ICAN Learn has really hit the ground running in its first year of operation as a registered training organisation with five Diploma of Financial Counselling courses being run concurrently to over fifty students. The relatively new ‘social enterprise’ prides itself on providing high quality, sector led training and has just brought a new lead lecturer into the team.
Those in Victoria’s financial counselling sector will know Robyn Shepherd-Murdoch well and may have even been one of the ninety financial counsellors trained by her in previous roles with RMIT and Victoria University. Robyn comes to ICAN Learn with ten years financial counselling and five years financial counselling lecturing experience.“We’re really excited to have Robyn on board leading ICAN Learn’s training delivery, it’s really important that our lecturers know from experience what it means to be a great financial counsellor,” said Aaron Davis, ICAN/ ICAN Learn CEO.
We asked Robyn what the biggest challenge in the ongoing professional development of the financial counselling sector is, Robyn replied, “With constant changes in the sector and associated laws, the Diploma of Financial Counselling needs to be current and reflect community needs. The Diploma takes two years to achieve, with over 17 units and 220 hours of placement, as Financial counsellor’s we need this contemporary knowledge to provide the best options, support and advocacy for our clients and the community.”
Having worked with ICAN Learn’s Co-founder, Bernadette Pasco for a number of years, Robyn shares a vision for the financial counselling sector. “We share the belief that the continued professionalisation of financial counselling will come through the delivery of quality training that provides the latest information, resources and practise; empowering our graduates to be amazing advocates for their clients.”
Reflecting on the move to ICAN Learn from lecturing in bigger universities, Robyn commented, “ICAN has shown the financial counselling sector over many years that they are strong advocates for their clients, I want to see this level of advocacy become a financial counselling standard. The team here are also keen to develop career pathways through education, from financial capability worker to a financial counselling supervisor or lecturer like myself. Put simply we’re providing sector focused training delivered by financial counsellors, as both a financial counsellor and an educator, you can’t get better than that.”
ICAN Learn is extending its training delivery in 2018 to include two short courses the Financial Literacy Education Skill Set and Professional Supervision for Financial Counsellors (non-accredited). To find out more contact Robyn Shepherd-Murdoch on 0488 229 133 or email robyn.shepherd-murdoch@icanlearn.edu.au .