FPD Academy | Mind the Gap

MAKING THE MOST OF YOUR GAP YEAR 'FUTURE - PROOF' YOURSELF TO ACHIEVE YOUR DESIRED AMBITIONS FOR THE “CLASS OF 2018”.

High school is behind you. Now onto bigger and better. Either by design or by unfortunate circumstances, school leavers often consider a gap year as an alternative. By design, it affords you time to carefully consider your next career steps before you invest your time and money in further tertiary education. By circumstance, you may not have achieved a bachelors pass or been unable to find a place in a traditional tertiary institution of your choosing.

Why take a gap year?
• Unable to achieve the required results to enrol in your tertiary institution or course of choice and plan on rewriting subjects to fulfil these needs.
• You are undecided on what you really want to do.
• You want to work part-time or full-time.
• You still need to secure more funding for fees and housing.
• You reside too far from the mainstream tertiary institutions, with insufficient funding for accommodation and transport.
• You want to explore and volunteer in other interests to ensure you are more mature before entering a formal higher education institution.
• You want to ensure you are “future-proof” with essential business skills to enter the workplace.
• You want to avoid being one of the “too” many first-year drop-out statistics.
• You missed an enrolment deadline.

What are the risks?
• Getting into bad habits – very often school leavers who step off the academic treadmill struggle to get back into healthy study habits.
• Getting left behind – There is the chance your peers will have a head-start in their quest to enter the formal work sector.
• Most parents fear that you won’t go back.

What can you do to make the most of your GAP year? So, if by design or circumstance, do not get discouraged and strive to become the best possible version of yourself. THINK FORWARD!

• Create your own personal structured plan – it is not about sitting on the couch and playing video games.
• Seek out work or volunteer opportunities – part-time or full-time. This will allow you to experience different industries and environments and gain valuable life skills and management skills that can put you head and shoulders above those with no work experience.
• Embark on an entrepreneurial endeavour.
• Invest your time and money in generic adult learning skills that will give you a higher-level qualification. There are many credible distance learning institutions that offer affordable and accessible learning solutions. Avoid the “fly-by-night” operators. Beware of bogus institutions.

THE GOOD NEWS
If you are planning a gap year, and require flexibility to enrol during 2019, the FPD Higher Certificate in Management is a programme that is ideally suited to Gap Year school-leavers. It anticipates and solves the problem that recruiters find when they look to hire graduates further down-the-line, citing the lack of business and management understanding as a major hurdle when youth enter the formal sector.

More on why recruiters look for business skills coming soon.

President Ramaphosa has consistently endorsed this and urges 2018 school leavers to consider alternative learning solutions with business skills as a priority for future youth employment.

To find out more about the FPD Business School Higher Certificate in Management CLICK HERE