Recognition of Prior Learning (RPL)

 

If you already have the required skills and knowledge of a particular unit and can demonstrate this to us with satisfactory evidence, we can make an assessment of your competency based on this evidence. So in other words, instead of doing the coursework and the assessment tasks, you can gain some or all of the 12 units of the 10773NAT Certificate lV in TESOL by submitting evidence such as:

• certificates showing successful completion of training,

• references from employers and colleagues,

• documents or other material you have created and used at work

• video or audio recordings of you demonstrating these required skills and knowledge

 

As long as the evidence is valid, meets the requirements of the unit, and can be verified as true, it can be used to demonstrate your competence in this unit so you can be assessed as such. Please download the RPL kit on this page. The RPL kit has been compiled to help you to:

• choose which units you will apply for RPL in, and

• gather and submit evidence of sufficient quality for each unit.

 

In order to be awarded the full qualification you will need to be assessed as competent in all of the 12 units. If only some units can be awarded through RPL, you will need to do regular coursework and assessment tasks for the remaining ones. This is called gap training.

 

So that is how it works. In summary, RPL is a form of assessment that acknowledges skills and knowledge gained through:

 

• formal training conducted by industry or industry-related organisations

• formal education in institutions like TAFE or university

• training you’ve undertaken out of interest, such as online courses without accredited certificates

• work experience, including volunteering

• life experience

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You will need to submit your work with the RPL kit. The kit provides a systematic and orderly arrangement of your RPL application and the evidence you are supplying. It will be used by us also to demonstrate (to the industry regulator, the Australian Skills Quality Authority) that we have had a reasonable basis in awarding you competency in each of the units we do so.

 

That is it in a nutshell. Below is a little more detail which you can also find in the RPL kit. 

 

RPL:  Questions and answers

 

How much RPL can I apply for?

• You can claim RPL for as many units as you can provide evidence for. If you submit appropriate and sufficient evidence for all of the units, and our assessor considers that the evidence meets the requirements, then RPL can be granted for the full 10773NAT Certificate IV in TESOL.

• If you are not able to receive full RPL because some areas are not sufficiently addressed you will be advised of what ‘gap’ training and assessment is needed in order for you to receive the full 10429 Certificate IV in TESOL.

• If we grant you RPL for some units, we will advise you to complete the course (do the assessment tasks for the other units) without the need to do those units we’ve granted you RPL in.

 

How long will the RPL process take?

Generally, this depends on how long it takes you to gather and submit the evidence, and how easy it is for our assessor to confirm that your evidence meets the units’ requirements. The more thoroughly you complete the relevant sections of this RPL kit, and the more clearly you link the evidence to the relevant units, the faster the assessment process will be.

 

What evidence will I need?

We need evidence that clearly demonstrates your competence. This could be: 

• Past Studies

  • copies of qualifications you have received and academic transcripts showing exact subjects or topics and results

  • actual work you completed for past studies (e.g. essays or assignments)

 

• Workplace Documents produced by you (in paid or voluntary work)

  • lesson plans or training plans we have created or adapted for work as a teacher

  • training programs or other records of training you’ve received

  • (this is also commonly called ‘professional development’)

  • learning materials you’ve created or adapted for use at work

  • assessment tools you’ve created or adapted for use at work

  • assessment reports/ grades you’ve written

 

• Audio/Video Recordings

  •  e.g. of you teaching or assessing

 

• Third Party Reports

  • references from your employers

  • supervisor reports

  • student testimonials

  • peer/colleague testimonials

  • supervisor/ peer observation feedback

 

• Any Other Evidence

  • documents from workshops, seminars and conferences

  • academic papers or reports you’ve written

 

The RPL kit will give you suggestions of what can be submitted for each unit. 

 

RPL can only be given to a person where they have provided evidence that is:

• Valid – the evidence represents and matches the unit’s requirements

• Sufficient – the evidence is enough to show that you are competent in all of the requirements of the unit

• Authentic – it can be verified that the evidence you have submitted is genuinely your own work, qualifications, experience, etc.

• Current – the evidence shows your current ability and how it meets current industry standards

 

 

How much does RPL cost or save?

Receiving RPL in some or all units means that you can receive your Certificate IV in TESOL at a discount to the cost of our full 4 week face-to-face course, because you don’t need to attend all, or sometimes any, face-to-face sessions. Most of the time we will not know exactly how much discount to apply until we see your application and have given it an initial review.

 

We can give you an estimate of your discount if you send us an RPL enquiry email, stating clearly your experience and education to date, and which units you’d like to be assessed via RPL. Just send the email to info@australianenglishcentre.com. Your email should include your current resume and contain any other information which you think is relevant. Shortly after, we may contact you to arrange a time and method (phone, skype/ facetime, face-to-face) to discuss your prior learning, which will help us to determine the estimated price that you will pay to be assessed via RPL.

 

The estimate we provide to you will be based on the information that you provide to us. Generally the estimate will be accurate, but if the understanding we gained from you in this process turns out to be different from that you then provide in your RPL evidence, we may need to make an adjustment to the discount applied. This is rare when students have submitted accurate and reliable initial evidence.  

 

When you apply for RPL and choose to do any any gap training via our fully online course, the standard online course fee applies. In other words, there is no discount from the already discounted online course fee.

 

So, in summary, when you apply for RPL for some or all units of the course, your course fee will be the standard online course fee, or somewhere between it and the full 4 week face-to-face course fee, depending on how many units of RPL you can be granted. You can see our course fees on our website or on our promotional material.

 

To be assessed via RPL you must first enrol in the course.

You can enrol online through our website. You will either pay the online course fee or pay the estimate we have provided you (which was a discount to the face-to-face course fee). You will also need to provide evidence that you meet the English language proficiency requirements of enrolling in the course. These requirements are specified on our Enrolment Form.

 

After you enrol and pay, we will send you an email with access to our online Learning Management System to access our course materials. This course content will help you by:

• giving you a good understanding of the course content (theory/ research/ knowledge) which will help you to gather suitable evidence for your RPL submission

• help you understand the requirments of the course, helping you to demonstrate your competency with your assessor (in written work, in the phone or video interviews)

• giving you your content and assessment tasks for your gap training assessment (which were the units you did not receive RPL for.

 

What is the process for obtaining my certificate via RPL?

1. Contact us if you want to do the course partially or fully face-to-face and want to enquire about the discount for RPL. We’ll give you an estimate of the discount you’ll receive and an initial idea of what units you can be granted RPL in. You’ll complete the rest of the course like a regular course participant. If you want to enrol in the online course, you don’t need to contact us for this discount as the online course has the same cost when some or all units are assessed via RPL.

2. Enrol in the course by completing our enrolment form. In the form you will choose your delivery method (either via face-to-face, blended or online only) and nominate which units you’d like to be assessed in via RPL.

3. We’ll contact you to arrange a phone, Skype or FaceTime interview which will take around 15 minutes where we will discuss your experience with you and advise you on units you appear to be eligible to apply for RPL in, and what evidence you will need to supply. This evidence will be based on that suggested for each unit in the RPL kit (pages 10-21 of this kit)

4. Gather your evidence for RPL. Send it to us with the completed forms in this RPL kit, making sure you clearly link the evidence with each of the units by filling in the forms clearly and thoroughly.,

5. One of our assessors will conduct an initial assessment of your submission.

6. We will give you feedback about your submission. We may ask you to provide more evidence. We’ll request this by email. If this is the case, you will send us further evidence. In some cases we may also invite you to participate (face-to-face, over the phone or via Skype/ Facetime) in a ‘competency conversation’ in which we will ask you questions about your skills and knowledge, experience. Your answers to these questions can provide evidence that you do have the knowledge and skills necessary for RPL to be granted.

7. We will send you an email to confirm what units you can be granted RPL in and what units you will need to complete gap training in. You will need to complete and submit the assessment tasks for these gap training units, just like regular students do. We’ll assess your competency in these units based on your submitted tasks.

8. When we assess you as competent in all of the units, either by RPL or by regular assessment, we’ll send you your Australian Government accredited 10773 Certificate IV in TESOL.