The National Federation of Paralegal Associations
The National Federation of Paralegal Associations (NFPA) and online schools aimed at educating non-paralegals so that they can eventually become true professional paralegals work hand-in-hand with each other. These days, many people are considering a career change for a number of reasons. Maybe they found themselves stuck in a rut in their old career or maybe they found that their old career — in the face of new technology and changes in what they did in those jobs — is going the way of the dodo bird. For whatever reason, the legal professions — including the paralegal profession — are attracting large numbers of people, which means that a strong national paralegal oversight body is needed if only to keep an eye on the absolute boom in programs occurring all across the nation.
A quality online school aimed at paralegal education always seeks out not only accreditation but a strong oversight body that will help it develop curricula and student training programs. The NFPA has as one of its core missions ensuring that any online school offering paralegal education be sufficiently competent at doing so.
This means that it stands strongly against the “shortcut programs” that promise a sound paralegal education with only several short classes, relatively speaking. The NFPA recognizes that a paralegal is an attorney’s closest assistant in many cases and that the work a paralegal does for the attorney can be far more complicated than just a brief summer session spent learning what is basically a highlight of much deeper and more rigorous legal concepts and procedures.
Why the NFPA Means Better Paralegal Online School Programs
Here’s what the NFPA stands for:
- NFPA is committed to honesty and integrity across the profession, including in the educational instruction that an online school is promising
- NFPA works hard to encourage online schools to accept the paralegal profession’s recognized Code of Ethics
- NFPA provides instruction to the online school extending paralegal education such that a love of lifelong learning is instilled into as many students as possible for the benefit of not only the student but also the profession
NFPA maintains a strong position advocating for a thorough online school education when it comes to the student. The NFPA has been active in the area of online school education that is truncated or shortened by certain unaccredited and non-certified online schools that are promising a full paralegal education in an unrealistically-short amount of time.
The NFPA website has a very comprehensive position paper dedicated to the issue of the online school that fails to deliver a recognized strong paralegal education. Additionally, NFPA works with not only the American Bar Association but several different recognized accrediting associations for the online school to ensure that those considering entering a school know exactly what they should be looking for.
The NFPA is a very strong advocate for a quality online school that delivers a quality education to its students — the kind of paralegal training and instruction he or she deserves through an online school. Anybody considering entering the profession would be well advised to research what the NFPA stands for and how it is working to grow and strengthen the paralegal profession across the board. Nowadays, more paralegals than ever are needed and the students that intend to enter the profession via training through an online school are helped greatly by the attention that the NFPA pays when it comes to an education delivered in an online environment.
