On this page
Types of assessment
Where can you be assessed?
Assessor's role
Being assessed
If you know what qualification you’re seeking and you’ve started to match your skills with that qualification, you’ve given yourself a head start in applying formally for skills recognition.
Registered Training Organisations (RTOs) have trained assessors who can assess your skills for courses they are authorised to deliver by their State Training Authority. Some RTOs may require you to enrol in a course before they begin assessing your skills.
You will be more likely to have a good result from the skills recognition process if you feel comfortable with your assessor. You should be able to contact them to ask questions and discuss any difficulties with the process. Before proceeding, ask how much support your assessor can give you.
It’s also important to check how long the RTO will take to assess your application. Different RTOs will have different timeframes but about three weeks is probably a reasonable time to expect a decision after you have lodged your application.
Give yourself plenty of time to prepare your application for lodgement. It may take several days to collect the evidence and prepare your application. It can take even longer if you have to wait for references or third party reports. It’s reasonable to assume it will take you a couple of weeks to prepare.
You should also check in advance about any fees for skills recognition. Some RTOs may charge the usual enrolment fee for the subject or course you are seeking recognition for. Ask what their fee is for assessing skills recognition and what this includes.
Types of assessment
To demonstrate what you know and what you can do, you will need to present evidence. This could include:
- a portfolio with examples of your work, certificates, references and third-party reports
- being observed in a workplace or classroom setting
- an oral test
- a written test
- any combination of these that you and the assessor discuss and agree on.
It might sound scary but remember, you’re doing this because you already know a lot. People who go through this assessment process often feel more confident afterwards.
Remember, the assessor will not ask you to write your portfolios or make your presentations at a higher level than would be expected in the workplace.
If you have any disabilities that need to be considered, let the assessor know. They will take them into account.
Where can you be assessed?
If the assessor needs to talk to you more, they may arrange a meeting with you. Or you might agree to do further assessment online, especially if it is difficult for you to travel or if online work is more relevant to your skills.
If they need you to demonstrate your skills, they may arrange a venue where you can show what you do. This could be in a classroom or in your own workplace. They will discuss this with you.
Assessor’s role
The first step for assessment is that you hand your application to the assessor and they consider it. In some cases, that is also the last step – the assessor can see clearly from your application that you are already competent in the areas you have applied for skill recognition.
Sometimes, the assessor needs more evidence to make their decision. This might be because:
- the evidence you provided, though strong, did not relate clearly to the units you applied for
- you did not give enough evidence of your skills
- the evidence was not current – you need to show not only that you once had these skills but that you still do
- some of the evidence you provided was inconsistent.
The assessor will give you an opportunity to provide more information or demonstrate your skills and will clearly explain what kind of evidence is needed
You may simply need to attend a meeting with the assessor to give them some more information. In some cases, assessors may ask to meet with your employer or someone else who can give evidence of your skills. Or they may ask to watch you on the job or to stage some kind of demonstration of what you do in a classroom.
Another option is to arrange for you to have a written or oral test or to do a work-based project.
Whatever venue is chosen, the assessor’s job is to explain clearly what will happen at that venue, make you feel comfortable and let you know the outcome as soon as possible.
They are also responsible for giving you clear, prompt and constructive feedback on your application.
Finally, they will give you official notification of the assessment result. If you are successful, this means you will be given any of the following:
- a qualification
- a statement of attainment for one or more units but not for the whole qualification
- course entry
- credit exemption.
There are degrees of success in the skills recognition process. You may succeed in proving you have the skills for one or more units of competency, but not for all the ones you applied for. Or you may succeed in proving you were competent at a certain level of competency e.g. Certificate II but not at the level you applied for e.g. Certificate IV. It is worth looking carefully through the National Training Information Service (NTIS) to notice the different skill expectations at each level. They are quite precise.
If you don’t think the decision (or the process for making the decision) is fair you can appeal.
