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Is recognition for you?
The old-fashioned way of studying is to take a course and study from beginning to end, regardless of whether you already know part of the material in the course. Skills Recognition shortens that process by acknowledging the skills you already have. So, if you have experience in the area your course covers, you are a likely candidate for skills recognition.
You may have worked in the area you want to study. If so, it doesn’t matter whether you were paid or you were a volunteer, whether it was here or overseas. The skills may still be relevant. You may have done other studies that include some of the same subjects, here or overseas. Even some of your hobbies and interests might include relevant skills. For instance, you might have been a sports coach or worked on the school tuckshop.
To be recognised, you only need to prove you are already competent in that study area. If you have just left school and you did not do part-time work or have many interests, you may not be a candidate for skills recognition. If you are a mature age student with a wide range of successful work and study experiences, you are probably a very strong candidate.
To decide whether you are competent in something, start by asking yourself these kinds of questions:
- What tasks have I done at work or in community activities?
- How recently did I do them and would I still remember how?
- What training have I done that might be relevant, including informal on-the-job training?
- How can I prove I can do these things?
Skills recognition is not for everyone. Some people love to learn and don’t mind refreshing existing skills. But if you don’t want to revise your skills, because you have difficulty getting to classes or just don’t have the time, fast-tracking through skills recognition is worthwhile for you.
Your role in the recognition process
In traditional training, the trainer teaches and you have to learn what they give you and pass assessments on that material. With skills recognition, the responsibility is on you to find out what competencies are required and prove whether you have them. The teacher assesses you and can then teach only what you need to fill in the gaps in your skills and knowledge.
Although skills recognition saves you a lot of study time, you need to put a fair amount of work into your application. For instance, Peter, a public servant, applied for skills recognition for a Certificate IV in Business. He was able to prove he was already fully competent by producing references, examples of his work and other documentation. ‘It saved me months of study but it took me several days to gather all the material and present it to my assessor,’ he said. ‘I had to think pretty hard about what skills I had and how they related to the Cert IV.’
