Will completing either the 3 day or the 5 day ERS training course in Chapel Hill make me a reliable user of one of the scales?

Both the 3 day and the 5 day training courses are designed as introductory courses. Upon completion of either course, the participants are given a letter of completion. The 3 day course consists of one day of training on the background and mechanics of the selected scale, and 2 days of supervised field practice in small groups, led by trained group leaders. The 5 day course provides an additional day and a half of in-depth explanations and activities to enhance the participants understanding of the scale, along with 2 days of supervised field practice. Neither course is designed to train to reliability. Reliability training usually requires more field practice sessions and the trainee must achieve the appropriate target percent of agreement with a reliable user of the scale over the last 3 field observations. It is not possible at this time to provide more than 2 field practice sessions during our regular introductory courses.

Participants in our courses typically come from a variety of background, with varying levels of training and experience on the scales, and different goals for using the scales. Some will be using the scales in research or evaluation, others for training or technical assistance. We try to take the participants’ level of previous training and experience on the scale, as well as their projected use of the scale, into consideration as we constitute the small field practice groups, although this is often difficult to do. During the debriefing session which follows each practice field observation, it is possible to calculate a reliability percentage for that day, if the participants are at a level where they can score independently and do not need a guided “walk through” during the debriefing. Calculating reliability can give each trainee a rough measure of how accurately she or he has used the scale that day. However, the goal of our introductory courses is to give the best possible training for each participant, not to train to reliability.

It should be noted that the authors of the scale design and conduct training to reliability at various sites upon request, and have done so in a variety of communities.