot program, developing slowly. As it develops, the  
organization can observe pitfalls, make corrections, see things that  
might be emulated, or abort the whole thing if it seems to be more  
negative than positive.

Regards,
Fred Sturm
University of New Mexico
fssturm at unm.edu