How does your registered training organisation treat RPL? Do you embrace it or discourage it? Do you openly recommend it to students, or do push it under the rug and hope no one will ask about it? Do you even offer it?
Hopefully, you at least offer recognition of prior learning. Under the 2015 Standards for Registered Training Organisations, every RTO operating in Australia is required to offer RPL to students. This requirement is stipulated by the Australian Skills Quality Authority. In other words, if you want to remain above board and continue operating your RTO legally, you need to add RPL to your business offerings. An RPL assessment management system might help you with the adoption process.
RPL Assess: The RPL Assessment Management Software You Need
Perhaps you have been trying to ignore RPL for years and need to correct that fact now. Alternatively, maybe you have realised that there’s a real market out there for quality RPL offerings and are doing what you can to improve the RPL services at your RTO. Either way, RPL Assess can make life easier for your students and your assessors alike.
It stands to reason that most RTOs don’t focus on RPL. After all, RTO stands for ‘registered training organisation.’ You probably want to promote your training and learning opportunities, rather than emphasising the assessment-only process that is recognition of prior learning.
However, the fact is that RPL is an integral part of the skill learning, assessing, and recognition process. Every day, people learn skills and competencies outside of formal educational or training environments. Some individuals teach themselves essential skills, while others learn essential competencies in the workplace. It doesn’t make sense for these people to sit through training courses that cover material they already know. On the contrary, most people who have existing skills they want to be recognised are not willing to undertake inessential training. By failing to offer proper RPL services, therefore, your RTO could be missing out on a substantial chunk of business.
While RPL can be a reliable revenue source, though, that doesn’t mean it is an easy one. The ASQA requires RTOs to ‘develop and implement strategies for training and assessment that consider the characteristics, skill, and experiences of each learner.’ Since RPL can vary from case to case—depending on the industry, competency, the skills of the learner, and how the learner gained their competencies—it can be a complicated service for RTOs to provide.
Embracing RPL Assess as your RPL assessment management system, your RTO can clear these hurdles with aplomb. With 11,000 units spanning 35 training packages and more than 50 industry sectors, RPL Assess has the tools you need to assess a wide range of competencies. By allowing you to upload RPL evidence into the system and assign weights or scores to everything, it also lets you determine learning in the way that you prefer. When finished, it’s easy to store your assessments for auditing.
Compete with Other RTOs by Expanding Your RPL Offerings
Don’t fall into non-compliance with the ASQA. Don’t leave potential revenues on the table because you aren’t telling learners about RPL. Instead, embrace recognition of prior learning and expand the number of students you can serve. Using RPL Assess as your RPL assessment management software will make the entire process easy and painless—both for your assessors and your learners.