Vice-President, vice-president@astrologyeducators.com
Martha Patterson, BA BSc, BEd, MEd-Psych, CA-NCGR-PAA
is Director of the Halifax Astrology School, and founding Director of the Atlantic Professional Astrologers’ Association.
Specialising in rectification, with clients worldwide, Martha teaches and consults in French, Spanish and
English in person, through her weekly radio show (ckdu.ca). She remains, always, a grateful student of
Monsieur Axel Harvey of Montréal, the Grand Old Man of Canadian Astrology – in both languages.
Why do I care about competencies?
Because after decades of teaching in many contexts, I am less concerned about where you learned it and more interested in whether can you do it. When I onboard new students in my Astrology school, it it sometimes difficult to know where to place them, as there is no clear shared understanding of competencies, so they could perhaps be missing key competencies that I assume they have, or, they already possess competencies that i inadvertently then try to reteach them. How lovely it would be to avoid all that!
Canada has a national programme of competency-based standards for most skilled trades called the Red Seal programme. It is not a requirement to practice, but those who choose to achieve the Red Seal Competencies are highly sought-after by employers and command higher salaries. I love the optional vibe of this, also the Red Seal measures outcomes, not inputs. If you learned it off of a cereal box or at university, it is all the same. When you show what you know – you have that competency! I have been working on this for Astrology for over a decade and found myself among like-minded others in ICAE. I love the truly international approach (sending surveys and newsletters in multiple languages, for instance) and I truly believe that “a rising tide floats all the boats” as we say here in the Maritimes.