A new certificate in Chaplaincy and Pastoral Care will next year commence at Acts 2 College of Mission and Evangelisation. Photo: Supplied.
By Natashya Fernandez
A new certificate in Chaplaincy and Pastoral Care will next year commence at Acts 2 College of Mission and Evangelisation.
The new certificate four, a first for the Osborne Park College, will provide students with the skills and knowledge to undertake the role and responsibilities of being a Chaplain in a Catholic school setting.
In an interview with The eRecord, Principal Jane Borg spoke about the course, the advantages of a lay Chaplain in Catholic schools and why it is important to add a course like this to the College’s scope of delivery.
“It is a nationally mandated qualification for people who want to be a Chaplain in schools. At the moment our graduates are in high demand as youth ministry graduates and are employed in a number of schools and parishes,” she said.
“But we also had enquiries from schools asking whether our graduates have the required chaplaincy units, and from people wanting to study this qualification, so that they could take on the chaplaincy role in Catholic schools.
“While we had some graduates going to Pentecostal Bible Colleges to study those chaplaincy units, the feedback from them was that the Pentecostal setting of the training did not prepare them for working within a Catholic school culture.”
This led the college to research the demand for the Chaplaincy and Pastoral Course, she added.
“About 12 months ago, we started to get an increase in enquiries from people interested in moving into chaplaincy roles in Catholic schools. So we investigated where this course was already delivered, talked to a range of people about the need for lay chaplains and the potential demand for training,” Mrs Borg said.
“Once we realised that there was a need for us to get a course like this up and running, we spent time trying to put together a suit of units that would meet the needs of the training package and the types of duties being fulfilled by lay chaplains at present.”
“The course sits within a national training package written by the industry council that dealt with community services at the time. Given that Acts 2 College is the only Catholic ministry training college in Australia, it is the only College to run this course in a Catholic setting,” Mrs Borg added.
Mrs Borg explained that the Cert IV course is run for 10 months beginning February 2018.
“We have structured the course so that the in-class learning can be done in two terms – two trimesters, which is six months. There are 100 hours of pastoral care practicum that must be completed, which would take the rest of the year to complete,” she added.
The new Certificate four course is run for 10 months beginning February 2018. Photo: Supplied.
It is hoped that the whole course will be available online from 2019, with some components available online in 2018.
“The common units with the College’s Certificate IV in Catholic Ministry (Youth – 10602NAT) also provides extension options for those students to study a further six months to also achieve the Certificate IV in Chaplaincy and Pastoral Care.
“However the nature of chaplaincy work suggests that people have some life experience within which to frame their learning. To this end the course is more suitable to those 21 years and older.”
With the recent interest in Chaplaincy and Pastoral Care from potential students and employees, Mrs Borg noted that the college is excited to start this new chapter next year.
“A number of schools are wanting to go this way, where the traditional clerical role of chaplain is supported by youth ministers and/or lay chaplains working to capture the imagination of young people in the school, build relationships with them, engage them in their faith and where possible, reconnect them to their parishes.”
“Through this course, we will be extending our service to schools and parishes to provide qualified chaplains, in addition to the qualified youth ministers already working within school and parish communities – young, dynamic youth teams working with students to enrich the wider church,” Mrs Borg concluded.
For more information about the Chaplaincy and Pastoral Care Course, Click Here