Launching Tuesday 5 December 2023
CIfA is pleased to announce that the newly updated fieldwork Standards and universal guidance will be launching next week. These will replace the current Standard and guidance documents on archaeological field evaluation, archaeological excavation, and archaeological watching brief on Tuesday 5 December 2023.
Before the documents are released, we wanted to highlight some of the key changes you will see outlined here.
CIfA has been updating and reformatting its suite of Standards and supporting guidance for archaeological practice to ensure the information is fit-for-purpose and applicable to all those engaged in archaeological work, wherever they’re based. This work forms a key objective in the Institute’s 2021-2030 strategic plan and has been supported by a Professional Standards Advisory Panel (PSAP) comprising of CIfA-accredited archaeologists from across the historic environment sector.
The initial focus has been the three fieldwork Standards and guidance documents with work on the remaining documents still underway. This means that there will a period of overlap where some of the Standard and guidance documents on the website will remain in the current format (Standards and guidance all together in one document) and some will appear in the newly updated format with separate Standards and separate guidance documents. The documents will be clearly presented on the CIfA website and regardless of the format they follow they are the documents that CIfA-accredited professionals and registered organisations have agreed to abide by.
We understand that the difference in format may initially cause some confusion, but we do not envisage any issues in terms of their implementation or their use in professional conduct cases. Please be aware that in the event of a professional conduct case it is the Standard and guidance and related documentation that was in use at the time of the alleged Code violation that will be referred to.
Thank you to the PSAP panel and to all who provided feedback and comment during the consultation process earlier this year. The application of these new fieldwork Standards and guidance will be monitored.
Please contact Jen Parker Wooding (jen.parkerwooding@archaeologists.net) if you have any questions or queries.
