APA - NJ Chapter
P. O. Box 200402
1 Riverfront Plaza Newark, NJ 07102
Chapter Admin:
Michael E. Levine, AICP
P:973-286-4708
F:973-504-7097
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Home > Professional Development > Certification Info > AICP/PP Comparison
AICP / PP comparison
AICP: Planners using the certification AICP after their name have both experience and training in Planning and are recognized as professionals by the American Institute of Certified Planners. To become an AICP member, Planners must both qualify in terms of education and professional experience and must pass a rigorous examination of their skills and knowledge. AICP certification is recognized throughout the United States as the mark of a Professional Planner. Over 50% of APA members in New Jersey have an AICP membership!
In addition to membership in APA, there are several threshold combinations of education and professional planning experience that are possible, as shown below:
| Education Requirement |
Professional Experience Required (Yrs) |
| AICP |
PP |
| Accredited graduate degree in Planning |
2 |
2 |
| Non-accredited graduate degree in Planning |
3 |
3 |
| Accredited undergraduate degree in Planning (PP: minimum of 21 credit hours in recognized Planning subjects) |
3 |
3 |
| Other post-graduate, graduate or undergraduate college degree |
4 |
4 |
| Secondary school graduate/no college degree |
8 |
8 |
The requirements for the two credentials are similar, but not identical.
What is "professional planning experience"?
In preparing your qualifying application, you will be asked about your degree(s) and/or professional planning experience. You will need to demonstrate to the reviewers that your individual professional background meets the thresholds described above. To qualify, each planning job must meet a four-part test involving exercising influence, comprehensiveness, planning processes, and responsibility and resourcefulness. The following excerpt from the AICP application materials sets forth the minimum standards for professional planning experience:
The following criteria define professional planning experience in the work of an individual applicant. While the criteria [are] more likely to be met in an agency (private or governmental), institute, or firm engaged in comprehensive planning, instruction or research, this is not a prerequisite.
Applicants offering experience in more narrowly focused places of work should take particular care in showing how that experience meets the four criteria.
Applicants must demonstrate how their work as a professional planner was related to the four criteria.
Professional Planning Experience
"Professional planning experience," whether acquired through practice, teaching or research, must address all four of the following criteria (a faculty member with a planning degree teaching in a planning program with at least five (5) years experience qualifies as meeting the definition of professional planning experience):
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Influencing public decision-making in the public interest. Recommending specific actions or choices to elected/appointed officials, private sector representatives, or others regarding public decisions concerned with social, economic, or physical change in the public interest.
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Employing an appropriately comprehensive point of view. Appropriate comprehensiveness requires: (1) looking at the consequences (e.g., physical/environmental, social, economic/financial, governmental) of making a proposed decision; (2) conforming a proposed decision to the larger context in which it will occur; and (3) treating multiple policies, actions or systems simultaneously when inter-linkages are too great to treat separately. It does not require looking at everything at once if the above three criteria are met with a proposal, plan, or program of narrower scope.
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Applying a planning process appropriate to the situation. This means a process which is appropriate to its place and situation in (1) the number and order of its steps -- e.g., problem/opportunity definition, goal setting, generating alternative strategy choice, implementation, evaluation; (2) its orientation to the future, to value change, and to resource constraints; (3) its quality of research and analysis; and (4) its format of policy, program or plan proposal.
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Involving a professional level of responsibility and resourcefulness. This means initiative, judgment, substantial involvement, and personal accountability for defining and preparing significant substantive elements of planning activities.
To qualify as professional planning experience, the work must meet all of the above criteria.
Full Time and Part Time Experience. Persons engaged in part-time professional planning experience may prorate that experience into a full time equivalent. Persons working full time, but devoting a portion of their time to professional planning and a portion of their time to another field, may prorate their professional planning experience into a full time equivalent.
Not Generally Considered Professional Planning Experience
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Work in related fields, unless it constitutes a minor element of the applicant's planning experience - the following illustrates types of work in related fields sometimes performed by planners, but more often by other professionals:
Subdivision design
Large scale housing or site design work
Traffic engineers or highway design
Land surveying or mapping
Community organization
Social work
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Experience in related professions (e.g., law, architecture, landscape architecture, engineering).
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Market research or analysis, and other types of physical and social science normally performed by other professions or academic disciplines.
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Work at a pre-professional level -- Although there is often a fine line between professional experience and pre-professional experience, the latter generally involves less personal responsibility and less substantive technical accomplishments along the lines of the above four criteria that define professional planning experience.
To learn more about what the AICP exam involves and how to approach studying for it, click here. To learn how to apply for the AICP exam, click here.
PP: In the State of New Jersey, a PP (Professional Planner) designation may be used by professionals who have a professional background in Planning or a related field and who have passed a comprehensive examination covering New Jersey planning law. Although people trained as Planners need to have direct work experience in Planning in order to become licensed, persons who are New Jersey licensed Architects, Engineers, Surveyors or Landscape Architects need not have direct experience doing Professional Planning work to qualify for the examination. Until just a few years ago, other licensed professionals only needed to pay the license fee -- not even take the license exam -- to become licensed. To learn more about what the PP exam involves and how to approach studying for it, click here. To learn how to apply for the PP exam, click here.
SO, if you are looking for a Professional Planner, look for certification from both the American Institute of Certified Planners (AICP) and the State of New Jersey (PP).
For more information on licensing, contact:
American Planning Association
122 South Michigan Ave., Suite 1600
Chicago, IL 60603.
Their phone is (312) 431-9100, the fax number is (312) 431-9985 and the E-mail address for membership information is membership@planning.org.
In Washington D.C. (the AICP offices), the phone number is (202) 872-0611 and the E-mail address is AICP@planning.org.
New Jersey State Board of Professional Planners
124 Halsey Street, 6th Floor
Newark, NJ 07101
973-504-6465
Or send an e-mail to Michael E. Levine, AICP.
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