NEBOSH course tips

The NEBOSH National General Certificate is a great way to provide yourself with a strong foundation knowledge of Health & Safety. Whether you are looking to reinforce your knowledge as a Health & Safety manager to give you more confidence in your role or you are looking to open doors into a new career.

The course is broken down into 3 sections, NGC1, 2 & 3. NGC1 & 2 are written exams and 3 is a practical assessment. The written exams are 2 hours long and if you are not used to transferring lots of information from your head onto paper then practice is essential. Usually you will sit the exams for NGC1 and 2 in the same day (1 in the morning and 2 in the afternoon).

NGC1 is focused on the Management of Health & Safety whilst NGC2 is based on Controlling workplace hazards. Each paper has one 20 mark question and ten 8 mark question. The pass mark for the written papers is 45%. It is unlikely that you will be tested on any legislative changes in the 6 months prior to your exam date.

NGC3 has a higher pass rate of 60%. There is no syllabus for this part. You will be expected to demonstrate your knowledge of parts 1 & 2 in a working environment in the form of a risk assessment and report to senior management.

There are various study paths available such as full classroom tuition to e-learning. In any case you will have access to a tutor, either in the classroom or via email. Most tutors will be qualified NEBOSH examiners so use their knowledge and experience as much as you can.

A lot of students are surprised when they read their first NEBOSH style question so it is very critical that students get to grips with NEBOSH’s terminology and question style. NEBOSH issue a guide to the action verbs that they use and it is important that students learn these well as a lot of marks are lost due to confusion of the verbs.

The last piece of advice is to practice answering questions. You will get questions in books that you are provided with and your course supplier may also be authorized to provide you with past exam papers and examiners comments. If they cannot provide you with any past papers they can be purchased from NEBOSH. Use as many of these as possible and try to test yourself under exam conditions. The experience will prove worthwhile.