Career Skills Competition - An Overview
The Career Skills competition is a nationwide competition aimed at promoting the awareness and development of ‘transferable skills’ with students. It is being run in conjunction with the Transition Year, Leaving Cert Applied and Leaving Cert. Established & Vocational Programmes, and support the curricular requirements of these programmes.
The Career Skills competition offers students the opportunity to present both information gathered and insight’s gained from a work placement or work experience. Work experience is generally regarded as having a strong influence on a person’s choice of career, and offers an excellent opportunity to experience first hand the realities of a work environment, the various different job roles that operate within it, and the responsibilities and challenges faced by workers on a daily basis.
The Career Skills competition requires a student to complete a Career Investigation. The Career Investigation is a record of a persons experience on such a placement. Students are encouraged to investigate one particular job role that they have had the opportunity to observe closely during a placement, and to submit this information as their entry to the competition.
In addition to helping a student understand the core work and responsibilities of a particular job role, this Career Investigation encourages students to notice the importance and frequency with which common non-academic skills are used in the workplace.
A finished Career Investigation would show a good understanding of a particular job role, the tasks and responsibilities that characterise it, the specialist knowledge needed, and an awareness of the non-academic (transferable) skills required to fulfil the role competently.
The focus of the competition is on the 
