News & Events

JIB partners with australian school

By Carmelito Q. Francisco

Published : 2008-01-09

THE Joji Ilagan Foundation Career center Inc. is offering starting in June a Certificate III Hospitality Course with the graduates getting certification from the school and from the Technical and Further Education-New South Wales- South Western Sydney Institute of Sydney, Australia.

Joji Ilagan-Bian, owner of the local school, said the graduate of the course, which provides certification for commercial cookery, will have a direct migration path because the certification of the Australian government school is equivalent to 60 points, or 10 points lesser than the required points in entering the country.

Those who will take the course and eventually finish it will have the edge over those who just want to migrate to Australia because the course allows them to get employed in Australian restaurants because commercial cookery is listed under the Skilled Occupation List of the Migration Laws of Australia as of September 2007. This means that this occupation is in demand in the country.

Bian added the school will also allow the student to start discussing her or his migration, including his or her family, to Australia with an Australian lawyer who is expert in migration.

After graduation, the person will have the option to work in Australia or get employed in the Philippines at higher salary rates considering that he or she will have two certifications.

“We are giving global education to our students right at their doorsteps,” Bian said, pointing out that students need not travel to Australia and pay 27,000 Australian dollars (P966,826.88 @P35.802 to 1 Australian dollar) a semester. Aside from that the student will also pay another 10 Australian dollars a month for board and lodging.

Bian added that the undertaking is a gamble on her part because she has yet to know the acceptability of the course in Mindanao while her school has become successful in courses it has offered.

“To me this is an investment. This is also an investment to the students, particularly those who want to migrate to Australia,” she added.

In her school, she said, the student will get dual certification, that of her school and an authentic certification from the Australian school.

She said she is hiring an Australian teacher that will teach the students between four to 15 weeks every semester “to ensure the quality of teaching.” She added she is also sending a teacher to study the course.

The course runs for 20 months with half of the period devoted to on-the-job training in restaurants and hotels at four hours a day based on Australian educational system. The classroom, she added, will be equipped with closed circuit television camera that will broadcast real time events for the Australian school to monitor the activities of the students.

Aside from the P4 million investments infused into the classrooms, Bian she is also paying the Australian teacher she has hired in Australian currency.

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