In Cumbria, Barrow Sixth Form College are leading the development of the literacy element of Access to Employment (A2E).
Successful links have been made between the College, the NHS Academy's Access to Employment Programme and Cumbria Colleges Ltd.
As a result of working closely together, the Access to Employment literacy element of the course has been carefully contextualised to be relevant to people who would like to work in the Health Service/Care Sector.
The colleges have been very flexible and understood the need to make learning opportunities available to people who are unemployed and wishing to work in the sector or for those in employment who work shifts and aren't always able to attend courses at a set time.
One way around this was to provide computers for staff in the canteen in the afternoons, so they could log on to their learning programmes when they came off shift and the canteen wasn't being used for anything else.
Cumbria Colleges Ltd have also worked with the NHS Academy to bring the college learning bus into the workplace so staff could access learning at a time suitable to them.
For more details contact Karen Ingram on 07917 235012.
