RSA III word processing

Housework*Fairy

Hi to anyone who reads this :j

Many moons ago I did RSA I and RSA II word processing / typing qualifications.

I'd like to do RSA III however when I have googled it, there does not seem to be anywhere locally to me that does it.

I've looked on the OCR website but I cant see mention of it.

I've looked at my local colleges and can't see that any of them offer it as an option any more.

Does anyone know if this is something which is still done?

The reason I am asking is that I am currently a Secretary but my local hospital will not interview for a senior secretary position if you do not have RSA III WP/typing.

Thanks if anyone can help

heartbreak_star

Do learndirect do it? If not maybe you can take an online typing test and see how that goes, maybe take them in a screenshot or something?

HBS x

t0rt0ise

Something like this distance course... http://www.keynet-training.co.uk/ocr_level3_courses.html

I did text processing III and word processing III about 15 years ago, and also typewriting III which felt old fashioned even then and I doubt they still do that one anymore. Many colleges only do I and II because that's what most employers ask for. I found it all easy enough and I'd only just started touch typing so you should have no problem at all.

Housework*Fairy

Hey T0rt0ise, thank you so much I think that is perfect

I did look at Learn Direct and they do the EDCL which I think is a good qualification but employers don't seem to ask for it. I want to (eventually) be a Scale 4 NHS Medical Secretary but they wont even interview you if you don't have RSA III, which is stupid because when I went for an interview for a Scale 3 job, we were talking about Scale 4 and they said that the Scale 3 job is more of a 'typist' (support secretary) and Scale 4 is more of a PA role.

anamenottaken

Housework*Fairy wrote: »

Hey T0rt0ise, thank you so much I think that is perfect

I did look at Learn Direct and they do the EDCL which I think is a good qualification but employers don't seem to ask for it. I want to (eventually) be a Scale 4 NHS Medical Secretary but they wont even interview you if you don't have RSA III, which is stupid because when I went for an interview for a Scale 3 job, we were talking about Scale 4 and they said that the Scale 3 job is more of a 'typist' (support secretary) and Scale 4 is more of a PA role.

1 The NHS is, in my experience, one employer which does ask for ECDL specifically - for administrative jobs in general, not just secretarial ones. However it demonstrates an ability to use various applications (not just text processing) and general IT knowledge. It does not test real useful speed in using these applications. (I write as a former ECDL trainer/script marker.)

2 If "they" are asking for an RSA III, then they are possibly out of touch with what is currently available. The RSA is now the R part of the OCR acronym. For word processing this, however, does test speed as well as accuracy in carrying out the task.

3 The NHS is not one employer. Are you contacting just your local hospital? You may find other NHS employers do not specify RSA III as an entry requirement or will include something like "or equivalent qualification" in the person specification.

WhiteHorse

I did RSA I and II some years ago. RSA III was next to impossible to find, even then.

Housework*Fairy

anamenottaken wrote: »

1 The NHS is, in my experience, one employer which does ask for ECDL specifically - for administrative jobs in general, not just secretarial ones. However it demonstrates an ability to use various applications (not just text processing) and general IT knowledge. It does not test real useful speed in using these applications. (I write as a former ECDL trainer/script marker.)

2 If "they" are asking for an RSA III, then they are possibly out of touch with what is currently available. The RSA is now the R part of the OCR acronym. For word processing this, however, does test speed as well as accuracy in carrying out the task.

3 The NHS is not one employer. Are you contacting just your local hospital? You may find other NHS employers do not specify RSA III as an entry requirement or will include something like "or equivalent qualification" in the person specification.

Hi

The situation I am in at the moment is that I am a medical secretary in a privately run hospital. I enjoy the job but I don't like my manager's way of working. I like the work enough that I don't want to leave for 'any old job' but not enough that I want to stay there working under this manager any longer than I have to. I'd like to work at my local NHS hospital which is within walking distance and would cut down on petrol considerably. I don't want to work any farther away from my home town than I have to while I have school age children. Once they have left school I am happy to look farther afield, just not now.

Over the last 14 months there has been two scale 3 secretaries jobs advertised at my local hospital (which is quite a large hospital), I got interviews for both of them, but not a job out of the interviews. There have been four scale 4 jobs advertised in that time all of which I applied for but I didn't get an interview. It does state 'RSA III or commesurate experience' (I have no idea what that means). In my last interview for the scale 3 job I did ask about progression to scale 4, and they did say that a secretary would need to have RSA III or they wouldn't even interview but they did say they had a learning centre where employees can do this.

In the job spec my local NHS Trust does say ECDL is a 'desirable' for a lot of jobs, whereas for secretarial on the RSA II or III is 'essential'. It definitely wouldn't harm me to do this and I would like to learn how to use Excel better as my knowledge at the moment is almost non-existant

Anyway I have sent off an enquiry form to the place in the link above so hopefully it will be something that is affordable for me to do.

anamenottaken

Housework*Fairy wrote: »

Hi

The situation I am in at the moment is that I am a medical secretary in a privately run hospital. I enjoy the job but I don't like my manager's way of working. I like the work enough that I don't want to leave for 'any old job' but not enough that I want to stay there working under this manager any longer than I have to. I'd like to work at my local NHS hospital which is within walking distance and would cut down on petrol considerably. I don't want to work any farther away from my home town than I have to while I have school age children. Once they have left school I am happy to look farther afield, just not now.

Over the last 14 months there has been two scale 3 secretaries jobs advertised at my local hospital (which is quite a large hospital), I got interviews for both of them, but not a job out of the interviews. There have been four scale 4 jobs advertised in that time all of which I applied for but I didn't get an interview. It does state 'RSA III or commesurate experience' (I have no idea what that means). In my last interview for the scale 3 job I did ask about progression to scale 4, and they did say that a secretary would need to have RSA III or they wouldn't even interview but they did say they had a learning centre where employees can do this.

In the job spec my local NHS Trust does say ECDL is a 'desirable' for a lot of jobs, whereas for secretarial on the RSA II or III is 'essential'. It definitely wouldn't harm me to do this and I would like to learn how to use Excel better as my knowledge at the moment is almost non-existant

Anyway I have sent off an enquiry form to the place in the link above so hopefully it will be something that is affordable for me to do.

Seek out the syllabus for the Stage III tests which should explain what they are looking for. See how you measure up against that.

Alison is a site which offers free training online for ECDL (including using Excel for the spreadsheet module). It isn't a way of actually gaining the qualification because it is just online but it would help prepare for ECDL or at least give you an insight into what it can do.

Vision2Learn also offer free courses which do provide nationally recognised qualifications in IT - including word processing and spreadsheet units.

Housework*Fairy

Just thought I would let you know how I have got on.

Keynet e-mailed me back quoting £270 for the course, plus £14.99 P+P, plus the exam fee that I would have to take at an external testing centre.

I rang another local college this morning and was put through to a skills workshop. The reason I could not find RSA III WP when I searched is because it's now called OCR Text processing level 3. They do the text processing award (which is the core module 'copy typing' plus one optional unit Audio, word processing and document presentation) or the text processing certificate which is all units. The total cost of this is £185 + £68.80 for the exam. It's also in a workshop so I can spend as much time as I wish at the workshop and then they will enter me for the exam. So I am going along on Thursday to enrol and they are open on a Saturday morning.

I also signed up to Vision2Learn to do an NVQ in Business admin. I'm awaiting to hear from them.

There is also a learn direct place where I can do ECDL but I'm going to concentrate on my Word processing and NVQ first

LittleVoice

Housework*Fairy wrote: »

Just thought I would let you know how I have got on.

Keynet e-mailed me back quoting £270 for the course, plus £14.99 P+P, plus the exam fee that I would have to take at an external testing centre.

I rang another local college this morning and was put through to a skills workshop. The reason I could not find RSA III WP when I searched is because it's now called OCR Text processing level 3. They do the text processing award (which is the core module 'copy typing' plus one optional unit Audio, word processing and document presentation) or the text processing certificate which is all units. The total cost of this is £185 + £68.80 for the exam. It's also in a workshop so I can spend as much time as I wish at the workshop and then they will enter me for the exam. So I am going along on Thursday to enrol and they are open on a Saturday morning.

I also signed up to Vision2Learn to do an NVQ in Business admin. I'm awaiting to hear from them.

There is also a learn direct place where I can do ECDL but I'm going to concentrate on my Word processing and NVQ first

Thanks for letting us know - and good luck and enjoy the learning.

t0rt0ise

I found this the other night when looking.. if it's the same course then there are past papers there to see which would give you an idea of what you're going to do, also the whole syllabus outlined. It's pretty much the same as I did 15 years ago.

http://www.ocr.org.uk/qualifications/type/qcf/text_pro/bp_l3_award/documents/