The NECPA Commission is pleased to announce that we have partnered with BadgeCert to offer you and your program a cutting-edge way to share your NECPA Accreditation Award through Digital Badges and Certificates.

Digital Badges are web-enabled representations of your NECPA Accreditation Award. Your programs digital badge is made of an image and metadata uniquely linked to your program. This ensures that only your program can take credit for the achievement.

You can share your program’s digital badge to popular online social media and professional platforms, such as LinkedIn, Facebook, and Twitter. It can also be embedded in your programs website, or your company’s email signature. Anyone who views your program’s badge can select it to learn more about your NECPA Accreditation Award and to verify its authenticity.

NECPA created a custom badge icon to reflect your accreditation award. 

When you receive your NECPA Award or renew your award term, you will receive an email (to your program’s email on file) from the NECPA office with an Award URL link. This link can be embedded into your organization’s email signature, LinkedIn, Twitter, and Facebook. The digital badge contains information about your NECPA Award, including your program’s address, unique NECPA site number, and award effective and expiration dates. The badge also contains your program’s Accreditation certificate in PDF for immediate download. You will need to login with BadgeCert to access this PDF. This step it completely optional but does allow you to access additional features. 

The email will include a unique link to access your program’s digital badge where you can claim, view, print, and share your program’s digital NECPA badge.

It will also include custom login information and a temporary password to access BadgeCert features including your program’s digital NECPA certificate. Logging in is optional but helps you in easily sharing your program’s badge and downloading your program’s certificate. 

The email will also include instruction on sharing your digital badge on social media and your website, as well as how to imbed the badge in your email signature. You can also download a guide here. 

When you click on your unique link in the award email you will be able to see your program’s digital badge and information on how to share the information about your program’s NECPA Accreditation Award. 

Please see if the email is in your spam folder. Please make [email protected] a friendly sender e-mail. If you are using an organizational e-mail you may have to work with your IT department or email administrator to enable this. This step is often called whitelisting an email. 

We are happy to resend the award email, please contact our team at 855-706-3272. 

If you’re unable to activate your program’s badge right away, reminder emails will be sent to you after:

• 30 days
• 60 days
• 120 days

Login using the custom username and temporary password in your award email. As soon as you login you will be prompted to update your password. Once you are logged in to your ‘My Badge Portfolio’ page, you can open the badge and select either the badge or the PDF certificate to print. 

Your program will be issued a hard copy of your NECPA Award Certificate via USPS mail. This certificate will have the NECPA Embossed Gold Seal and be included as part of a larger award packet. You can display this certificate proudly, framed on your program’s lobby wall or welcome area where families and staff members can view and appreciate your program’s quality! 

Additional hard copies featuring the NECPA Seal are available online for purchase. In addition to extra copies of your program’s certificate, NECPA offers a variety of materials to advertise and promote your program’s new status. This also includes Teacher Appreciation Packages and Open House Marketing Packages. 

For additional purchase methods, please contact the NECPA Office. Call 855-706-3272 or email [email protected]

Yes! You will receive renewal reminder emails from [email protected] at twelve months, eight months and 6 months prior to your award expiration. These will include steps on how to re-enroll and request your renewal visit. You can also watch our video on Re-Enrolling here.

For additional ease of renewal , please find our online forms here.

In addition, once you set up your badge, there will be automatic email reminders when your badge is nearing your award expiration date. These emails will be sent:

• 30 days before expiration
• 7 days before expiration
• 1 day before expiration

Badges will only be issued to actively accredited programs. If the accreditation term should lapse, the NECPA Award badge will appear with “Expired” across the front, pictured below. 

If your program’s award should be at risk to lapse, please contact the NECPA Office immediately at 855-706-3272 or by email at [email protected]. 

In order to update your program’s name, please complete the required Self Report Form and submit any needed accompanying documentation. This can be completed online or submitted via email for processing. Once approved, we will update your program’s name in our accreditation database and on BadgeCert. 

To update your program’s email address, please contact the NECPA Office at 855-706-3272 or by email at [email protected] and we will update your program’s account.

To add your program’s digital badge to your organization’s website, save the image of your badge from the badge issuance email, insert the image onto your desired site page then right click the picture and select ‘add hyperlink’. Add the URL address of the badge as the hyperlink. The badge URL is the bcert.com URL, also located in your award email. Additionally, you can login and locate the badge image and link in your BadgeCert portfolio.

Linking your Award Badge image on your website to your custom badge page will enable interested parties, such as families, to learn more about your highly valued award and what being NECPA Accredited means to the children in your care. 

Detailed information can be found in the BadgeCert User Guides. Please access them below: 

Managing Badges In The Portfolio

Manually Sharing Badges

Add your digital badge portfolio to your email signature using your custom Award Badge’s URL link. The link is obtained in your digital badge issuance email, by sending the sharing email to yourself, or on your badge profile itself. This URL looks like http://bcert.me/YourBadge.

Please use the guides below for detailed information on adding an image and link to your Outlook or Gmail signature.

Simple Guide for Outlook: https://support.microsoft.com/en-gb/office/change-an-email-signature-86597769-e4df-4320-b219-39d6e1a9e87b

Step by Step Guide for Outlook: https://support.microsoft.com/en-us/office/create-and-add-a-signature-to-messages-8ee5d4f4-68fd-464a-a1c1-0e1c80bb27f2

Guides for Gmail:  https://support.google.com/mail/answer/8395?hl=en-GB&co=GENIE.Platform%3DDesktop

Easily display your program’s award badge on Facebook, Twitter and LinkedIn by logging into your BadgeCert profile and using the social share buttons.

For more detailed information on sharing to your social media pages, please download the User Guides below. 

Managing Badges In The Portfolio

Manually Sharing Badges