The Association for Challenge Course Technology (ACCT) has withdrawn the draft standard it submitted for public review in November 2022 after finding that the large volume of comments received during the public comment period, which closed Jan. 9, 2023, indicated the draft was “not the direction that the industry wants to pursue at this time,” said ACCT board chair Korey Hampton in an email to members.
The draft standard was a proposed revision of the ANSI/ACCT 03-2019 standards.
Hampton thanked the volunteers and commenters that participated in the process—ACCT received 1,729 comments on the draft from 79 different individuals during the comment period. “We still plan to consider the valuable feedback received and look forward to determining how some of the ideas may help inform future drafts,” she added.
ACCT has not begun work on a new draft, but rather is “taking some time to carefully consider what the next steps in our standards development process will look like,” said Hampton. The recently formed Accredited Procedures Task Force (APTF), a group made up of ACCT staff, board, Consensus Group, and TIRE members, is undertaking the work to “re-think, revise, and reorganize” the process ACCT uses to develop standards.
“The ANSI (American National Standards Institute) standards process is one designed around the concept of consensus,” said Hampton. “As an ANSI-accredited standards developer (ASD), we understand how important stakeholder input and involvement is to building consensus, and this is a main area of focus for the APTF as we update our standards development process. We are making good headway, and we will be sharing more information on our progress as we move forward.”
ACCT adopted its first consensus challenge course standards in 1994 and became an ANSI accredited standards developer in 2006. It actively maintains that status, and development of the eighth, ninth and tenth versions of the standards have followed the ANSI process. The withdrawal of the November 2022 draft was made in accordance with the ANSI standards process and the ANSI Essential Requirements, according to Hampton.
