A Competency Assessment Supplement (CAS) is an option you can choose to complete if CNO has assessed your nursing education, and it does not meet substantial equivalence to meet the nursing education requirement. CNO will let you know if this option is available to you. It is most often an option for RPN applicants.

You may complete the CAS in English or French.

No. Completing a CAS is one option for meeting the education requirement. Some applicants choose an education pathway instead, and some must complete both. Completing a CAS gives you the opportunity to describe how your education and experiences have met the nursing education requirement and demonstrate that your education meets substantial equivalence.

There is no time limit specifically for writing and submitting your CAS to CNO.

However, we encourage you to submit your CAS as soon as possible so we can determine whether you meet the nursing education requirement.

You have two years from the date CNO notifies you of receiving both your application and your application fee to meet all your requirements to register, including the nursing education requirement. If you don’t meet all the requirements by that date, your application will be closed.

Yes, there is a fee for having your CAS assessed. After you submit your CAS, we will send you payment instructions. You can find the related fees on our Application & Registration Fees page.

Please notify CNO in writing if you do not want to participate in the CAS or take the education pathway. You can either withdraw your application or submit it for review to the Registration Committee.

The Committee may:

• ask you for evidence to show that you meet the education requirement or
• suggest that you reconsider completing the CAS or education pathway

If you disagree with the options offered by the Committee after their review, they may refuse your application.

You can appeal their decision to the Health Professions Appeal and Review.

If you do not meet the requirement or withdraw your application (and you do not successfully appeal the Committee’s decision), your application will be closed two years after you submitted it.

Notify CNO in writing that you want to withdraw your application. CNO will confirm to you through the online portal that your application has been closed.

Review the competencies shared with you by CNO. Look back on your nursing experience and identify a situation in which you demonstrated each competency in your practice.

Here is an example of how an RPN applicant might respond to a report that identifies gaps in her conflict-resolution skills (RPN Entry-to-Practice Competencies numbers 22, 46 and 59):

There are different types of conflict, such as conflict between nurses, nurse and client, nurse and families, and nurses and doctors. Conflict starts when there is a difference of opinion

For example, when I was working in the ICU, a nurse I was working with was always late for her shift. I was working the night shift and wanted to leave after giving my report. When she came to work her shift, she always had an excuse for why she was late. This upset me and I did not feel that she respected me as a colleague. Knowing that I was tired, it was not a good time to resolve the issue because I would have shouted at her.

I asked my teammate if I could meet her for coffee before the next shift and talk about something that was bothering me. She agreed. I knew that I needed to address the behaviour and not yell at the person. I knew that I had to let her know how I feel when this happens. I knew that I needed to listen to her explanation (C. #22).

So, we met for coffee in a quiet place, just the two of us. I told her how I felt when I could not leave my shift on time and how I was scared to go home because I was so tired. I asked her if there was a reason for her lateness. Then I was quiet and let her talk. She told me her story about her daycare problems. Then we came up with a plan that would be good for both of us. We agreed to try it out for two weeks and come back to see if it works (C. #46). At the end of two weeks, we met again. Our plan was working out nicely, and I thought about my approach and how we were both happy with the outcome (C. #59).

That is up to you. If you can talk about one example from your past experience that includes each of the competencies you want to address (as seen above), you can do that.

You can also use a different example for each competency. 

Your CAS submission must not be handwritten.

You can submit it

1. in the Maintain Your Membership applicant portal by going to the “upload a document” section and selecting “Competency Assessment Supplement (CAS)”
2. By mail: College of Nurses of Ontario
   101 Davenport Rd.
   Toronto, ON M5R 3P1
   Attention: Registration – CAS Submission
3. By fax: 416 928-6507
   Attention: Registration – CAS Submission
4. By email: enp@cnomail.org
   Attention: Registration – CAS Submission

If you send your CAS by fax or email, be sure to write “Attention: Registration – CAS Submission” in the subject line, to avoid delays.

Yes, but you must provide examples from your own nursing experience. You can support those examples with information from the internet, but you must give credit to the original author by identifying who wrote the content and where you found it (for instance, list the person’s name and website address). This applies to information from internet sources, books, magazines, conference materials and research papers.

If you do not give credit to the source of information, you are committing plagiarism, which could seriously affect the status of your application.

Plagiarism is the act of presenting someone else’s words or ideas as your own without giving them proper credit. According to plagiarism.org, it happens when you:

• turn in someone else’s work as your own
• copy words or ideas from someone else without giving credit
• fail to put quotation marks around a quotation
• give incorrect information about the source of a quotation
• paraphrase a passage by changing words but copying the sentence structure without giving credit
• copy so many words or ideas from a source that it makes up the majority of your work, regardless of whether you give credit

CNO considers plagiarism to be a serious matter. It can have serious consequences for your registration and future career.

Your CAS submission should be mainly your own writing about your experience and not rely too much on other sources. Make sure you write in your own words and do not paraphrase or use quotations from any other source without indicating the author and the source.

Before you prepare your CAS, familiarize yourself with what plagiarizing means. According to the Collins dictionary:

 “Plagiarism is the practice of using or copying someone else’s idea or work and pretending that you thought of it or created it.”

CNO does not require a specific format for citations in your CAS, as long as it is clear which parts of your writing are borrowed from other sources. (Search “essay citation examples” online for examples of how to do this.)

CNO checks every CAS submission for plagiarism by submitting the CAS to an online plagiarism detection service called Turnitin.

Turnitin compares your CAS with texts from a variety of other sources. It also keeps a copy of your CAS in its database to detect plagiarism in future submissions. CNO follows Turnitin’s Terms of Use agreement.

If CNO finds plagiarism in your CAS, it will stop the assessment and send your application to the Registration Committee for review. There, you will be offered a chance to explain what happened.

The Registration Committee may respond with different possible outcomes:

• The Committee could invite you to rewrite your CAS with proper citations.
• The Committee could refuse your request for registration on the basis that you have not demonstrated you would practice nursing with decency, honesty and integrity.

If you are offered another opportunity to rewrite your CAS, it is very important to ensure there is no plagiarism.

Notify CNO in writing (by mail, email or fax) that you do not want to submit your CAS to Turnitin.

If you choose not to allow CNO to submit your CAS to Turnitin:

• CNO will not review your CAS and we will be unable to determine whether you meet the nursing education requirement

and

• the Registration Committee will review your application.

You are not allowed to use artificial intelligence (AI) tools, such as chatbots, to generate or help you to write your CAS. The CAS must be your own writing in your own words.

If CNO detects the use of AI in your CAS, we may take it into consideration when we review whether you meet the character and conduct requirements for registration with CNO.