May 2019 - Parks & Recreation - 74

N R PA U P DAT E

CAPRA Accreditation - The Power
of Positive Perception
By Laura T. Wetherald, MS, CPRP

ccreditation from NRPA's Commission for Accreditation of Park and
Recreation Agencies (CAPRA) is a powerful stamp of approval and
a great tool to help build a positive brand around the value of your
agency. Howard County Recreation and Parks in Maryland achieved CAPRA
accreditation in 2002. In the years preparing for our initial accreditation and
then maintaining our continual five-year reaccreditation status (most recently in
2017), we developed the positive culture of a CAPRA agency. Every time I speak
to the community, county administration or Maryland colleagues, I share with
them the importance of accreditation and the benefits it provides to an agency
and its community. Stating that our agency is one of the 165 accredited agencies
out of 10,000 agencies in the United States gets the listeners' attention.
CAPRA Accreditation recently
helped us secure a $150,000 grant to
increase the participation of low-income students and students of color in afterschool sports activities.
The Horizon Foundation, Howard
County's (Maryland) community
health foundation, sought out our
agency and offered us the grant
because our CAPRA accreditation
gives us notoriety and recognition
as experts in the field. We were
able to deliver excellent resources
to coordinate and implement the
outcome of the grant because of

the policies, procedures, budget,
trends analysis, needs assessment
and program planning tools that
were established as part of the accreditation process. We also could
demonstrate best practices that
provided the Horizon Foundation
and other grant partners with confidence in their selection.
Among the requirements for
maintaining CAPRA accreditation
is an annual self-assessment report.
This exercise is one of the most
valuable parts of the entire process because through it, the agency

comes to know itself better. This
self-assessment also has the unexpected benefit of being a helpful
tool for new staff orientations, as it
provides an overview of the agency
and allows them to easily digest the
agency's inner workings.
A site visit is required to validate
the self-assessment. This includes
a networking event during which
the accreditation team meets the
agency leaders and directors from
human resources, risk management, police, fire, emergency management, finance, public works and
county executives/city managers.
It is exciting for the staff, directors
and officials attending the event to
witness the camaraderie and support of these agencies to assist the
agency on this journey. This event
also highlights how important
parks and recreation is to the comprehensive offerings of government.
Other CAPRA-accredited agencies agree that including the CAPRA
logo on their publications, vehicles,
facilities and social media relays the
message of quality service, excellence in programming, level of service credentials and best practices in
implementation.
All of these tools and resources
were easily accessed due to our commitment to the CAPRA standards.
They are among the reasons I encourage you to consider gaining CAPRA
accreditation for your agency.
Laura T. Wetherald, MS, CPRP, is the
Bureau Chief of Recreation for Howard
County Department of Recreation and
Parks (lwetherald@howardcountymd.gov).

Parks & Recreation

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May 2019 - Parks & Recreation

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