Closing date
20th March 2026
Are you a TY or Leaving Cert Student?
Tell us about your Work Experience, the Skills you developed and Investigate a Career of your choice
Tell us about your Work Experience, the Skills you developed and Investigate a Career of your choice
This exciting competition promotes the importance of Career Skills and encourages the value of career research. It gives students the chance to reflect on the skills they developed during their work experience and explain how those skills can help them in their future career.
The competition is developed by CareersPortal and is supported by the Department of Education, Gaisce, The President's Award, An Chomhairle um Oideachas Gaeltachta & Gaelscolaíochta (COGG), Fáilte Ireland, Construction Industry Federation (CIF), ESERO and the TY, LCVP and LCA Programmes.
There are great prizes and trophies to be won for each of the 7 categories, both for individuals and their winning school.
The Award Ceremony takes place in early May in the Clock Tower in the Department of Education and Youth. The winning students, their teacher / guidance counsellor and school management will be invited to attend.
Increase your chances of winning by investigating a career of your choice in one of our spotlight sectors for 2026:
The winning schools will each receive €1000 for their school programme (Guidance / TY / Leaving Cert)
There are also great prizes for 2 nd and 3 rd place winners in each category including Tablets, Bluetooth Speakers and Wireless Earbuds.
For many people, this will be related to the work experience they did, but it doesn't have to be! We understand that not everyone can find work experience in their dream career (Astronauts, Surgeons, Time-Travellers...)
Is your Work Experience placement or Career Investigation based on careers in Tourism & Hospitality? If so your entry will be included in this new category and is eligible for a special prize! View more...
Is your Work Experience placement or Career Investigation based on careers in the Construction Sector? If so your entry will also be included in this new category and is eligible for a special prize! View more...
Did you get experience in Space Science during your Work Experience placement? Or have you completed a Career Investigation in careers in the Space Science Sector? If so, your entry will also be included in this new category and is eligible for a special prize! View more...
Submissions can be:
CareersPortal
71-73 College House
Rock Road,
Blackrock,
Co. Dublin
A94 F9X9
PS - Make sure your Guidance counsellor / programme coordinator signs off on your entry before you submit!
“The Career Skills Competition is an excellent opportunity for students to reflect on their work experience and research future career paths, exploring skills and values that pertain to the workplace and specific careers. Every year, students find this competition enjoyable and rewarding and it provides extrinsic motivation to use their work to enter a completion with outstanding prizes. I would highly recommend engaging with the Career Skills Competition.”
Ailish Egan, Guidance Counsellor, Colaiste Muire, Ennis
“The National Career Skills Competition can be linked effectively to the Work Experience ProgrammeinTransition Year as well as theCareer Investigation inLCVP and Vocational Preparation and Guidance ModuleinLCA. As a guidance counsellor I find the competition very beneficial in improving students’ independentcareer and educational researchabilities along with developing their awareness of Career Skills.”
Guidance Counsellor, Cork
“The competition emphasises work experience and career research, which allowed participants to apply academic knowledge and practical skills to enhance their understanding of a chosen career. Detailing these experiences helped our previous winning student Sophia articulate the skills she developed, such as planning, professionalism, and sensitivity. I would highly recommend this competition as it promotes independent research and equips students with a comprehensive understanding of their future careers.”
Gordon Weldon, Career Guidance Counsellor, St Conleth’s College, Ballsbridge
“Tugann an comórtas spreagúil seo deis iontach do dhaltaí taighde gairme agus machnamh a dhéanamh ar na scileanna atá forbartha acu le linn a dtáithí oibre. Cuireann sé litearthacht, cruthaitheacht, féinmhachnamh agus litearacht digiteach chun cinn. Tá duaiseanna iontacha le buachaint fosta!”
Roisín Uí Fhearchair, Treoirchomhairleoir, Coláiste Oiriall
“The Career Skills competition helped our students to reflect on what they had learned on their work experience journey and the variety of entry streams meant they could be creative with their submission – some of our TYs particularly enjoyed filming and editing their entries for the Vlog category – it was great the competition catered to all our students’ talents.”
Guidance Counsellor, Wexford
“So much of the hard work our students put into their Career investigations could be transferred across to complete their submission for the National Career Skills Competition – it was fantastic to attend the Awards ceremony in the Department of Education and for the opportunity the students had to speak about their work experience with Minister Norma Foley, they made life-long memories.”
Guidance Counsellor, Galway
“Students are given an opportunity to complete a Work Experience Career Skills report. They are also required to investigate a career and identify a course that leads to that career. They discuss how their career choice might be a good fit for their skills, personal aptitudes, and interests. Our students enjoy the self-reflection involved and the self-awareness that is a result of entering the competition.”
Noeleen Bogue, Our Lady’s College, Greenhills, Drogheda
The Closing Date for the National Career Skills Competition is 20th March 2026
CareersPortal is proud to be an official Gaisce Challenge Partner!
Gaisce - The President's Award is Ireland's national youth award and self-development programme for young people aged 14-25. It is a direct challenge from the President of Ireland to all young people to dream big and realise their potential.
Gaisce Challenge Partners are organisations that offer opportunities for Gaisce Participants to complete one or more Challenge Area activities. These areas include Personal Skill, Community Involvement and Physical Recreation, all essential for earning a Gaisce Award. At CareersPortal, we facilitate activities for Gaisce Participants completing their Bronze Award.
Your application to the Career Skills Competition can be used to fulfil your Personal Skills Challenge for the Bronze Award.
For more information, you can contact [email protected].
To learn more about Gaisce, you can visit https://www.gaisce.ie/
Unfortunately, we can't accept any entries after the closing date.
There is a maximum word count of 650 for each of the pink headings under Section 2 and Section 3 on the Entry Details PDF.
The shortlist will be announced online by mid April. The winning students will be announced at the end of April and their teachers will be contacted directly.
Simply Upload the video to YouTube and send us on the link! You also have the option of using Google Drive or WeTransfer.
The video should be no longer than 5 minutes. Videos longer than 4 minutes will not be considered.
The competition is based on your Work Experience placement and the skills that you have observed and developed there. You have to have done a Work Experience to enter this competition.
Yes, you can still do a Career Investigation on your dream job as part of your competition entry. However, when it comes to doing your diary entry (TY) and talking about the career skills you observed you must use the experience you got during your work placement.
Yes, you can enter in either language. It would be a shame however, just to enter in English, if you have the ability to enter in Irish and remember there will never be as much competition in this category!
No, we can only judge the experience from one work placement for each competition participant.
No, you don't need a CareersPortal account to enter. You can email or post your competition entry directly to us. If you are going to submit your application through the online entry form, then you do need to register with CareersPortal. It only takes a few minutes and it is completely free. It will also be very useful for you going forward as you will be able to take a number of on line assessments, print a career report and save your favourite courses, occupations and sectors to the file.
The name and contact email of your Teacher or Guidance Counsellor must be on your competition entry.
Your Programme coordinator will be dependent on what competition you enter.
For a lot of students, it is their Guidance Counsellor, but it might also be your TY, LCVP or LCA coordinator. These are the teachers that head up these programmes in your school. You will need to put the name and contact details of this teacher on your application as most of the correspondence will be through them.
Your Programme coordinator will be dependent on what competition you enter.
Email entries can be sent to [email protected].
Postal entries can be sent to:We accept .doc .docx .ppt .pptx .odt .pdf
No. We do not publish the winning script. We do publish your name and your school. Pictures are also taken at the award ceremony and these are both published in the media and online.
The Award Ceremony will take place in early May in the Clock Tower at the Department of Education and Skills on Marlborough Street, Dublin 2.
Why not explore our Self Assessment area. From here you can learn about career interests and take our free interest profiler.
Use can also use our Career Explorer tool to find out more about different types of careers.
Yes. We have a Career Skills self-assessment worksheet and a Work Placement Skills evaluation form which you may find useful.
Yes, feel free to email us at [email protected] or call us on 01-440 2314
