DSP training in Minnesota is governed by the Department of Human Services (DHS) Disability Services Division under the 245D home and community-based services licensing statute (Minn. Stat. Chapter 245D), which covers providers serving people on the DD, CADI, BI, and CAC waivers. Minnesota's approach is distinctive: the statute itself is the curriculum outline, and the license holder — not the state — decides how to deliver it.

Initial requirements sit in Minn. Stat. § 245D.09. Subdivision 4 requires staff orientation within 60 days of hire covering eleven statutory topics, including data privacy, service recipient rights, reporting of maltreatment of vulnerable adults and minors (per § 245A.65, with reports due within 72 hours), person-centered planning and service delivery, emergency use of manual restraints and prohibited procedures, first aid, and sexual violence prevention. Maltreatment reporting must then be reviewed annually.

Subdivision 4a adds the competency layer that surveyors focus on: before working unsupervised with a person served, staff must demonstrate person-specific competency in that individual's support needs — ADLs, the person's support plan and outcomes, medication setup and administration where assigned, and use of equipment. For life-sustaining equipment, training must come from a licensed health professional with an observed skills assessment. Subdivision 5 then requires annual retraining on the orientation topics. Minnesota sets no hour floor anywhere in this chain — the license holder is responsible for documenting that training was sufficient, and DHS licensing reviews test that documentation.

Medication administration follows the same competency-based logic with a professional gate: instruction must be provided by a registered nurse, nurse practitioner, physician assistant, or physician before unlicensed staff administer medications, tied to the person-specific competency demonstration in subdivision 4a.

Delivery is fully open. Minnesota names no curriculum, no platform, and no approved-vendor list. The best-known option — the DirectCourse/College of Direct Support catalog, whose Minnesota crosswalk to 245D was produced with the University of Minnesota's Institute on Community Integration and reviewed by DHS licensing — is recommended, not mandated. Any provider may self-select training and prove clause-by-clause topic coverage at licensing review; the ICI/DHS crosswalk simply demonstrates the format reviewers like to see.

Training and eTracking Solutions provides online DSP training mapped clause-by-clause to Minn. Stat. § 245D.09 — orientation courses covering the subdivision 4 topics, annual retraining aligned to subdivision 5, and documentation formatted the way DHS licensing reviewers expect to see it. Our platform tracks each employee's 60-day orientation window, annual retraining cycle, and the person-specific competency demonstrations and nurse-delivered medication instruction your agency completes on site, so the full 245D record is one export away at licensing review.