Belleayre Ski Patrol 


How to Make High Quality NSP Certificates by Clark Goodrich

This page describes how to make high quality NSP certificates of achievement using Microsoft Word that look like this.



Before printing certificates on your computer you will need to go to Staples and purchase quality paper for printing NSP certificates. NSP Certificates should NEVER be printed on white paper. Staples sells a Fine Parchment Paper from SOUTHWORTH. Try the SOUTHWORTH - Ivory Fine Parchment Paper.


Next you will need to install an Old English Font on your computer. For example this bold underlined text Old English Text MT Font probably does not look like an old English font on your computer. The reason is your computer does not have the old English font installed. Therefore, web pages and word documents using non-standard fonts like Old English will look and print differently on a computer that does not have this font installed. To make your computer display and print Old English fonts correctly, the next thing you need to do is follow the directions below on Old English Text MT Font Download.

Next you will need a sample NSP Certificate of Achievement in a Microsoft Word document like the one shown above. To download this sample word document shown --> right click here . To download the sample education course completion certificate --> right click here .

Now your ready to modify the sample word documents with Microsoft Word as needed for the members on your patrol that have achieved a certain level or have completed an education course. You will also need to change the printing properties to LANDSCAPE mode before printing. To be official a patrol director, instructor, or higher must personally sign the certificate.

Now for the advanced user. Lets say you are an instructor with a class of 15 students and you want to print off 15 certificates with 15 different names. With Microsoft Word it is very easy to do this with a recipient mailing list. To do this display the certificate with Microsoft Word, at the top click on Tools, then Letters and Mailings, and then click on Mail Merge Wizard. Follow the instructions in the Mail Merge Wizard to create a mailing list, which in this case will only contain first and last names. The wizard will also ask you to click or select the merge field <<address block>> location where the names from the list will be substituted. So you would select Charles "Minnie" Dole and then click on "address block' in the Wizard. You can even preview all the certificates with a different name in each certificate. The Mail Merge Wizard makes it very easy.

I decided to add an optional more advanced third sample document that prints an NSP# and uses a recipient mailing list for two patrollers (Charles "Minnie" Dole and Roger F. Langley). If you know your NSP history, Roger is honored with the very first NSP member number 1. I added a new field in the recipient mailing list called NSP# and removed all the other fields except for First Name and Last Name. In the document I created merge fields <<First Name>> <<Last Name>> and <<NSP#>>. The first and last name will be printed in a large font while the NSP# on a new line under the name will be in a much smaller font. This sample requires TWO files. To obtain the sample NSP certificate --> right click here and save file. To obtain the recipient mailing list --> right click here and save file in the same directory. Open the NSP certificate file with WORD, click on Tools, then Letters and Mailings, and then click on Mail Merge Wizard. You can click on edit recipients to see both Charles and Roger listed. Note new recipients may be added here. When you proceed and print you will get two certificates printed for recipients Roger and Charles with their respective NSP# printed under their names.

I hope these instructions will save you time. If you have problems e-mail: goodrich@belleayreskipatrol.org


Old English Text MT Font download

1. Right click on this link --> Old English Text MT Font File
2. Select "Save Link As" from the menu and save the file to your desktop
3. Unzip the zip file using your computer's Unzip application (hopefully you have one); 3 files will be created
4.  For Windows, open your control panel and double click on fonts or locate the fonts directory on your system
5.  Move or install the Oldengl.ttf file from your desktop to the fonts directory (e.g. c:\WINNT\fonts)
6.  Exit and restart your browser; come back to this page to test the font. If this page now display's Old English Text your all set.
7.  Remove the downloaded files from your desktop labeled oldengl.zip, Oldengl.fif, Oldengl.fot and Oldengl.ttf

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Another idea is to take an existing NSP certificate and scan in into a JPEG picture. Then use your favorite photo software to crop only the top half of the certificate JPEG. In your MS Word certificate insert the JPEG picture of the top half of the certificate and the lower half of the certificate that includes the name is all text. The text part you can easily change as needed using MS word. It might look something like this.