The Crux of the Matter - Training Queensland - Queensland ...

Case study
Shelley had a string of part-time retail jobs prior to the birth of her son eight years ago. Since then she’s not
had a paying job but has been involved in numerous fund raising projects for her local school and her son’s
junior footy club. She wanted to get a part-time job that fitted with her son’s schooling, and thought that
office work would possibly offer the best means of doing this. As she has not had any experience in this type
of work she was worried that this may prove difficult. She knew there were things she’d have to do and learn
but she didn’t know what they were. She contacted her local training organisation and made an appointment
with Gerard the course advisor.
Gerard looked over her list of past employment and the skills she had gained from her fundraising and
chatted to her about her goals. He said, ’Tell me a bit more about the sausage and pie stall at the football on
Sundays, the way you bought all the food and organised people to be on the stall.’
Shelley began to talk through all the things she’d done: putting together a roster; making a food-purchasing
list; dealing with all of the money; doing the banking; having to speak at the football club AGM. As she
spoke Gerard made notes and asked her more questions. When she had finished he said, ‘Those are all real
skills, Shelley. If we present the evidence you’ve given me today with a bit of extra evidence from the footy
club committee and some others who know your work, I think you would be able to apply for assessment for
recognition of prior learning of a couple of units from our Business Administration course. Being able to add
a qualification like that to your CV will help your chances of getting a job.’
Shelley was delighted that the past eight years had not been wasted time and that the skills she had
developed would now count towards something. She left the centre with a RPL guide feeling ‘back in the
main game’.
Resources
Resources: General VET Skilling
Solutions Queensland has a
number of key RPL resources
available to RTOs
Effective questioning
You should structure your questions carefully in
a competency conversation to gather information
about underpinning knowledge and skills and
particularly, ‘contingency‘ based information.
Remember, it is important that you check the LLN
skills that are really needed to do the work and
not have expectations that are higher than the
competencies themselves.
40 The Crux of the Matter - Language, Literacy and Numeracy and Vocational Education and Training