Employability Skills and Foundation Skills
The Commonwealth Government's National Foundation Skills Strategy for Adults Consultation Paper defines 'foundation skills' as:
'Language, literacy, numeracy and employability skills in the information age'.
Below is an excerpt from the Consultation Paper, providing more details on each of these components.
Language - the ability to understand and speak the English language, which allows everyday communication with others, and allows individuals to fully participate in the broader community and the workplace.
Literacy - the ability to read and write: for example, the ability to understand public notices and signs in everyday contexts, use the internet, email and newspapers, and to write instructions for work colleagues.
Numeracy - the ability to use mathematics in everyday situations, such as the ability to calculate future household costs and to manage a household budget.
Employability Skills - skills required not only to gain employment, but also to progress in the workplace, achieve one's potential and contribute successfully to the goals and activities of the organisation:
- communication skills that contribute to productive and harmonious relations between employees and customers
- teamwork skills that contribute to productive working relationships and outcomes
- problem solving skills that contribute to productive outcomes
- initiative and enterprise skills that contribute to innovative outcomes
- planning and organising skills that contribute to long-term and short-term strategic planning
- self-management skills that contribute to employee satisfaction and growth
- learning skills that contribute to ongoing improvement and expansion in employee and company operations and outcomes
- technology skills that contribute to effective execution of tasks.
Foundation skills in the information age - the increasing use of computers and the internet in the workplace and in society at large suggests that, to reflect the real contexts in which modern communication and work occurs, skills such as reading, writing and problem solving should be learned in an information technology-rich environment.
We will talk more about Foundations Skills and their incorporation into the Australian Core Skills Framework in Section 4 under 'Language, literacy and numeracy'.
Accredited courses
Accredited courses are privately developed courses that sit outside the Training Package system. They are only approved for accreditation if the developer can demonstrate to the regulator that they meet the quality standards required, and address training needs that are not already covered under existing Training Package qualifications.
Once approved, an accredited course has the same level of 'national recognition' as a unit of competency. The period of approval is generally a maximum of three years.
For more information on accredited courses, and the process involved in submitting a course for approval, go to the 'Standards for VET accredited courses' page on the ASQA website.