Educating Ourselves
The IASA believes that education of architects belongs in the hands of a the academic and professional community and not a vendor. In no other field is a vendor responsible for the education, training and certification of the professionals. This is for a good reason. The only sure way to avoid abuse of accreditation and certification is a) to take the monetary reward out of the system and b) put the control and oversight in the hands of the community who cannot benefit from lowering the standards. Thus doctors are recognized by other doctors and not by a vendor or corporate consortium. Accountants, lawyers, building architects have followed this practice for many years and it has made them successful, stand-alone professions. The IASA is the the only professional association with a full education plan for IT architects.

Training
IASA training is the only skills based practical resource for continuously updating your skills as an IT architect and the only program completely controlled by individual architects. It is run by an immensely skilled member-based group of IT architects called the Architect Training Committee. The training program focuses on practical techniques over abstractions and is setup will provide over 85 individual courses. In addition IASA is delivering accreditation of 3rd party training providers.

Internship
Arguably the most technically complex, mission critical profession in the world is medical doctor. Yet, obviously, un-experienced doctors who have completed their basic education in medical school are not allow to immediately practice un-observed. IASA believes that architects are similar. Without signficant qualified experience an architect should not be able to move to the next level. In 2009 IASA will launch an accredited internship program which will allow organizations to provide recognized internships to architects who have acquired the knowledge in the training program. This program will help employers find quality architects and architects find quality employers while growing their own careers in a standardized fashion.

Certification
The AMA, AIA, bar associations, and even Project Management Institute (PMI) provides certification for their members based on transparent standards set by individual professionals. This situation ensures the most up to date body of knowledge as well as a trust-worthy system where anyone can be assured that certification rests on ability.

The IASA certification program provides all of these advantages as well as many more. It includes three levels of certification; associate (knowledge based), professional (knowledge and experienced based), and master (top tier professionals). The professional and master architect certifications will be based on written and oral reviews in front of a qualified board of architects. Additional benefits include:

• Local mentoring 
• Lower cost due to low travel expenses and local setup
• Higher quality due to local knowledge base
• Centralized governance to ensure program quality across individual chapters