Springboard courses. Free college courses sponsored by the Irish Government

yoshx wrote: »

You are right its a bargain site, my point is you can be productive part of society without a degree ,and being self taught, if you feel to deepen yourself in the academic field this is a really great opportunity . If you here only for the bargain and thinking you will profit , you might get disappointed.

My opinion is :

higher degree isn't ≠ better life

also

better job [more money] ≠ a peaceful respectful life and being more productive part of society , unless you can keep your Ego in check

Am I being too wishy washy ? I am sorry for being different from you

Ah, the old double negative. So you're saying that a higher degree is equal to a better life!

CBear1993 wrote: »

Is it really necessary if you’re looking to change industry you’re in? Will the PgDip be enough to get you in the door with employers/recruiters...

Depends of the industry you're in and what you want to move to, as well as how many years of experience and transferable skills you've built up.

If you've no experience in the IT sector and you want to break into it, I'd say in most cases you'd require a qualification or at least be working towards one.

In my opinion the majority of employers don't overly care about the content of your course or where you studied. Third level qualifications are prerequisites and they like to see you can start something and finish it out. If you're adding to your qualifications/continuing your professional development off your own bat and paying it for yourself, employers also love to see this.

Lainey Mushy Stinger wrote: »

Well it's something anyway. In the IT industry, an NFQ qualification would generally open the door, but professional certifications would be more valuable after that in many areas.

Agree with this, in most cases anyway.

Mystery666 wrote: »

I know there's an option to turn the Higher Diploma in Computer Science into an MSc in UCD by converting halfway through. I only know about this through word of mouth, is there any other Higher Diploma's that have a similar option as this is the only one I know about.

Most postgrad diplomas are just a masters with a component missing.

Dante7 wrote: »

The site is still not up. They might want to take one of their own courses that covers load balancing.

They've said on their Twitter that the site will be back up on Friday. Springboard have actually been quite good with their updates on Twitter.

I cant find the Financial Accounting and Payroll course on Athlone's website, can anyone help me

Seems to be open now but website is very hit and miss.

I'm doing one of these at the moment - my main reasons for studying via Springboard were (a) the piece of paper, (b) the promised work placement.


I'll still get the piece of paper, which is good, but I could have learned much more in far less time from youtube etc. than by doing the course. You will find the courses have a couple of "filler" modules that often won't be of interest to you or of any practical benefit, and parts of them can be very slow in parts to bring everyone up to speed, whereas if you're studying on your own, you can focus on the things that do interest you and do so in more depth. (Obviously you can still do extra stuff that isn't mandated on your own, but time, time, time.) The courses are helpful if, like me, your self-discipline is lacking.


The course I'm doing doesn't provide the work placement for the students - you have to organise that yourself. If you can't get a work placement, you can write a "prior workplace experience" essay to attest that you play well with others etc. So it's a trivial module from a "credits" point of view, and the work placement seems to be just there as an advertising pull rather than being an important part of the course. Your course may, of course, differ - might be worth asking.


As a self-employed person, I paid ~700e over the two years. It feels approximately worth it.

Ficheall wrote: »

I'll still get the piece of paper, which is good, but I could have learned much more in far less time from youtube etc.

The same could be said of pretty much any third level course. The difference is that it provides the structure through which to do it in with externally set deadlines and objectives with proper accreditation at the end. If you consider yourself better able to learn on your own and that much of the course content is filler then maybe third level education is not for you?

Ficheall wrote: »

The course I'm doing doesn't provide the work placement for the students - you have to organise that yourself.

While various places will have different levels of support for work placement, the onus is still on the student to go off and secure something for themselves. Ain't nobody going to spoon feed you once you graduate.

Is there any application deadline?