All Pyridion Management Academy courses are endorsed by the British Government, with all our qualifications recognised under the new Qualifications & Credit Framework (QCF).

Our Courses:

It is important for all students to be aware of the new Qualifications and Credit Framework (QCF) that has recently replaced the previous system in the UK. The QCF is a new framework for recognizing and accrediting qualifications in England, Wales and Northern Ireland. The framework is at the heart of the major reform of the vocational qualifications systems designed to make the whole system simpler to understand and use, whilst informing learners/students of the exact level and type of qualification they are or intend to undertake.

The QCF is a new way of recognizing achievement through the award of credit for units and qualifications.  In the system that is being replaced, it is hard to understand all the different types of qualification that learners hold - what level they are, how long they take to complete, what content they cover, and how they compare to other qualifications. The new framework will help present qualifications in a way that is easy to understand and measure.

International students should be able to use the QCF to identify what LEVEL a particular qualification is at. Quite often, students are misinformed as to the exact LEVEL of the course they are studying. For example, there is potential for students to misunderstand a qualification such as a Certificate or Diploma in Hospitality. Under the new system, a Certificate or Diploma can be at any level ranging from level 1 to level 8. A student might 'assume' that a Diploma is at Level 4, whilst in reality it is a Level 3. What is important is the actual LEVEL of the qualification NOT the LABEL. For example a Level 4 Certificate is a higher-ranking qualification than a Level 3 Diploma. International students should be aware of this when making applications to International Institutions.

For those students who progress onto a Level 4 Qualification in the second year, upon completion of the Level 4 they can access University Degree Courses (Level 5) and in some cases get exemptions for the credits.

CREDIT AND LEVEL

Every unit and qualification in the framework will have a credit value and a level between Entry level and level 8 (showing how difficult it is). 

There are three sizes of qualifications in the QCF:

So in the new framework you can have an award at level 1 or an award at level 8. This is because the qualification type 'award, certificate, diploma' represents the size of a qualification, not how difficult it is.

Each qualification title contains the following:

Simply by looking at the title of a qualification you will be able to see how difficult it is, how long it will take the average learner to complete, and its general content. To understand the level of difficulty of the units and qualifications in the new framework it might be helpful to know that GCSEs (grade A*- C) are level 2 and a PhD is a level 8. Knowing this can help to position the difficulty and challenge of each level in the framework.