
Pictured: Art Curtis, Chair of IHRSA; Joe Moore, President of IHRSA; Jean-Ann Marnoch, Registrar, REPs UK; Stephen Gacsal, Registrar, REPs NZ; Alison O'Kane, IHRSA; Craig Knox, General Manager, Fitness Australia; Catherine Carty, Chair, REPs Ireland Board of Governors, and Richard Beddie, CEO, Fitness New Zealand.
International registrars including REPs Registrar Jean-Ann Marnoch entered into an agreement, that in turn will mean greater recognition for all REPs members, during an annual meeting held during the International Health, Racquet and Sportsclub Association (IHRSA) convention in San Francisco in March (2011).
The UK national occupational standards were reviewed and changed recently as were the Australian Standards. This meant that work had to be carried out to re-map those standards to ensure that registered members from each country could still enjoy reciprocal arrangements should they wish to live and work in one of the IC REPs (International Confederation of Registers of Exercise Professionals) partner countries.
Registrars from Australia, New Zealand, the UK and Ireland agreed that the re-mapped standards would continue to support reciprocal arrangements currently in place.
The partners also agreed to register IC REPs as a formal company and IC REPs will now enjoy recognition from IHRSA, as THE International Confederation of Registers of Exercise Professionals.
REPs Registrar Jean-Ann Marnoch explains: “On a corporate level this will mean IC REPS and its member registers will gain a much higher profile which in turn will mean greater recognition for our members too. The number of Registered Exercise Professionals globally now total nearly 60,000 with a new Register in South Africa soon to increase those numbers. The cachet of this agreement will also put us Registrars in a much stronger position when it comes to lobbying key decision makers and presenting our members as highly qualified exercise professionals.”