Apprentice Briefing - 29th July 2021

 

Hi, a very good evening everybody. Thank you for joining us those of you that have. I’m Marcus Bailey, Chief Operating Officer. I’m joined on the session, though you won’t be able to see them yet, but as we swap round you will see. I’m joined by Bob Champion, Director of Workforce and Chris McGregor, Head of Education and Training as well.

We wanted just to take the opportunity just to a) keep in contact and say hello but b) just tell you kind of where we are and an opportunity as well then, because we know some of you will have had one-to-ones we’ve been planning delivered, where there’s any kind of questions you wanted to ask us as well. And that was always our commitment just to say look we will look to try to answer whatever we can as soon as we can as well. So, the question-and-answer function is there so please do put that through and that way we can go through and answer them.

So, if I start just to talk about, and kind of.. I guess the really important bit. One is making sure you’re ok, and hence why we’ve got the one-to-ones planned, it’s very much about a supportive, it’s very much about a wellbeing conversation, making sure you feel safe and make sure you feel ok. It also gives us a chance to pick up any frequently asked questions, any areas that we need to assist and focus on. And believe us when we say this, some of your comments, questions and feedback and frequently asked questions, we’ve been able to use in conversations with education providers in securing it because it’s about that smooth transition, it’s about that assistance.

So, look what I was hoping we would be able to do, is we would be able to formally announce who our education provider would be, we’re working in partnership. We’re not quite there, and when I’ve spoken to colleagues around the patch when I’ve been out and about, I’m not here to jinx anything in reality. I don’t want to give anything away until we’ve got things signed on the dotted line.

But what I can say is that we are working really, really hard. We have identified an education provider, so its one education provider, and we are in discussions with that education provider to, in effect, take on all the apprentices that were under EEAST as an education provider. So, that’s everybody in the scope for that. We’ve been discussing with them about you and your progress, so forgive us in this term that we use to describe, but we use it in groups. So, you’ll have people who are waiting EPA’s, you’ll have people who are making progress as we move forward with regards to those areas of portfolios and return, so a number of things in there as well.

As I said, we believe that we have made good progress. We believe, because this is a contractual relationship that we have with the provider, that we need to make sure we’ve done our due diligence. While we are keen to progress it as fast as we can, we need to do that kind of safety check, as you would do with any contract, we need to make sure, and both parties actually have to sign up to it. So, the education provider and us have to sign up to that as well.

So, we believe that we are making good progress. We’ve spoken with the provider every single day, more than once every single day, over the last two weeks, really to start getting into the detail, the nuts and bolts of what that may mean. So, if I can give anything here is, I have good optimism that we are getting this towards the line. Remember when we did the first briefings, the conversation was that once we can get the education provider signed up on the line, then in effect, the work would continue. I’ll hand over to Chris in a minute just to talk about what our next steps would be when it came to a transition to an education provider as well.

The other bit is that when we do this we are, the education provider and us, we are pushing each other on time scales, so we are trying to do it as rapidly as we can, but also we need to be realistic because what we don’t want to do is give you a false promise and the education provider is very clear, and actually we’re very clear is, if it’s going to be three weeks, four weeks, five weeks, eight weeks before we can get everything done, I would rather we told you an honest and realistic time frame that we stick to rather than promise something that we then break.

Because actually, if we think about culturally where we are, if we think about where we are in our openness in communication, I would not want to give you anything that is false, because actually that’s not how we operate as well. So, I would say please we are working really hard, the team are working, and I say this because Chris is on the line and I can do it, Chris has cancelled his annual leave to focus on this for you and us as well, so actually people are saying this is really important, and they are giving their own time back to try and help get this over the line for you as well.

So, I’m going to pause there for a second and I’m going to hand over to Chris if that’s alright Chris, just to talk about the conceptual bit of what an implementation approach might be with a new provider. Thank you.

Thanks Marcus, I think the main thing that I think is really important to say is that that continuation of support is the really important thing for us. So we’re working with the new provider to make sure that we’ve got the right support and practice in place and that’s really crucial that we have got the right people in the right place to support you as a learner.

The gathering of evidence, so getting your competencies signed off, working through your portfolios, that has been continuing and what we’re aiming to do with the new provider and with the structure that we’re putting in place, is to limit any disruption to your progress. So it’s really important that you continue to work through those portfolios and as soon as we can update you on the support and practice, and any changes on that front then we will do.

Some of the big questions we’ve been asked through the one-to-ones and the frequently asked questions are around those topics. So, first there is a lot of questions around your portfolios, and we as an organisation still work on a paper portfolio, some other providers use electronic portfolios. But a lot of people have been nervous about having to revisit or redo their work, so just to give you some assurance that the awarding body, so FutureQuals, have already assured us that they will do what is called a sample, or a dip sample, they will look at the portfolios, the quality of the portfolios, and there has never been any question over the quality of your work, we’ve always done extremely well on these quality assurance visits.

So, they will do that, and then that will allow them to work with a new provider to continue with the paper format so there will be no need for you to transfer on to any other system, that paper format will continue. So that’s why it’s so important that you continue to gather your competencies, because that’s just keeping you on your own time scales and deadlines.

The other big question is around End Point Assessments, and of course if you are approaching the end of your journey I think, rightly so, you’d be nervous about any delay getting to that end point. So again, working with FutureQuals who is the awarding body, they are aware of how many people are approaching End Point Assessments, they’re already making provisions to work with the new provider to support those End Point Assessments. We have prioritised that list, and any new provider that we’ve been consulting with knows that that group of staff needs to be progressed in a really timely manner.