07/11/2015

Skillsfuture Credit To Be Available From 1 January 2016

The SkillsFuture Credit will be available to eligible Singaporeans from January 2016, and it can be used for about 10,000 approved skills-related courses across 57 functional areas covering all the key industries. This was announced by Mr Ong Ye Kung, Acting Minister for Education (Higher Education and Skills), at the the Lifelong Learning Festival today, held at the Lifelong Learning Institute (LLI) from 7 to 8 November 2015.

The SkillsFuture Credit was first announced by Deputy Prime Minister Mr Tharman Shanmugaratnam in Budget 2015. The Skillsfuture Credit will empower Singaporeans to take personal ownership of lifelong learning.

Under the SkillsFuture Credit, Singaporeans aged 25 years and above will receive an initial credit of $500 which can be used to pay for course fees, apart from government subsidies. Through the month of January 2016, eligible Singaporeans will receive their SkillsFuture Credit account activation letter. They will then be able to access their account to use their credit for courses that commence on or after 1 January 2016.

The SkillsFuture Credit will not expire. The Government will make periodic top-ups to the accounts. There is hence no need for Singaporeans to rush to use their SkillsFuture Credit.

For a start, the SkillsFuture Credit can be used for about 10,000 approved courses, across 57 functional areas covering all key industries. The list of approved courses include:

• Courses subsidised or approved by WDA
• Selected courses offered by the Ministry of Education (MOE)-funded institutions
• Courses supported by public agencies
• SkillsFuture@PA courses offered by the People’s Association and courses offered by the Infocomm Development Authority’s participating Silver Infocomm Junctions

A preview of these approved courses will be available on 20 November 2015 through the SkillsFuture Credit course directory at www.skillsfuture.sg/credit. WDA, which is administering the SkillsFuture Credit, will continue to work with training providers and government agencies to update the courses available. Please see Annex A for an indicative sample of selected courses which will be available.

Mr Ng Cher Pong, Chief Executive of WDA said, “Lifelong learning is essential for skills deepening and mastery, and the SkillsFuture Credit supports Singaporeans on their lifelong learning journeys. Starting from 1 January 2016, there are about 10,000 skills-related courses that the Credit can be used for. WDA will continue to work closely with both training providers and government agencies to expand the list of of quality approved courses which Singaporeans can use their SkillsFuture Credit on.”

Annex A: Factsheet on SkillsFuture Credit