By Steve Rizer
When preparing for the Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design Green Associate (LEED GA) exam, what are the “final steps” that should be taken? In a recently concluded WPL Publishing series of four webinars, presenter Beth Shuck of Green Building Services Inc. (GBS) provided a list of such steps, urging audience members to, among other things, identify all of the wrong answers from their practice exams and figure out why they got those answers wrong.
Another advisable step is to select a date for taking the exam and “hold yourself to that [date] so that you stay on track with your studying,” according to Shuck, who serves as a LEED consultant and project manager at Portland, Ore.-based GBS.
Shuck additionally recommended that professionals seeking the credential read the LEED GA Candidate Handbook and use study aids such as the Core Concepts Guide and Exam Prep Study Guide. The handbook addresses how questions appearing on the exam are structured “and what it’s like to actually go in and take the exams.” She also suggested “The Treatment by LEED of the Environmental Impact of Refrigerants” report as a helpful resource.
For those prospective LEED Green Associates not using the handbook, “forming study groups is a good idea,” Shuck said. “Just talking through concepts is really useful. If you can do that within your office somehow or get together with another person at lunch [to engage in such discussion], that’s also studying, and that makes it a lot easier.”
Shuck also advised webinar attendees to “be aware of the keywords [and] vocabulary” associated with LEED GA vernacular.
Moreover, it is a good idea not to “second-guess yourself” when taking the exam, Shuck said. “Oftentimes, your first intuition is correct.”
Shuck further implored webinar attendees to “be aware of the rating systems.” In particular, she pointed to the LEED for New Construction and Major Renovation and LEED for Existing Buildings: Operations and Maintenance rating systems. Even though “you don’t need to know all of the different requirements of the credits [for those systems], learning what strategies are being suggested, what types of environmental impact they have, and how the rating systems are organized in terms of categories of concern” can be helpful, she said.
The ConstructionPro Network member version of this article includes responses to several questions that Shuck and GBS Principal Richard Manning were asked during the program's question-and-answer sessions. To sign up for a membership, click here.
To register for WPL Publishing's next LEED GA webinar series, which is scheduled to begin Tuesday, click here.
