CFRE International’s Board of Directors accepted the 2002 Annual Program Report at its Board meeting in Alexandria, VA on June 2, 2002.
 
During 2002, a total of 382 individuals were granted initial certification as a Certified Fund Raising Executive (CFRE).  A total of 494 new applications were received and 577 examinations were administered at 55 locations in four (4) countries.  The most significant increase was a 47% rise in candidates from Canada over 2001 numbers.   Applicants from the United States increased by 12% over last year.
 
Following are the 2002 statistics for the American and Canadian forms of the exam.
 

2002 Exam Statistics	Total Number of Scored Items on Exam	Passing Point	Mean Score of all Candidates	Range of Scores	KR-20 Reliability Coefficient	Standard Error of Measurement
Canada	200	144	143.52	92 - 176	0.85	5.70
United States	200	145	150.20	105 - 182	0.83	5.73

 
 
Explanation of Terms:
 
Total Number of Scored Items on the Exam: The current examination length is 225 questions.  However, 25 of those are pre-test questions.  That means that information on how candidates perform on those questions is collected without the question affecting the score.  These questions are being evaluated for possible addition to an exam at a later date.
 
Passing Point: This is the number of items candidates need to answer correctly in order to pass the exam.  The number of questions that must be answered correctly is determined by evaluating the overall difficulty level of the exam.  The more difficult the exam, the fewer questions a candidate would have to answer correctly in order to be assessed as having mastered the content.
 
Mean Score:  This is the average score of all candidates who took the exam in 2002.  CFRE International does not score its exam on a curve.  This means that it does not matter what group of people a candidate tests with, or how large that group is.  The passing point does not change between exam administrations.
 
Range of Scores: This shows the range of candidate scores between the lowest scoring candidate and the highest.  The range for the CFRE Exam is considered typical for a professional certification program.  No one has scored 50 points, which would indicate the candidate guessed at all the questions.  No one has scored a perfect score either, indicating the difficulty level is appropriate for the candidate population.
 
KR-20 Reliability Coefficient: This is one of the most important program statistics.  It indicates the reliability and consistency of the exam, or how well it represents a candidate’s mastery of the information tested.   Professional certification programs strive for KR-20 results of 0.80 or higher.  These statistics indicate that the exam is quite dependable for assessing a candidate’s mastery of the information tested.
 
Standard Error of Measurement: The standard errors of measurement yields an estimate of the average amount of error associated with a CFRE test score.  A large standard error indicates that a significant amount of error exists in the test score.  The small standard errors results suggest that the CFRE tests are precise measures of baseline knowledge in the field of fundraising at the five-year level.
 
The current CFRE examination is broken down into six major content areas of fundraising: Prospect Identification, Solicitation, Donor Relations, Volunteerism, Management, and Stewardship.  Candidate performance across those content areas is monitored.  In 2002, American candidates performed best in the area of Solicitation, and poorest in the area of Management.  Canadian candidates performed best in the area of Prospect Identification and poorest in Donor Relations.
 
Below is a matrix of the average performance of candidates by content area:
 

Content Area	Maximum Score	US Candidate Mean Score	Canadian Candidate Mean Score
Prospect Identification	22	16.54	16.33
Solicitation	55	42.18	39.63
Donor Relations	51	37.23	34.99
Volunteerism	17	13.59	13.53
Management	30	21.8	21.26
Stewardship	25	18.8	17.79
TOTAL	200	150.2	143.52

 
 
CFRE International is currently undertaking a Job Analysis which is used to update the knowledge, skills and competencies assessed in the Certified Fund Raising Executive (CFRE) Program.  The results of the Job Analysis will create a new Test Content Outline, which will be approved by the Board of Directors in September 2003.  New forms of the exam based on the new outline will be released in March 2004.
 
CFRE International continues to experience a healthy recertification rate.  Sixty-three percent of candidates recertify in accordance with their certification expiration date.  An additional seventeen percent take advantage of the automatic six-month grace period, bringing the final recertification rate to 80%.   
 

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