Hours are assigned to one of two categories: Skills or General.
Members are required to take 20 hours every two years, and 10 of these must be Skills hours.
Skills hours teach either a hands-on skill or assessment skills.
General hours are everything else; for instance, business, behavior, skills that are out of scope for a massage or acupressure practitioner but are useful to know about for referral purposes.
In interpreting whether lecture should be considered Skills or General, consider whether the material is essential to perform the skill well. For instance, in a nerve gliding course, a background review lecture on the nervous system as a whole would be General. A lecture teaching the path of the sciatic nerve would be Skills because that is necessary to know in order to work with that nerve.
A reasonable amount of homework time may be counted. For reading time, count the time an average person would take to read the material (10,000 words per hour or 166 words per minute).
Online courses may only count as Skills if the skills are assessed by an instructor; we suggest by case study or video review. Otherwise, they will be General.
A course may have hours of both types; for instance, a 10 hour course with 7 Skills and 3 General hours.