Application Appeals Process

See special considerations for the 2020 Applications Part B Below!!

Any declined applicant is welcome to appeal the Credentials Committee decision.  Below is a description of the process.  First off, the process is defined in our Constitution and Bylaws:

Section 5. Appeals (Amended 2018)

a. Candidates denied eligibility to sit for the VTS (Emergency & Critical Care) Certification Examination may appeal this decision within thirty (30) calendar days of receipt of the letter of notification. The appeal must be made by written petition to the Executive Secretary and shall include a statement of the grounds for reconsideration.  The Appeals Committee may request additional information as needed.

1. Upon receipt of an appeal, the Executive Secretary shall notify the President and the Chair of the Credentials Approval Committee. The President will appoint a committee of sufficient VTS (Emergency & Critical Care) members to address the volume of appeals received, to serve as an ad hoc Appeal Committee within 15 calendar days of receiving notification of the appeal.
2. The Chair of the Credentials Approval Committee shall submit to the Appeal Committee a written statement indicating the reasons for rejecting the candidate. The complete application file of the candidate will be provided for the Appeal Committee to review.
3. The Appeal Committee shall review the appeal(s) and render the recommendation(s) to the Directors within thirty (30) calendar days from the date the committee was appointed.

The Board of Directors will render a decision on the appeal upon the recommendation of the Appeal Committee and notify the petitioner of the decision within 16 calendar days after receipt of the report of the Appeal Committee.  The decision of the Board of Directors shall be final.

The Process:

1. The applicant must submit the appropriate form below (Part A Appeal or Part B Appeal) within 30 days of the rejection letter being sent by email.

2. The applicant must clearly state his/her reason(s) for appeal.

3. Supporting documentation should be submitted with the appeal, depending on the reason for appeal.  Supporting documentation is only reviewed in the following cases:

a) The reason for being declined was due to the committee not being able to verify credentialed work hours.  In this case, documentation that will be reviewed may include: a license or diploma, letter from the licensing board identifying licensure for the required time period, or a letter from the applicant's workplace verifying hour totals.  Generally appeals of this nature are suggested in the decline letter.

b) The applicant failed to sign an important document, such as skills list or waiver.  Appeals of this nature will be noted in the decline letter.

c) If the applicant can prove that they attempted to upload documentation or had a technical failure of the application form, in some cases, additional information may be allowed. 

4. The application "as submitted" is sent to the appeals committee for review.  If additional information was submitted, as listed in 3 above, this is added to the application files.  Additional information provided by the appellant are NOT added to the application files.  Please DO NOT send additional Letters of Reference, additional skills lists, case logs or reports, as these will NOT be reviewed.

5. The committee reviews the application as requested by the executive secretary.  They are not provided with the reason's for decline, or the appeal letter.  The application is reviewed with the exact standardized process as the initial round of application reviews.

6. Following the review, the reason for your initial decline and your appeal letter will be presented to the appeals committee and they will determine if they are in agreement with the original decision, or if it will be overturned.  Keep in mind, it is possible that the appeals committee will notice other deficiencies that were not noted in the initial review.  

We want you to be successful in your goal of becoming a VTS(ECC).  We are a very inclusive Academy, and welcome new members to keep our standing as the first AND largest Academy.  We do however need to maintain our standards to ensure that we are meeting the goal of our Mission Statement:

"To advance emergency and critical care veterinary nurses and technicians through certification and standards of excellence.”

We hope that all those declined will consider applying again at another time.  Please take the critiques you have received and use them in your future application to better your chances of success!!

Part A Appeal Form** Due May 30, 2022

Part B Appeal Form ** CLOSED

For those that were not accepted to pass Part A of the 2023 Application Process, submit the Part A Appeal form above by May 30, 2022.  Late appeals are not reviewed. 

SHOULD I APPEAL??

The choice to appeal is yours, however we can provide some general guidelines.  Your appeal is most likely to be accepted for one of the three reasons provided in "supporting documentation" above, and this was the ONLY reason for decline. 

If your Part A application was denied because you failed to show CE Proof, filled in forms incorrectly, etc., you are probably better to learn from the experience and apply again next year, watching for those errors.  You cannot submit those missing documents on appeal, so they will still be missing when the committee reviews.

If your Part A application letter suggested you need clarification on something, ie all the information was provided, but we could not read something (ie a scan error), you may be asked to submit clarification on appeal.  Please do this!

If your application was declined for a few case logs, OR one report, we would certainly suggest you appeal.  We don't overturn many credential committee decisions, however, when your application only failed by a small margin, its worth trying.  GO FOR IT!

If your application was declined for MANY case logs AND/OR more than one case report, please think wisely before undergoing the appeals process. This is a time consuming process, if multiple deficiencies were found in the first round the likelihood of an appeal being overturned is extremely unlikely.  The same process is used to evaluate, and no further information can be submitted.  Submitting an appeal for this type of application will only prolong your wait, and instead you can be focusing on the next year's application. 

REMEMBER

Once your appeal letter is received, your Part B application will be provided to the committee using the files you submitted. Nothing can be added or altered from its original form, unless we are advised of an  issue such as in 3(a) above.