Free State Retraining: How It Works and Who Qualifies

People usually know two things about free retraining: that it exists, and that getting in seems complicated. Both are roughly true and neither helps. Below is how the system works in principle, so you know what to check.

⚠️ The specific lists of directions, the categories of participants and the conditions change: they are revised and differ by region and by year. So there is no list of occupations here and no figures for durations — the current information always lives on the state employment portal, not in an article of any age.

How the scheme works

The logic is the same across state retraining programmes, and it helps to hold it whole.

1. Entry through the state employment service. The application goes through the employment portal, not to an educational organisation. A school is a provider, not the entry point.
2. Checking whether you fall into a category. The programmes are targeted at defined groups, and the composition of those groups is revised. This is what gets checked first.
3. Career orientation at an employment centre. In almost every scheme this is a mandatory step rather than a formality: the training direction is agreed on its basis.
4. Choosing a direction from the available list. The list is finite. Training runs at accredited organisations, educational or corporate.
5. The training itself. Formats vary: in person, remote, blended. Durations differ widely by direction.
6. Employment support afterwards. Some programmes do not stop at training but tie directly to getting a job.

Where people usually get stuck

Not checking the category first. Someone picks a direction, gets enthusiastic, and then discovers they do not fall into this year's group of participants. The correct order is the reverse: category first, direction second.

Choosing from the list rather than for themselves. The most expensive mistake. «Free» is about money, not about fit: a direction from the list that does not suit you will take months and lead nowhere. The training is not free — it is paid for with your time.

Not counting time and energy. Free training removes the question of paying for a course but not the question of where the evenings come from if you are working. That is a separate constraint, and it is worth counting before applying rather than after.

Confusing it with private school courses. Advertising for private programmes sometimes looks official. The entry point for a state programme is the employment portal; everything else is worth double-checking.

What to do before applying

An order that saves months:

1. Check whether you fall into a category — on the portal, from the current description of the programme.
2. Look at the list of directions available in your region — it is finite, and that already narrows the choice.
3. Match the list against your own profile: which of the available options actually suits you by content and by values, not just by name.
4. Test one or two directions in real life — a conversation with an insider about an ordinary Tuesday. That is cheaper than several months of training.
5. Count your time constraint: how many hours a week you genuinely have after work and family.
6. Apply and go through career orientation at the employment centre.

Note that step 3 is the only one that cannot be done on the portal. It is also the substantive part of the decision.

About that career-orientation step

State career orientation does its own job: establish an orientation and offer options from the available list. It works and it is free. What it usually does not do is explain why this particular direction suits you, where it will be hard for you specifically, and what to do about your constraints. That is not a complaint: a mass procedure has a different format.

So it makes sense to arrive there already understanding your profile, rather than to go looking for it. Then the conversation is about the available options rather than about you from scratch.

What an algorithm computes here, rather than a list

A list of directions answers the question «what is available». It does not answer «which of these is mine».

The career direction test answers the second: code scores six interest types and six work values, applies your constraints — runway, room for income to drop, room to study, mobility, backing — and matches candidates from a 192-occupation directory. For some entries the directory notes that a direction regularly appears in state retraining lists — but that is a hint about where to look, not a claim about your region and year. The current list always lives on the portal.

Nearby on the same subject

Neighbouring readings in this cluster, if this is not your only question:

• In-Demand Occupations
• How to Choose an Occupation