INTERIM EVALUATION OF CAREER LEARNING PILOTS

Today (5th September 2019) DFE published an interim evaluation of the Career Learning Pilots which were established to test innovative approaches to lifelong learning and inform the design of the National Retraining Scheme.

https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/cost-and-outreach-pilot-evaluation-interim-findings

In England, the Cost and Outreach Pilots are running in five areas, led by the Local Enterprise Partnership (LEP) or Combined Authority: Greater Lincolnshire LEP, Heart of the South West LEP, Stoke and Staffordshire LEP, Leeds City Region LEP, and West Midlands Combined Authority.

Hope to see the National Retraining Scheme gathering further momentum soon – watch this space! We’ll be discussing this with Unionlearn at our forthcoming conference on 10th October 2019 in Birmingham (one of the pilot areas) – https://dmhassociates.org/international-conference-career-development-identity-and-impact-central-birmingham-england-10th-october-2019

Here’s a set of ppt slides outlining National Retraining Scheme latest developments

NRS_Overview powerpoint

Implications for the National Retraining Scheme

Findings from the learner survey and learner interviews highlighted the following implications for the National Retraining Scheme (NRS):

• To successfully engage adults seeking to retrain, the NRS will need to address both barriers related to individuals’ attitudes towards career learning, as well as more practical barriers related to individuals’ personal circumstances.

• The range of career-related motivations cited by learners illustrates the diversity of messages that need to be conveyed as part of any outreach activity for the NRS. These messages will also need to be tailored to ensure they are engaging for the broad target group.

• Learners responded positively to becoming aware of learning opportunities in the workplace, either implicitly through seeing promotional materials or explicitly through employer encouragement to participate in training. This emphasises the importance of employer engagement in the NRS – not only to support new recruits but also to communicate messages about the scheme and the offer of training to staff.

• Feedback from some learners indicated that they would have welcomed more substantive IAG. This highlights the importance of having a more in-depth IAG offer for people who need it. This offer will need to be clearly communicated to ensure individuals are aware of what they can access, how, and the benefits of doing so.