Employers can have their staff trained in Microsoft, Cisco
and Comptia qualifications at further education colleges for a
fraction of the price of equivalent private sector
training.
Further education colleges have been offering the iPro
qualification for one year now and are keen to promote it to
business. iPro combines academic with practical training to gain
supplier-specific accreditation through day-release or evening
courses.
The training costs about £250 for a one-year course, compared with
thousands of pounds for equivalent training by private sector
companies.
iPro, which covers system support and software development skills,
allows students to choose from a range of modules, so they can
specialise or gain general skills. The options include 15 Microsoft
Professional courses, Comptia A+ and Network+ PC maintenance exams,
Linux+, Server+ and Cisco qualifications.
After the first year of running the training, 17 students have been
awarded iPro qualifications and a further 500 have started courses.
North Hertfordshire College has been offering iPro for the past 12
months, with a combination of Microsoft and Cisco qualifications.
John O'Neill, who is responsible for business liaison at the
college, said a number of employers were encouraging their staff to
attend evening or day-release courses to improve their IT
skills.
"Employers are quite keen. The thing they like is, yes, they are
getting academic qualifications, but they are also getting the
supplier qualification," he said.
Schools are also using iPro to offer supplier qualifications to
pupils who want to train for careers in IT. Paul Varney, ICT
manager at Deanery High School in Lancashire, is running an iPro
course for sixth form students.
"We have had quite a few of our students out on work experience
with employers. They have always been very favourable about iPro,"
he said.
Training is available at levels two and three for IT practitioners
in systems support or software development, and examination board
OCR, which developed the qualification, plans to add a level four
qualification for systems support this year.