Visited FOR Consulting today, very interesting tour!
They were delivering the equivalent of SkillsNET training for participants who are seeking work. What was interesting was they structured this 1,700 hour programme in two streams: one for those who have not fully completed their secondary school education (got to Level 7), and a separate stream for those who went to University, which has less modules than the first stream. It means less irrelevant (or foundation level) material to have to sit through.
They also have a good blend of hard and soft skills on the course, from Accounting, Management and Language skills, to Personal Development such as visiting Art Galleries and other cultural experiences which have little to do with the course material but is a great timeout for them.
Their end of module assignments can vary slightly from tests to demonstrations etc, but each module asks the students to describe their learning outcomes for the subject, and crucially how they will apply this to their job!
In other words, it will show value for money as well as employability!
In my view this can easily translate to our own QQI system as part of the modules we deliver, the benefits being those described. How does each instructor know how they themselves are performing as deliverers of training? And how do we know what our students are taking away from our classes?
Unless we make a point of asking them, we won’t!
#erasmus+