First Up: The Cornerstones For Providing High Quality Programs

Welcome to the premiere issue of MSF/PERSPECTIVES. Over the past few months, many of our colleagues and friends have asked us to address a range of matters regarding rider safety education and training. To serve this purpose, we have developed this new online newsletter.

The goal of MSF/PERSPECTIVES is to share our point-of-view on important topics that affect those of us in the motorcycle safety community, and with your support and encouragement, to continue our dedicated efforts to advance the shared mission of making motorcycling safer.

On this website, we will address topics you identify as top-of-mind. Subjects will include: issues related to basic and advanced rider training, professional development, quality assurance, licensing, delivery challenges such as capacity and reciprocity, safety renewal, mandatory training, and certification of RiderCoaches and RiderCoach Trainers.

For this first issue, however, we would like to reflect on the cornerstones of our overall approach to rider education and training: curriculum development, professional development, quality assurance, and continual improvement. These four key areas drive our efforts to provide high quality programs and services to support the safety and welfare of motorcyclists.

Curriculum Development: An Intellectually Disciplined Approach
We invest significantly in both the scope and quality of the curricula in our Rider Education and Training System. The focus of "RETS," as we like to call it, is to advance safety, enhance the riding experience, and always improve.

We adhere to a strict educational protocol for curricula development. It is an intellectually disciplined approach, one that involves input from a variety of experts, exhaustive research and field testing, as well as continual process improvement.

To incorporate the broadest knowledge base and best available thinking, subject matter expertise is provided by professionals in a wide variety of related disciplines from both inside and outside the motorcycling community.

This knowledge is supplemented with the hard work of practitioners, who, like many of you, have been immersed in the best motorcycle training practices in an effort to provide curricula and programs of the highest caliber. Our focus continues to be the development, maintenance, and improvement of the highest quality research-based curricula that best meets the safety-related needs and interests of the motorcycling community.

Our collective efforts are making a difference. Since 1973 there have been four versions of the learn-to-ride basic course for beginning riders, and each new program has been an improvement over the former.

The arduous task of developing and implementing a new MSF learn-to-ride curriculum has produced a sound program that has proven to be a remarkable success. More than 800,000 riders have been trained with the new Basic RiderCourse since its introduction in 2001.

The Basic RiderCourse was designed to create a dynamic learning environment that incorporated the most recent research on adult learning principles and modern, learner-centered instructional practices.

We made best use of the 147 curriculum recommendations for improvement from instructors and students that were provided during the initial phases of the BRC development process. Based on the latest research in motor skills development, the riding exercises were restructured to build rider skills in a safer and more sequentially sound fashion. And emphasis was deepened in the areas of personal responsibility, self-assessment and risk management strategies.

Adult learning principles - key ways in which adults best acquire knowledge and skills - were identified and incorporated into the BRC. These adult learning principles were integrated into and refined throughout the curricula development process for both the classroom and range exercises, in an effort to provide the best opportunity possible for a class participant to acquire the skill set needed to learn how to ride.

To aid and accelerate the process of learning, a student-centered approach was adopted for the classroom environment. Educational research has clearly demonstrated that information conveyed in a learner-centered, participatory environment, one that includes active involvement (versus an instructor-centered, lecture-styled one) supports better learning and retention of relevant concepts and information.

Knowledge, skill, and rider attitude and behavior were all addressed. In developing the new learn-to-ride curricula, teaching students how to ride a motorcycle - the "what" to be taught - would not change significantly. But the method of delivery - how the information would be conveyed - would now reflect the most contemporary research available on adult education and learning.

The results have been dramatic. In 2005, instructors who had experience with both the former curriculum and the new BRC participated in a national survey that provided all of us insight as to the margin of improvement in the new curriculum. More than 3,000 RiderCoaches - representing 43 percent of all RiderCoaches and 49 states - participated in the survey.

There was an overall approval rating of 83 percent for Basic RiderCourse range and classroom effectiveness. In terms of satisfaction in teaching, of those who had experience with both curricula, 87 percent found the BRC the same or more satisfying to conduct. Eighty-two percent stated that the students were as prepared or more prepared to continue to develop their skills on the street.

The RiderCoach survey respondents stated that the BRC is safer, easier to instruct, produces more confident graduates and is associated with fewer drops and falls, significantly less student stress, and earlier student control - all leading to a more enjoyable student and coaching experience.

As encouraging and positive as these results are, more importantly they provide a benchmark for when we survey RiderCoaches once again for their invaluable feedback in our efforts to continue to improve what we do.

Professional Development and Quality Assurance:
Setting the Highest Standards
As you may have seen or experienced firsthand, we have invested time and resources not only in the development of various courses and other education and training opportunities (such as our "SeasonedRider," "Common Road," "Riding Straight," and "Guide to Group Riding" kits and "Guide to Motorcycling Excellence" book), but also in professional development and quality assurance to help provide the best and continually improving programs.

Examples of this investment include:

-	providing an increasing number of professional development opportunities for RiderCoaches and RiderCoach Trainers, such as the ongoing Learning Centers and RiderCoach Trainer Clinics throughout the country;
-	developing a variety of web-based quality assurance tools and resources;
-	using a comprehensive "Best Practices" system;
-	implementing ongoing field research dedicated to providing input for continual program improvement;
-	increasing our involvement in state, regional, national and international conferences.

To help the global community further their motorcycle safety efforts, this spring we once again hosted an International Motorcycle Safety Conference. Held in Long Beach, California, more than 300 professionals from 20 countries attended the event, all there to share the latest in motorcycle safety research and practice.

We know RiderCoaches and RiderCoach Trainers rightfully take much pride in what they do and that MSF certification is highly valued. For certification to truly mean something, it is essential to establish and maintain high standards in curriculum development and delivery. Along with state rules and standards, this includes the rules of professional conduct and the enhanced level of professional development that MSF certification requires.

It is a reflection of these high standards and the elevated level of quality assurance that the integrity of our certification and of the training curriculum is respected, and expected, around the world.

Continual Improvement: A Never-ending Quest
As the education and scientific community yields research that leads to new and better ways to facilitate learning, and as the motorcycling community embraces improved ways to achieve safety and enjoyment from riding experiences, the MSF staff will remain committed to continuous measurement and improvement of our programs and processes.

Nowhere is this never-ending quest for improvement more deeply rooted than in the Rider Education and Training System. RETS provides a structural framework whereby its curricular offerings are managed and improved for maximum effectiveness. This is achieved in several ways.

First, RETS RiderCourses are designed to allow for program flexibility - the Basic RiderCourse, for example, purposely uses a modular approach so states or jurisdictions may adjust or complement content or schedules to accommodate variations required by statute or administrative rules. This approach allows a jurisdiction to add elements that are required in its state-approved curriculum. Content-specific topics may be added to the basic template of instruction to topical areas. For instance, a state may require that a certain amount of time be used to address alcohol and highway safety - this can easily be achieved as an addition to the existing content.

As all of you who teach MSF RiderCourses are very aware, RETS curricula are also designed to allow for flexibility in the delivery of the curriculum in both the classroom and on the range - RiderCoaches have flexibility within the classroom units and range exercises as long as the content is technically correct and the sequence and action steps are followed.

And yet another component of the MSF Rider Education and Training System is a well-defined and rigorous curricula evaluation and change/best practice process. The actual curricula change process begins when an idea or suggestion to improve, change, or revise content, range activities or specific teaching methods is submitted for consideration by someone in the training community.

Ideas submitted that do not involve a curricula change, but are related to methods or teaching practices that can potentially improve the quality of instruction within the basic template that already exists, are posted as "Best Practices" on the Rider Education and Training System Online Resource Guide (RETSORG) for RiderCoach consideration and use.

Ideas of merit that would require an actual structural change to the curricula itself (e.g., a change in actual content or sequence of instruction) are researched and field-tested using a MSF research laboratory. Through the research laboratory process, the idea can be evaluated using rigorous controls to ensure the validity of outcomes.

With any proposed curricula change, it is critical that the fundamental principles of learning inherent in the MSF curricula are not violated. As evidenced by extensive field-testing and research, we have gone to great lengths to ensure the most recent research for effective learning was incorporated into the curricula to meet the needs and interests of novice and experienced riders.

Looking Forward: Serving the Rider Training Community
So what does the future hold? We will continue to research, develop, and field test all aspects related to our Rider Education and Training System based on sound and accepted principles and practices, and will continue to look for opportunities to achieve excellence in curricula programs and services.

We will seek your continuing input through the various surveys conducted with RiderCoaches, RiderCoach Trainers, state administrators, site sponsors, students and others. And we urge all of you to provide comment and feedback, whether face-to-face at Learning Centers and other events, via correspondence and calls, or through submissions on the curriculum list and RETSORG. Using this feedback, we will continue to refine our curricula and services for even greater effectiveness.

As we look toward a promising future, we encourage all to remain focused on maintaining strong, positive relationships and work with each other to help develop needed courses as well as enhance the delivery of training. We hope to continue to challenge each other to be the best we can be and do what is right in maintaining high professional and ethical standards, all within publicly accepted standards of accountability and integrity.

Your feedback on how we can better serve you is invaluable as we look ahead, and all of us continue our dedicated efforts to serve the most important people in motorcycling, the current and prospective riders. Together, we can help prepare others so that they can enjoy what we all love so much - the ride.

MSF/PERSPECTIVES will be published various times throughout the year, so please come back often, or subscribe to receive an e-mail alert that will be sent to you whenever we post something new. (If you received an e-mail alert directing you to this Premiere Issue, you are already a subscriber and will continue to receive e-mail notification of our new postings.)

Founded in 1973, the Motorcycle Safety Foundation's mission is to make motorcycling safer and more enjoyable by ensuring access to lifelong quality education and training for current and prospective riders, and by advocating a safer riding environment.