ALA

Registered training organisations (RTOs) across Australia are helping learners gain a competitive edge in the job market, using e-portfolios to provide real evidence of competency as an alternative to paper-based resumes.

More than ever, learners are using software and web-based tools such as wikis, blogs, podcasts and dedicated tools, like Mahara and the TAFE Virtual Campus e-portfolio tool, to create an e-portfolio to prove they have what it takes to enter the workforce.

These RTOs, which are helping their students develop an e-portfolio, are providing alternative ways for their students to demonstrate that they are adept at the competencies they have achieved.

In Victoria, the Connected Learning in ACE project is helping return-to-work mums studying for the Certificate III in Community Work with Coonara Community House by using a wiki as a platform to develop an e-portfolio – which will assist them to showcase their up-to-date skills to potential employers.

Learners spend half an hour at the end of each full day of class in the computer lab to practise their IT skills, to upload examples of their work onto their wiki e-portfolio, as well as inputting their thoughts about the day’s activities and the course in general.

The students are being exposed to such e-tools as wikis, podcasts, blogs, digital storytelling and online chat to develop their e-portfolio, giving them plenty of practical experience with the technology used in today’s workforce.

This project is also assisting another group of students, mostly working mums, studying for the Diploma of Children’s Services.

These students are already in the workforce and are developing their e-portfolio for recognition of prior learning (RPL) purposes.

They can work completely online or through blended delivery, again using a wiki as their e-portfolio tool. The students are also using a Live Classroom to get together once a week and they create podcasts of processes at their child care centre to share with other learners, which will be incorporated into their e-portfolio.

Coonara Community House is amongst a number of RTOs who are developing competent, qualified workers in Children’s Services.

In the ACT, Canberra Institute of Technology’s Centre for Health, Community and Wellbeing Children’s Services E-learning project is focusing on the unit of competency, Identify and respond to children and young people at risk of harm.

A core part of the Certificate III in Children’s Services, this unit of competency concentrates on equipping workers in Children’s Services with the necessary knowledge and skills to respond to indications of neglect and abuse.

The Centre has been delivering the course face-to-face to year 11 and 12 students at St Clare’s College for a number of years and is moving to put course content online.

As most of the learners have little practical or life experience relating to child protection, they will be able to search for information about child abuse and neglect cases on the web, including government and news sites, as well as popular video sharing sites.

The learners will then be able to apply the information they have researched to scenarios contained within the online course content. This will then be translated into their assessments and added to their e-portfolios as evidence.

The plan is for all Children’s Services courses at CIT, from Certificate III to Diploma, to go online in the future.

These projects are being undertaken with funding from the national training system’s e-learning strategy, the Australian Flexible Learning Framework (Framework).

The Framework’s E-portfolios Business Manager, Allison Miller, said e-portfolios offered learners the ability to promote their skills to potential employers or to help them gain a training position using a range of digital media tools.

“E-portfolios are about the learner learning to manage their own information and customising that information to support the learner’s transition into further training or into employment,” Ms Miller said.

“We need people to understand that learning not only occurs in a formal educational setting. E-portfolios can help people move from adult and community education or the school sector to VET, and from there to higher education, by using examples of their achievements from a range of their learning, workplace and community experiences.”

Other Framework-funded projects with an e-portfolio focus include:

·         Western Australia’s Challenger TAFE’s Sustainabilit-e project is allowing Diploma of Sustainability students to use web conferencing, wikis, blogs and Moodle to populate their e-portfolios.

The Diploma includes the creation of a sustainable business plan with an industry mentor, which will be a key part of their e-portfolio. Rather than displaying their skills and achievements on paper, learners will be able to demonstrate to potential employers how they’ve applied their skills to real-life scenarios, electronically.

• The E-portfolios – the future direction project being led by Kangan Batman TAFE  in Victoria is honing in on Indigenous students through its Indigenous Education Centre, delivering IT courses to learners from the Victorian Aboriginal Child Care Agency.

The courses will incorporate technologies, such as media files, blogs, digital images and word files, as a way of putting assessments, presentations, chats and forums online, which can all be housed in the learner’s e-portfolio.

• In Victoria, Wodonga TAFE’s E-portfolios: recording artefacts of the journey project will enable students, including those studying interior design, building, events management, outdoor recreation and VCAL (Victorian Certificate of Applied Learning), to use Adobe Creative Suite III to create their e-portfolios. At the end of the year, representatives from the various industries will be invited to provide feedback on the use of the e-portfolio tool for gaining employment or entry into further education.

• In Western Australia, Swan TAFE’s E-portfolios for the Trades project marks the first time in WA that e-portfolios are being implemented for trades training with students (all apprentices) using blogs and digital storytelling to collect on-the-job evidence for their e-portfolios.

For more information about these and other projects visit: http://flexiblelearning.net.au/innovations