Fasset — the sector education training authority (Seta) for finance, accounting, management consulting and other financial services — has achieved a 100% placement rate, which is 29% higher than the 71% Seta average for placement into employment or income- generating projects within three months after completing training.
”We attribute our success to the fact that our learnerships are aligned to real skills needs within our sector,” says Fasset chief executive Cheryl James.
Barriers to entry into the sector traditionally have been high as many careers require higher-grade mathematics. ”Fasset learnerships offer a range of entry points for technicians and accountants alike. The implementation of accounting learnerships at technician level, where higher-grade mathematics is not a prerequisite, means a range of career paths have opened up in our sector,” James says.
As at March 31, 27 022 learners had been signed to Fasset learnerships. ”All 12 022 learners who have completed Fasset learnerships already have been placed in employment,” she says. The National Skills Development Strategy (NSDS) II places emphasis on improving the skills levels of unemployed learners and helping them to enter the formal economy.
”Fasset has made huge strides in attracting the so-called unemployed learners into our sector. About 43,9% of learners signed on to Fasset learnerships are from the ranks of the previously unemployed,” she says.
James cites transformation as the biggest challenge the sector faces. The percentage of black learners — African, Indian and coloured — on Fasset learnerships is improving steadily. In the second year — April 1 2001 to March 31 2002 — 29% of registered learners were black. This has increased to 45% of learners in year seven — April 1 2006 to March 31 2007.
Learnerships represent 23% of the total beneficiaries of Fasset’s skills upliftment initiatives. ”The skills levels of an additional 82 200 learners have been raised through Fasset’s development projects, National Skills Fund projects and lifelong learning interventions,” James says.
Fasset has identified development projects as an important vehicle for opening up access to the sector for black learners and learners with disabilities. More than R144-million has been allocated already and 8 900 young South Africans have benefited.
Beneficiaries are in line with NSDS targets of 85% black, 54% women and 4% people with disabilities.
Despite the shortage of accounting and financial skills, a lack of workplace experience often serves as a barrier to employment for recent graduates.
”Our management board has taken a strategic decision to fund work readiness programmes for professional and associate professional level accounting and commerce learners in the sector. More than 600 learners have been signed on to the Thusanani work readiness programme and the placement rate is about 90%.
”With more than three months remaining until project closure, 97 of the 100 learners on the Fasset-funded Bonani Virtual Office Workplace Programme have been place. These statistics confirm that the Fasset-funded work readiness programmes really add value to our sector,” she says.
Lifelong learning interventions — previously continuous professional education — play an important role in ensuring that the skills levels of small, medium or micro enterprise practitioners remain at the leading edge.
”For many of these stakeholders lifelong learning would otherwise be unaffordable. Fasset has gone out of its way always to ensure that top-tier training providers are used and that the topics covered are in line with real training needs. By March 31, 24 307 stakeholders had attended this training,” she says.
In the past seven years Fasset has exceeded its national skills development strategy learnership targets more than sixfold. ”We would like to increase these numbers even further. Fasset cannot, however, influence the schooling system or the number of learners matriculating with mathematics on the higher grade, a prerequisite for many careers within our sector.
”Constantly thinking out of the box to find innovative solutions to improve skills levels, in partnership with our stakeholders, Fasset will continue to pull out the stops to produce the finance, accounting, management consulting and other financial skills that our growing economy requires,” James says.