APL/APEL As a Method of Gathering Evidence For Your NVQ

What are APL/ APEL?

APL means Assessment or Accreditation of Prior Learning. This should be proved by either a certificate of attendance or by records signed by the tutor or an authorised person at work but not necessarily from an awarding institution. It could be a work based learning course or in house training session at work, whereby you were given a certificate of attendance which might state the content of the training or learning outcome.

It does not necessarily require that you have undertaken a formal assessment like a test at the end of the training; this is what is referred to as informal learning.

APEL means Assessment or Accreditation of Prior Experiential Learning. This does not necessarily refer to courses you have attended but could be learning and experience that has taken place over a period of time within the sphere of your work life, social life or domestic life that is relevant to your NVQ.

Generally mature students have acquired a range of expertise, skills and knowledge gathered from their job role, the community and their personal life experience. Using APEL as a method of assessment provides you with the opportunity to have your previous experience assessed and included in your NVQ.

Benefits of using APL/APEL

• It may mean that you do not have to repeat aspects of your NVQ units which you are already familiar with and have evidence to show for it.
• It may help to speed up your rate of study and complete your NVQ earlier than you may have thought, although this can be as time consuming as completing a workbook if you are unable to freely express yourself and complete the requirements for your APEL/ APL assessment.
• It’s a good reflection exercise to help you develop the ability to think about all you have done in the past that adds up to your competence and a free expression of how you have developed yourself professionally and personally.

How do I know if I have “relevant” learning?

• You will need to ensure that any informal training or experience you wish to claim evidence of competence for is relevant to the units within your NVQ. This means it should address the unit, elements and the knowledge specification to a broad extent.
• You need to be able to judge and reference the evidence as similar to the standards within the units of the NVQ and also ensure the level is similar to the NVQ level you are working towards.
• You need to be able to demonstrate your experience or acquired learning. This could be through work products that you can show your assessor.

How do I provide Evidence using APL/APEL?

• Start by getting your curriculum vitae (CV), your job description, all your training certificates (of attendance or formal tests you completed during the training), supervision or appraisal reports or statements from employers and any work products.
• Write a personal statement outlining the relevance of your learning experience to the NVQ units (APEL). There is no set format for this personal statement. See how you can write one in the article title “Why health and social care as a career?” on our website, although you need to work in agreement with your NVQ assessor on what to be covered.
• Reflect on your training in the past 2-5 years, select the relevant certificate you wish to include in your portfolio to use towards your NVQ, on each of these trainings write about:

1. How you did the training?
2. Why it was necessary?
3. What you learnt?
4. How it has been of benefit in your job?

Note:  APL is not complete if you do not write a reflective account on each of your training certificates to ensure it meets the standards within your NVQ. This means if you just insert copies of training certificates into your portfolio without any reflections it would not be used as a method of assessment. Read article on “How to write a good reflective Account for your NVQ”

Below is a list of common areas of training and their respective NVQ Units that have similar standards which you can use to reference your reflection. 

• Basic communication skills – HSC21
• Advanced communication skills – HSC31 and HSC369
• Report writing skills – HSC21and HSC31
• Basic Life Support & Emergency First Aid – HSC22 and HSC32
• Moving and handling – HSC223 and HSC360
• Medication Awareness – HSC221 and HSC375
• Safeguarding Adults (formerly known as POVA) – HSC24 and HSC35
• Understanding Mental Health Difficulties – HSC336
• Handling challenging behavior – HSC336 and  HSC337
• Food hygiene – HSC213 and HSC214
• Pressure Area Care – HSC217 and HSC358
• Care planning and Review – HSC328 

As an Assessor I tend to encourage my candidates to start with the unit – HSC23, HSC33 and HSC43 –“Reflecting on your development and Practice”, this will give candidates the opportunity to use APL/APEL as a method of assessment for a range of units before they get cumbersome with workbooks and other assignments. So dear reader, if you are an NVQ candidate, find out from your assessor how you can use your previous experience or training certificates to provide evidence for your units, you will be surprised to know that you can get credits for your NVQ and this will reduce the workbooks or assignments you need to complete.