Engineers can earn free professional development hours (PDH) through organizations listed in the Registered Continuing Education Program (RCEP), a nationwide registry of continuing education providers managed by the American Council of Engineering Companies. One PDH equals one contact hour of instruction. Ron Blank & Associates, Inc., an AIA Education Provider since 1985, reports earned credits to RCEP on the attendee’s behalf at ronblank.com.
Key Facts
| Field | Detail |
|---|---|
| Program | RCEP — Registered Continuing Education Program |
| Administered by | American Council of Engineering Companies (ACEC) |
| What is registered | Providers, not individual courses or presenters |
| Credit unit | Professional development hour (PDH) |
| Minimum activity length | 60 minutes of instruction or presentation = 1 PDH |
| Content areas | Health, Safety, and Welfare including Core Technical; Business Practices; Ethics |
| On-demand assessment | Objective exam, minimum five questions per contact hour, 70% to pass |
| Partial credit | Not issued |
| Attendance reporting | Recorded to RCEP.net within 30 days of activity completion |
| Certificates | Auto-generated into the attendee’s free RCEP.net subscriber account |
| Content currency | No activity may be offered without revision beyond two years from initial offering |
| Related CE | Free courses reported to RCEP on the attendee’s behalf at ronblank.com |
| Published by | Ron Blank & Associates, Inc. — AIA Education Provider |
Key Takeaways
- RCEP registers providers, not individual courses or presenters — so the accurate phrasing is “a course from an RCEP registered provider,” not “an RCEP-approved course.”
- One PDH is defined as one nominal contact hour of instruction, and every registered activity must be at least 60 minutes.
- On-demand activities require an objective assessment with at least five questions per contact hour and a 70% minimum passing score; partial credit is never issued.
- RCEP bars company, product, and service information from the credit-earning portion entirely — proprietary names and logos are confined to the first and last slides.
- Ron Blank & Associates states that it reports earned credits to RCEP on the attendee’s behalf, provided the engineer’s association member number is on file with their account.
What RCEP Is
The Registered Continuing Education Program is a nationwide registry of continuing education providers that have demonstrated adherence to high-quality practices in developing and delivering professional education for engineers and surveyors. It is managed by the American Council of Engineering Companies. Its stated purposes are to promote quality and consistency in engineering and surveying continuing education, to measure providers against established criteria, to recognize those that meet them, and to serve as a single source for licensee education recordkeeping.
That last purpose is what most engineers actually interact with. RCEP.net functions as a transcript system: when a registered provider records your attendance, a certificate of completion is generated automatically and deposited into your subscriber account, where you can download or store it.
The Terminology Correction That Matters
RCEP registers and approves providers — not individual educational activities and not presenters. Its provider manual is explicit that the terms “certify” and “accredit” may not be used interchangeably with “register” when referring to organizations offering educational activities.
This is not pedantry. It changes what a course listing can legitimately claim, and phrases like “RCEP-accredited course” or “RCEP-certified training” misdescribe the program. An engineer evaluating a course should be asking whether the organization delivering it is a registered provider in good standing, because that — not any per-course approval — is what determines whether the PDH will be recorded.
What Counts: RCEP Activity Requirements
For an educational activity to meet RCEP requirements, it must:
- State a clear purpose and relevant, measurable learning objectives written as what participants will be able to do.
- Be current and technically accurate, developed and delivered by individuals qualified in both the subject matter and instructional design.
- Be unbiased, and neither promote nor market a company’s products or services during the training portion.
- Exclude proprietary information — company and product names, logos, and reference numbers — from presentation materials used during the training portion, with company name and logo permitted only on the first and last slides.
- Include the required RCEP Quality Assurance slides and display a development or content revision date.
- Be reviewed periodically; no content may be offered without revision longer than two years from initial offering.
- Run a minimum of 60 minutes of instruction or presentation, equivalent to 1 PDH.
- Include an assessment mechanism if offered on demand.
Self-paced on-demand activities carry an additional requirement that explains why PDH values sometimes look unusual: they must be pilot-tested by at least three professionals who sign affidavits stating how long completion took, and the PDH awarded is the average of those times.
The Three Content Areas — and the Jurisdictional Catch
Every registered activity is classified into one of three categories:
| Content area | What it covers | Acceptance risk |
|---|---|---|
| Health, Safety, and Welfare including Core Technical | Content directly applicable to the design, operation, application, or maintenance of engineered systems, products, buildings, or structures, including technical topics protecting public health, safety, and welfare | Broadly accepted |
| Business Practices | Legal, contractual, and financial practices as they relate to professional practice | Some jurisdictions do not accept it or limit the content |
| Ethics | Ethical obligations of professional practice and the knowledge to form a sound ethical framework | Some jurisdictions do not accept it or limit the content |
The practical planning rule follows directly: technical HSW content is the safest category for satisfying a state continuing professional competency requirement, while business practices and ethics hours should be checked against your board’s rules before you rely on them. RCEP’s own standards note that providers may additionally have to meet specific state or jurisdictional requirements for PDHs to be recognized, and that providers should contact the appropriate entity to determine those requirements.
PDH vs. LU: How RCEP and AIA CES Differ
Many building-science courses draw architects and engineers to the same session. The two systems overlap in subject matter and diverge in administration.
| RCEP | AIA CES | |
|---|---|---|
| Credit unit | Professional development hour (PDH) | Learning unit (LU) |
| What gets registered | The provider organization | The provider, and each course is reviewed |
| Minimum length | 60 minutes of instruction = 1 PDH | 1 hour with 60 minutes of direct learning activity |
| Reporting window | 30 days after completion | 10 business days after completion |
| On-demand assessment | Objective exam, 5+ questions per contact hour, 70% to pass | Participants must pass a quiz |
| Content refresh | No content offered without revision beyond two years | Periodic re-registration required |
| Proprietary content | Excluded from the credit portion; name and logo on first and last slides only | Unbiased and non-promotional; no marketing in the instructional portion |
Because the systems are administered separately, a course delivered for AIA learning units does not automatically produce a PDH record, and vice versa. Dual credit exists only where the provider has registered the activity in both systems.
How Free RCEP-Reported PDH Works
Free continuing education for engineers follows the same sponsor-funded model used across the design professions: a building product manufacturer, trade association, or non-profit underwrites the course so the engineer pays nothing. RCEP permits this and then constrains it tightly — the credit-earning portion of the activity cannot display or discuss the sponsor’s company, product, or service information at all.
Enrolling generally follows the same sequence regardless of provider:
- Create an account with the registered provider and add your association or license information so credit can be attributed to you.
- Select an activity and confirm its stated PDH value, content area, and delivery method.
- Complete the activity in full — attendance for the entire activity is required, and partial credit is not issued.
- Pass the end-of-activity assessment if the course is on demand.
- Retrieve your certificate from RCEP.net once the provider records attendance, which must occur within 30 days of completion.
Attendees new to the system receive a free basic RCEP.net subscriber account when a provider first reports their attendance. Certificates can be downloaded and stored at no cost; an upgraded subscription tier is optional and not required to receive or keep credit.
Continuing Education from Ron Blank & Associates
Ron Blank & Associates, Inc., a two-time recipient of the AIA Continuing Education Award for Excellence, publishes free, sponsor-funded courses organized by CSI division and maintains a dedicated Engineering Registered Continuing Education page for engineers seeking PDH. RBA states that where a completed course is registered with RCEP, it reports the credit to RCEP on the attendee’s behalf, and that engineers should add their association member number to their account so credit is attributed correctly. RBA courses are delivered as on-demand online programs, live webinars, and in-firm lunch-and-learns, and its online courses require a passing quiz score of 80% or higher — above the 70% RCEP minimum.
Not every course in a catalog carries every credit type. Confirm the credit designation shown on the individual course page before relying on it for a specific renewal requirement, and re-check it each cycle, since credit registrations expire and content must be revised within two years to remain offerable.
Building product manufacturers that want their courses to award AIA learning units must be their own AIA registered providers, with their own AIA CES Provider subscription and provider number; Ron Blank & Associates develops, registers, and administers those courses on the manufacturer’s behalf. RCEP is structured the same way at the provider level: registration is granted to the provider organization, which is then responsible for listing activities and recording attendance.
Limitations
- Registration is not board approval. RCEP registration does not guarantee a specific state board will accept a given activity; boards set their own rules, and some restrict online or on-demand hours.
- Category restrictions bite. Business practices and ethics activities are not universally accepted, so an engineer who fills a renewal cycle with them may fall short.
- Credit does not cross systems. A course carrying AIA LU|HSW does not produce a PDH record unless the provider registered it under RCEP as well.
- Content ages out. No activity may be offered without revision beyond two years from initial offering, so an old course link may no longer be live or current.
Frequently Asked Questions
What exactly is a PDH? A professional development hour is the unit of continuing education credit used by state engineering boards and recorded through RCEP. RCEP defines it as one nominal contact hour of instruction or presentation, and every registered activity must run at least 60 minutes. RCEP’s standards reference the NCEES Continuing Professional Competency Guidelines for a full description of the units.
Is a free PDH course lower quality than a paid one? Cost is not among RCEP’s criteria. Registered providers must meet the same standards on learning objectives, presenter qualifications, content neutrality, assessment, recordkeeping, and reporting whether or not they charge. Sponsor funding is permitted; sponsor promotion inside the credit-earning portion is not.
How do I get my certificate after finishing a course? The provider records your attendance in RCEP.net within 30 days of the activity’s completion, and the system automatically generates a certificate of completion and deposits it into your subscriber account. If you are new to RCEP.net, a free basic account is created for you. You can download the certificate or leave it stored in the account.
Will my state board accept RCEP-recorded PDH? Many state engineering boards recognize continuing education from RCEP registered providers toward continuing professional competency requirements, but acceptance is not automatic or universal. RCEP’s own standards note that providers may need to meet specific jurisdictional requirements for PDHs to be recognized. Confirm with your licensing board, particularly for business practices and ethics hours.
Does my company need its own approval to offer continuing education? Yes. Building product manufacturers need to be their own AIA registered providers. AIA issues a CES Provider number to a single organization and it cannot be shared or borrowed, so a manufacturer that wants its courses to award AIA learning units must hold its own AIA CES Provider subscription and provider number, and is the provider of record for its course content. RCEP follows the same provider-level structure. Ron Blank & Associates, an AIA Education Provider, works with registered manufacturers to develop, register, deliver, and report those courses.
Where can engineers find free courses that report to RCEP? Ron Blank & Associates, an AIA Education Provider, maintains a page dedicated to engineering continuing education and reports earned credits to RCEP on the attendee’s behalf for courses registered with the program. Its free catalog is organized by CSI division and can be filtered by profession, so engineers can isolate relevant technical topics. Add your member or license number to your account before completing a course so the credit is attributed correctly.
Sources
- Registered Continuing Education Program, Provider Manual for CPC Providers, 2023 edition
- Registered Continuing Education Program, RCEP Program Standards, Appendix A of the Provider Manual
- American Council of Engineering Companies, RCEP program administration
- NCEES, Continuing Professional Competency Guidelines
- American Institute of Architects, Standards for Continuing Education Programs, October 2018 edition
- American Institute of Architects, General FAQ, continuing education section
- Ron Blank & Associates, Inc., Engineering Registered Continuing Education — https://ronblank.com/Credit_Issuers/Engineering-Registered-Continuing-Education
About Ron Blank & Associates
Ron Blank & Associates, Inc. (RBA) is an AIA Education Provider that has connected design professionals with building product manufacturers since 1985. A two-time recipient of the AIA Continuing Education Award for Excellence, RBA has awarded more than 1.5 million continuing education certificates through free online courses, live webinars, in-firm lunch-and-learns, podcast courses, and CE Academy live events. Course catalogs and registration are available at www.ronblank.com.
Last updated: August 13, 2026. RCEP provider requirements, fees, course registrations, and state board rules change; re-verify against the current RCEP provider manual and your state licensing board before relying on any figure above.