The contents of this article are as follows:
Create a Qualification
Open the Volunteers section on the left-hand side of the staff dashboard
Click the Qualifications tab at the top
Click "Add qualification".
Give your qualification a name
Add any additional information in the description (this will be visible to volunteers if the qualification is discoverable in the app, see below).
Click Create qualification
If a qualification exists that looks like it is the same as the one you wish to add, I would check internally to make sure. You want to avoid having duplicates, e.g., "DBS" and "DBS check," which may actually represent the same thing.
Discoverable qualifications: prerequisites, renewals, and courses
Choose whether you want your qualifications to be discoverable in the app by volunteers. Discoverable qualifications can be found by volunteers in the app; they will see the name, description, and their issue and expiry dates.
Discoverable qualifications can be used for several reasons:
As prerequisites: Qualifications can be used as prerequisites for missions, ensuring only volunteers with the relevant qualifications can join.
When creating or editing a mission, you can set one or more required qualifications that a volunteer must hold in order to take part. For this to work, these qualifications must be discoverable in the app so volunteers can clearly see which qualifications are required before they can join a mission.
Setting a renewal period: Volunteers can automatically be notified and prompted to renew their qualification by redoing any courses linked to that specific qualification before it expires.
Please read this article on courses to learn how to link specific qualifications to courses.
Here, you can configure how many months before the expiry date, volunteers will be notified to retake the course. You can select 1 month, 3 months, 6 months, 1 year, 2 years, or customise the number of months yourself.
Self-enrollment: When a qualification is set to be discoverable in the app, this may encourage volunteers who haven't obtained that qualification to self-enroll themselves onto the respective course in order to gain that qualification.
This can help them discover and get more involved with missions that may have previously been restricted by certain qualifications they didn't have.
If you don't plan to use courses on Volunteero, you can use the description to explain how volunteers can earn or renew this qualification.
Add a qualification to a volunteer profile
Visit the volunteer profile that you'd like to add a qualification to.
Click into the "learning" tab on the top row of their profile.
Click "+ qualification", and a drop-down of your available qualifications will show up.
Select the qualification you wish to apply to the profile.
Add qualification issue and expiry
Add an issue
If applicable, add an expiry date
If the qualification doesn't have an expiry date, toggle 'Non-Expiring', this option sets the expiry date to the year 3000.
You can also add any notes to the qualification at this stage.
Click 'Add Qualification'.
View outdated qualifications / upcoming renewals
On the Volunteer Dashboard, where you can see all of your volunteers, you will be able to filter by qualification. You can filter by qualifications to quickly identify which are expired and which are coming up for renewal. Simply select a qualification and apply the “expires before/after” filter with your chosen date.
You can also choose to include those without a qualification by using the invert filter.
Include "qualifications" in your column view. Adjust this by using the 3 dots on the right-hand side and making sure this is visible.
Your volunteer qualifications will show up red if they have expired, and you can hover over the qualification to quickly see the issue and expiry date.
You can export volunteer qualifications with other volunteer data by clicking the three dots and exporting to CSV. Remember to apply the relevant filters/ columns before exporting to get the information you need.
Training History & Upload Tool
From the Training History tab, you can also export all qualification information to a CSV file by clicking the three dots. This export provides a different view compared to the Volunteer Dashboard export: here, the data is organised by qualification, whereas the Volunteer Dashboard export is organised row by row by volunteer.
The training history tab also allows you to filter data, similar to the Volunteer Dashboard, by qualification, expiry date, and even invert the filter if needed.
In addition to viewing and updating your qualifications individually, you can also mass upload or update multiple qualifications at once on this tab. For step-by-step guidance, check out our article on using the Qualification Upload Tool here.
Video Tutorial
If you require any further assistance, please use the support chat or email support@volunteero.org to ask a question to our friendly support team. We will be happy to help!