Recently The Disability Trust became a Registered Training Organisation (RTO) in NSW. This is a huge step with the system for lodging applications being quite complex and bureaucratic.

RTO status allows us to give our staff access to high quality externally recognised courses. Importantly we can also receive significant government subsidies to supplement the extensive training that we are already doing in-house. RTO status provides workforce development opportunities that will support best practice in direct care for people with disabilities and allow us to establish a minimum qualification at Cert III level for front line staff. Finally down the track The Trust may wish to develop some commercial opportunities to offer training to staff of other community organisations.

I would like to particularly recognise the work of Terri Goodwin our Manager of Training and HR for her efforts in all of this. Terri has worked tirelessly over the past 18 months to get new systems established and Learning and Development policies in place. She has also developed or modified training modules for the courses within our initial scope. Terri has been supported by Kim Roe and the HR and Training Teams who also deserve considerable recognition for this achievement.

While we may wish to add further courses down the track, our initial Scope of Works includes:

• Certificate III in Disability
• Certificate IV in Disability
• Certificate III in Home and Community Care.

Thank you Terri, Kim and everyone else involved in supporting our application.