Jordan’s Skills Recognition Programme Opens New Opportunities for Workers

RPL gives people an opportunity to have their existing abilities assessed against Jordan’s occupational standards, supporting access to certification, employment and professional development.

Skills learned on the job can shape a person's working life without ever appearing on a certificate, leaving experienced workers with limited ways to demonstrate what they know. A two-year initiative completed by the International Labour Organization (ILO) and its national partners has helped strengthen Jordan's system for recognising those skills, giving workers a route towards formal qualifications based on experience gained through work and non-formal or informal learning.

The initiative, "Strengthening National Institutional Capacities to Implement the Recognition of Prior Learning System in Jordan," was delivered under the ILO's PROSPECTS Partnership with funding from the Kingdom of the Netherlands. Its completion was marked at an event in Amman, bringing together partners whose work has helped establish the tools, services and institutional support needed to make Recognition of Prior Learning (RPL) part of Jordan's national system.

Making experience count towards a qualification

RPL gives people an opportunity to have their existing abilities assessed against Jordan's occupational standards, supporting access to certification, employment and professional development. The pilot targeted 1,000 Jordanians and Syrian refugees, creating an opportunity to test how the system works in practice and gather lessons for its future development and expansion.

For workers, the value lies in making skills visible to people who make hiring and training decisions, with recognised qualifications providing evidence of abilities developed outside formal education. ILO PROSPECTS Jordan Project Manager Dahlia Roque described the project's completion as a step towards a sustainable national system that can expand opportunities for employment, lifelong learning and decent work. Syrian refugees who choose to return to Syria could use documentation of their competencies to support their search for decent work and efforts to rebuild their livelihoods.

Building a system workers and employers can trust

The Accreditation and Quality Assurance Commission (AQAC) played a central role in accreditation, quality assurance and embedding RPL within Jordan's national framework. Working with the Commission, the project developed assessment and guidance tools and strengthened the skills of practitioners responsible for putting the system into practice, helping build a consistent approach to recognising experience.

Yousef Al-Abdalat, AQAC's Assistant President, said the partnership had established a strong foundation for RPL in Jordan's Technical and Vocational Education and Training sector, drawing on international best practices and cooperation between national institutions. That foundation creates scope for expansion into other sectors, with a nationally supported system helping employers identify and verify available skills and giving workers greater confidence in the recognition they receive.

Bringing recognition closer to communities

The Jordan River Foundation (JRF) helped reach potential beneficiaries and connect people with RPL services at the community level, making local outreach an important part of implementation. Mahmoud Al-Karaki, JRF's Programs Division Director, linked recognition of existing skills to better economic opportunities and described the Foundation's commitment to expanding routes towards sustainable livelihoods and economic empowerment. Digital tools developed through the project support access to services, with the Ministry of Digital Economy and Entrepreneurship hosting the online portal within Jordan's national digital infrastructure to support its longer-term sustainability.

National ownership, responsiveness to labour-market needs and sustainable arrangements for implementation and quality assurance remain central to the system's development beyond the pilot. Joost de Vries, First Secretary at the Netherlands Embassy, described RPL as "a tool for dignity," connecting Dutch support with Jordan's development priorities and greater self-reliance and resilience for refugees and host communities. The initiative contributes to Sustainable Development Goal 4 on quality education and lifelong learning and Goal 8 on decent work and economic growth, recognising that experience deserves a place in the qualifications people use to build their future.