In a California skilled nursing facility, the Director of Staff Development is the licensed nurse responsible for the facility's training program — orientation, in-service education, and, in many buildings, the nurse assistant certification program itself. The role is not optional: Health & Safety Code § 1337.4 requires every skilled nursing and intermediate care facility to designate a licensed nurse as its Director of Staff Development.

Becoming one is a defined sequence, not a single exam. Here is the whole path, in order.

Step 1 — Hold an active California nursing licence

You must be a licensed nurse in good standing. Both licensed vocational nurses (LVNs) and registered nurses (RNs) qualify; the deciding factor is the experience behind the licence, not the licence type itself. If your licence is inactive or lapsed, restore it before you go further, because every later step assumes it.

Step 2 — Meet the experience requirement

This is where most candidates find out which of two routes they are on. 22 CCR § 71829(d) offers two alternative pathways — you need one, not both:

  • Pathway (d)(1): one year as a licensed nurse providing direct patient care in a long-term care facility, and one year planning, implementing and evaluating educational programs in nursing.
  • Pathway (d)(2): two years of full-time experience as a licensed nurse, at least one of them in direct patient care in a nursing facility, and the education in Step 3 below.
A newer statute sits over the top of the 1992 regulation. Health & Safety Code § 1337.15 (AB 2850, effective 1 January 2019) requires an instructor in a certified nurse assistant training program to have no less than two years of nursing experience, at least one year of it caring for the chronically ill or elderly. If you plan to teach the certification program, plan against two years. Our full reading of § 71829 covers both pathways and the statutory overlay in detail.

Step 3 — Complete the required education

Pathway (d)(2) requires 24 hours of continuing education in planning, implementing and evaluating educational programs in nursing, completed within six months of employment and before teaching a certification program. This is the step a DSD course exists to satisfy: it is the piece you can complete on your own initiative, in advance, rather than waiting on a facility.

A course that maps to the role covers adult-learning principles, curriculum and lesson-plan development, competency evaluation, documentation, and the California and federal in-service rules a DSD works under every day. That is exactly what this course's curriculum is built around.

Step 4 — Submit the CDPH application

Approval is granted by the Department, not by your employer. The form is CDPH 279 (rev. 11/2022), Instructor or Director of Staff Development (DSD) Application, sent to CDPH's Training Program Review Unit. A program delivered online or by distance learning uses CDPH E279 and goes to the eLearning Review Unit instead. Sending the right form to the right unit is a common, avoidable cause of delay.

Step 5 — Wait out the Department's review clocks

Section 71829 sets the timeline you should plan around:

  • The Department replies within thirty calendar days as to whether your submission is complete or deficient.
  • A final decision follows within sixty calendar days.
  • Your facility must notify the Department within thirty calendar days of employing a new Director of Staff Development or Instructor, and keep a copy of your resume on file.

Step 6 — Know the hours the role carries

Once approved, the hours you owe depend on the facility's licensed bed count and whether it runs a certification program — from 20 to 40 hours a week, or 26 to 93 hours a month. The two columns use different units, which is the single easiest thing to get wrong; the bed-count table lays them out.

The short version

  1. Hold an active LVN/LPN or RN licence.
  2. Meet one of the two § 71829(d) experience pathways.
  3. Complete the 24 hours of education (pathway (d)(2)).
  4. Submit CDPH 279 — or E279 for online programs — to the right unit.
  5. Clear the Department's 30- and 60-day review.
  6. Take up the role at the hours your facility's bed count requires.

The one step you can act on today, before any facility is involved, is the education. That is the part this course takes off your plate — 24 contact hours, self-paced, ending in a verifiable certificate.