The Academy
Credentials that mean something to a board
Running a self-insured group is a real discipline, and until now there was no way to show you had learned it. These are the credentials — what each one asks for, how it is earned, and how anyone can check it.
Start here
Everyone begins in the same place
One short certificate underneath all three designations, so a trustee and an administrator share a vocabulary before they specialise.
SIG Foundations
The shared grounding: what a group is, who carries which duty, how it is measured, and the regulatory floor. Required before any designation.
- Courses
- 2
- Time
- 36 min
- Renews
- Never
What it requires
- What a self-insured group is · 20 min · 1 LU
- The regulatory landscape · 16 min · 1 LU
Then choose a track
Three designations sit on top of it. Nobody needs all of them — a trustee has a day job, and a credential a volunteer cannot finish teaches their board nothing.
Designations
Three, for three different jobs
Each renews annually. Renewal is not a formality: a set number of Learning Units each year, and a floor on how many must come from real coursework rather than from contributing to the community.
Certified SIG Administrator
CSGAThe flagship credential for the person running a group. Covers all seven measurement domains, governance and ethics, and ends in a governing scorecard built for your own group.
- Courses
- 12
- Time
- 3.0 hrs
- Renews
- 8 LU/yr
What it requires
- SIG Foundations · Held first
- Claims and injured-worker outcomes · 16 min · 3 LU
- Financial strength and actuarial performance · 15 min · 3 LU
- Underwriting and risk selection · 14 min · 3 LU
- Safety and loss control · 14 min · 3 LU
- Operating performance · 12 min · 2 LU
- Member service and retention · 10 min · 2 LU
- Marketing and responsible growth · 11 min · 2 LU
- Governance and the board conversation · 15 min · 3 LU
- Ethics and the fiduciary standard · 15 min · 2 LU
- Building the governing scorecard · 19 min · 4 LU
Renewal needs 8 Learning Units a year, of which at least 4 must come from courses or working sessions rather than from contribution.
Certified SIG Trustee
CSGTFor board members. Deliberately short — trustees are volunteers with day jobs, and a credential that cannot be earned teaches a board nothing.
- Courses
- 5
- Time
- 1.4 hrs
- Renews
- 4 LU/yr
What it requires
- SIG Foundations · Held first
- Governance and the board conversation · 15 min · 3 LU
- Ethics and the fiduciary standard · 15 min · 2 LU
- Financial strength and actuarial performance · 15 min · 3 LU
Renewal needs 4 Learning Units a year, of which at least 2 must come from courses or working sessions rather than from contribution.
SIG Succession Practitioner
SSPCapture, Transfer, Renew — applied to a real group. Ends in a succession plan you can put in front of your board.
- Courses
- 3
- Time
- 50 min
- Renews
- 4 LU/yr
What it requires
- Succession: Capture · 19 min · 3 LU
- Succession: Transfer · 14 min · 3 LU
- Succession: Renew · 17 min · 3 LU
Renewal needs 4 Learning Units a year, of which at least 2 must come from courses or working sessions rather than from contribution.
Integrity
Why the credential holds up
A designation is only worth what it costs to get. These are the four things that make ours expensive in the right way.
Time is observed, not claimed
Audio and video record which parts were actually played. Skipping ahead credits nothing, and playing at double speed credits nothing. 90% of an asset has to be heard before the lesson closes.
Answers are graded, not guessed
Every attempt orders its questions and its options at random, and is graded against the exact set it served. 80% passes. Three attempts, then a day's wait — long enough that guessing is not a strategy.
The work is about your own group
Every designation ends in a capstone built from your own numbers — a scorecard, or a succession plan — read by a reviewer and either passed or returned with revisions.
The credential is frozen at award
What a programme required on the day it was earned is stored with the award. Adding a course next year cannot retroactively invalidate a holder, and cannot quietly upgrade a thinner past credential either.
For boards and employers
Anyone can check a credential
Every certificate and transcript carries a verification code. Enter it and you will see the holder, the credential, the date it was awarded, and whether it is still current — and nothing else. No email address, no course history, no contact details.
This is an educational and management-planning programme. It does not replace the advice of the group's actuary, legal counsel, auditor, excess carrier, claims professionals, or state regulator. State requirements control whenever they differ. Certificates and designations are conferred by SIG National, LLC; they are not a state licence and are not approved continuing-education credit unless a regulator has separately said so for a given course.
Learning Units are SIG National’s own measure of study. They are not state continuing-education credit and are not claimed to be. Where a state accepts a course for CE, that is recorded separately and named as such.
Start the conversation
The first cohort shapes the credential
Membership is decided rather than claimed, so the way in is a conversation. Bring the part of running your group that keeps you up at night — that is what the next course gets built from.