The Skills First Program and JobTrainer Initiative

1. The Skills First Program

Not everyone can do Skills First training. Your eligibility depends on lots of things, including:

• your age
• what training you’ve done before or are doing now
• when you did this training

If you think you are eligible, please contact us before you apply for a course. We will confirm your eligibility and check if there’s a Skills First place available.

Citizenship

To be eligible for Skills First training, you must be:

• an Australian citizen, or
• an Australian permanent resident, or
• a New Zealand citizen

Asylum seekers

If you are an asylum seeker, you may be eligible under the Asylum seeker VET program.

Age

Skills First prioritises training for young people (under 20), Apprenticeships and Foundation Skills, and otherwise requires students do progressively higher qualifications to be eligible.

If you are under 20 years old or eligible under the JobTrainer Fund (see below) you can do Skills First training at any level .

If you are 20 years or over, you can usually only do Skills First training at a higher level than any qualification you already have. For example, if you have a Certificate III, you can’t do a subsidised Certificate II course. (Exemption for those under 25 years per JobTrainer below.)

You can also do Skills First training in skill sets. These are accredited short courses to help with quick and flexible training for skills shortages and workforce demands. When you do a skill set, your age and what level of qualification you already have doesn’t affect whether you are eligible.

How much Skills First training can I do?

There are also limits on how much Skills First training you can do. The limits are:

• You can’t start* more than 2 qualifications in a year
• You can’t start* more than 2 skill sets in a year
• You can’t do more than 2 Skills First qualifications or skill sets at the same time
• If you’ve already started* up to two government-subsidised qualifications at the same level in your lifetime you can’t do another Skills First qualification at that level

These limits encourage you to make informed decisions about your training and employment opportunities, and finish your training.

*This includes courses you start but don’t finish.

The Victorian Government has partnered with the Commonwealth Government to jointly invest up to $260 million under the JobTrainer Fund to increase access to training for thousands of Victorians who have been most impacted by the Coronavirus (COVID-19) crisis.

JobTrainer is available to eligible Victorians in a wide range of industries identified as having genuine skill needs and employment growth, such as health, construction, agriculture, community services, food processing, financial services, logistics and beauty services.

Eligible students are able to access free or low fee (concession) qualifications and free short accredited courses (skill sets) in key industries and occupations.

You are eligible to participate under JobTrainer if you are:

• an Australian citizen, permanent resident, New Zealand citizen or asylum seeker, and
• 17 to 24 years old when the course starts; or
• A Job seeker of any age, where a job seeker is defined as a person who:
  • holds a valid and current Health Care Card, Pensioner Concession Card or Veteran’s Gold Card; or
  • unemployed.

Victorians eligible for JobTrainer will be able to access our JobTrainer courses, even if they hold a higher qualification. Eligible students will pay only 20 per cent of the listed tuition fee which is NO tuition cost in all cases. You will also be able to access a free skill set through JobTrainer even if you have studied before. You can access up to one full qualification and one short course or skill set under the JobTrainer fund.

For more details about this training, please visit our individual courses which clearly label funding under the JobTrainer initiative.