I started home schooling our youngest two (of 7) kids when they were in years 2 and 10 so I spent a good deal of time that first year (2015) researching ideas to round out our year 10 daughters education/experience/resume and plan for her upper school years. Here is some of what I found.
As all high schools now have to provide certificate courses for non ATAR kids, more options have become available as government and industry seek to provide training for kids in that age bracket which of course home school families can also access.
There are dozens of courses available for the fee cap price of $410 – even though some courses are worth up to $11,000 (it’s across the whole year even if they do more than one course) for kids Year 11/12 AGE.
You can search various courses to see which providers are offering them at the cap price. It is only available for ‘compulsory school aged’ students in the year 11/12 age bracket.
The website is a bit tricky to navigate so I wrote up some instructions to hopefully help!!
It was through this resource that our year 10 was able to complete a Cert III in Childcare in year 11, and two Certificates IV in year 12 (Community Services and Ed Support) – with whhich she was able to gain entrance to commence a Bachelor Degree.
https://stars.dtwd.wa.gov.au/cpl
Instructions to navigate:
- Open the link above.
- For RTO courses at TAFES or private colleges, click on “Select” beside: Priority Industry Qualifications (PIQ)
- If you know a desired course number/code, click the small arrow beside “Qualification ID” to fill that box.
- If not – doesn’t matter. Click the small arrow beside “Qualification” where they are all listed (with their codes) Click on one that you want information regarding.c) If you know a specific TAFE/Private college/RTO that you want to go through click on the small arrow beside “Training Provider” and click the one you want.
- If not, it still doesn’t matter. You then can choose to have listed “ALL” or “PRIVATE” or “STATE” training providers. The private providers charge the same as the State/TAFES under this scheme and are most often smaller classes and nicer environments.
- You can then click a region if you want to, or leave it blank to see what is available in all areas.
- Then click “Run report” – it will open in a SEPARATE window and can take a few moments to load!THIS is where you can then see which provider runs the course you want at the fee cap price. Other providers will be running the same courses but NOT ALL other providers will have it for this cost. However there’s nothing to stop you asking them! The report will list if a course is available online which then enables the student to study a qualification from home.From here the leg-work is up to you 🙂 to then Google or phone the provider listed and check the course details/requirements etc.
- Then if you want to find info on another course – go back to point 2 and start again!
It does take a while to wrap your head around – but it can save you thousands of dollars!
Building a strong resume for teens can be tricky but there are lots of ways you can add experience and learning even before they get any workplace experience. The remainder of this note covers resources that can help.
Here are some links for free online courses. They are provided by amazing Universities (including Stanford, Harvard etc). Some have certificates which, while they might not be a qualification, do show learning/interest/participation – and are great for resume building.
We have used courses from the first 4. The others I have looked at but not used. (Clicking the bold text should take you to the site mentioned)
- ALISON
- COURSERA
- CRAFTSY (not free but very reasonably priced – our yr 10 daughter did a course “Colour Theory for Artists and Designers” here)
- OPEN 2 STUDY
- KHAN
- This link lists FIFTY OTHER places to do free courses. It is overwhelming so save it till last!!
Links for other low priced courses:
- UDEMY
- GROUPON – go to main site and search ‘education’ or ‘courses’ g
- SCOOPON – go to main site and search ‘education’ or ‘courses’
(It was Groupon and Scoopon that we used for the courses Caitlin did in year 10 – Photography, Makeup Artistry, Interior Decorating, Childhood Nutrition, and basic Childcare)
MONARCH
A pretty comprehensive range of courses – reasonable price – only looked at them today for the first time. Looks good.
You can purchase individual subject units – or pay a monthly price for 5 learning areas. They also have some career prep courses (under electives) that I’ve not seen similar to elsewhere.
www.aop.com/curriculum/shop-monarch
(And here is a link to a 30 day free trial of Monarch courses www.aop.com/discover-monarch?code=MON30HSBC )
Also in case it’s useful – there is a certificate II and III – “Certificate in General Education for Adults” that can be done through TAFE. Certificate 2 is equivalent to a year 10 level and Certificate 3 is equivalent to a year 11 level. These courses are not covered by any fee help and the Certificate 3 costs $161.20.
www.polytechnic.wa.edu.au/content/certificate-ii-general-education-adults
This link is to a free government provider of the General Education courses – start at any time – work at own pace.
Appears to be delivered onsite (for those local there is a Centacare in Midland)
www.centacarewa.com.au/courses/education-and-employment-see
