ACSM CPT passed on dec 25, 2012!

by nadina
(san francisco, ca)

done! it was hard, i did not ace it, but got enough knowledge to pass.
i was studying for 3 months, mostly in the mornings while my kid was at school.
my strategy was to study all KSAs, developing sets of flashcards. i did not read books cover to cover, also did not go to the workshop.

i bought test from this site which was sufficient as soon as i passed.

i guess if i did put one more month into studying i would have aced it but passing it is enough for me.

as expected my lowest scores were in nutrition and exercise prescription sections, but i am not going to use those much anyways as i think ACSM's nutrition and exercise prescription sections are way outdated. especially nutrition which uses USDA food pyramid (ewww)

besides, i am not going to be a nutritionist:)
i aced exercise science, physiology, medical considerations, human behavior (no surprise there, i used to be a teacher :))
anyway, this site is full of good advice on what to focus on and the practice test from this site gave me a good idea on what to focus.

Rating

ACSM additional
by: Anonymous

The one thing I will say about the workshop is they stressed a CPT's "scope of practice." And one of those things is nutrition. Their position is that proper nutrition guidelines and recommendations should come from a registered (or otherwise trained) dietician. That is why they only provide basic information on calories, nutrition, and why they follow FDA guidelines. There are tooooo many opinions, fads, diets, etc out there and they don't want their trainers giving out bad advice. Just like an ACSM CPT should not be recommending exercise supplements. From what they say (I have no idea what they practice), if you provide advice or instruction outside of your scope of practice while working under the guise of an ACSM certification and a complaint is filed, then ACSM has the right to take action. The CPT is fairly limited in scope and that's because it's the only certification (besides Group Fitness, EIM) ACSM has that doesn't require a 4-year degree in health science. And I don't hear alot of good things about personal trainers and their advice. And every personal trainer, it seems, has some special system. When someone asks me about questions about a personal trainer, my first question is "What is their certification?" Most people have no clue. Not all CPTs are created equal.... Good luck!

ACSM CPT passed on dec 25, 2012!

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