See how students have benefitted from these courses throughout the Highlands and Islands.

Discover how providers partner schools and help to deliver vocational courses effectively.

Vocational courses are now available to school pupils all over Scotland and are a good way for young people to gain the skills and knowledge required in employment. Some courses are provided within schools, but most are provided through a school-college or school-employer partnership. Pupils usually start these courses in S3, spending most of their time in the school but with a half day or more each week as a college student or working on the premises of an industry partner, for example on a farm in the rural skills course.

The work done on these courses should fit in with the young person's main job interest and he or she will develop hands on experience of the subject. It is very important that each student chooses the course which best suits them as an individual. This website is designed to help with that.

Young people are assessed and awarded a certificate by the SQA on completion of the course. All courses consist of four forty hour units of work, but sometimes two twenty hour half units are provided instead. Much of the work deals with the employability skills required within the chosen sector.

Young people who gain awards from these courses have something very useful to take to employers and have been readily gaining employment and modern apprenticeships as a result. Others may take up full time college courses in their area of interest. For those who stay on at school there is the opportunity to move on to the next level of the course.

Young people following the construction route will sit the Construction Skills (formerly CITB) and electrical trades (SECTT) tests, and will be supported by these bodies in gaining suitable apprenticeships.