Skills Archives - Page 12 of 28 - North East Local Enterprise Partnership

Pupils at Newcastle’s Excelsior Academy have been taking lessons from two North East rowers who are set to take on ‘the world’s toughest row’.

On 12 December, Paul Hopkins and Philip Pugh, known as the Atlantic Dream team, will be setting off from La Gomera, in the Canary Islands, to race 3,000 miles to Antigua as part of the Talisker Whiskey Atlantic Challenge.

As they have been training for the challenge, they have also been running workshops with year 8 pupils at Excelsior Academy, helping the students to learn about topics including nutrition, design, weather and engineering.

“By working with Excelsior Academy we’ve been able to help the students learn through experiencing a practical project like our rowing challenge,” said Philip Pugh. “The students have learnt about the construction of our boat – which will be the only wooden boat in the race – as well as how we prepare for a challenge like this, the training we do and the equipment that we’ll be using.”

Paul Hopkins added: “Children ask the most amazing questions and they come at things from a very different angle from adults. We wanted to inspire children of all backgrounds to know that they can achieve amazing things.”

The partnership is part of the North East Local Enterprise Partnership’s Education Challenge programme, which is piloting a new model of learning in North East schools. The model is based on an approach which was first adopted in Nashville in 2005 and which resulted in significant improvements in attainment.

Michelle Rainbow, Skills Director at the North East LEP, said: “We hugely appreciate the support and involvement of Paul and Phil with Excelsior Academy and I know the students have been really inspired by working with them.

“By supporting teaching in an applied context through projects like this, it really enables pupils to engage with the subject, helping them to understand how what they learn at school applies to real-world situations. They’re an amazing pair to take on such an epic challenge and we’re looking forward to following their progress and success.”

As well as hearing from Paul and Philip and having the opportunity to ask questions about the challenge, the students will also visit the Port of Blyth to learn more about the construction of boats.

The students had the opportunity to sign Paul and Philip’s boat and, once the pair begin the challenge, will track their progress using GPS.

“Taking on this challenge takes us away from our homes and families but it will help to know that we have the support of all the pupils at Excelsior when we’re thousands of miles from home,” said Paul.

“Our boat is signed all over by people from the North East and we are rowing for everyone in the region. We’re not looking forward to the sea-sickness and discomfort but we are definitely looking forward to returning to Excelsior Academy when we’ve completed the race and telling the pupils all about it,” added Philip.

The Education Challenge programme supports schools to tackle their key challenges so they can improve, closing the gap between the region’s best and lowest performing schools to ensure that no child is left behind. Find out more at northeastambition.co.uk.

The Talisker Whiskey Atlantic Challenge will begin on 12 December 2019 and the Atlantic Dream team, who are the oldest pair of rowers in this year’s race, will be raising money for Tiny Lives and the Firefighters Charity. Find out more at atlanticdream19.com/

A free event by Silverdale School and Additionally Resourced Provision (ARP) aims to boost the talent pipeline for North Tyneside businesses and help young people into the world of work.

The Wallsend-based special needs school is opening its doors to local businesses at a business breakfast on Wednesday 20 November in a bid to build relationships and help link classroom teaching with future career pathways.

The event forms part of work with Silverdale’s Enterprise Adviser, Emma Watson at Engie North Tyneside, who has been liaising with the school to introduce new ways of supporting students as they move into employment or further education.

Enterprise Advisers are business leaders who work closely with a school’s senior leadership team to develop and drive a careers strategy that helps young people gain more experience of work and have more meaningful encounters with employers.

The Enterprise Adviser programme is a national initiative which connects senior business leaders with schools and colleges. It is managed in the North East by the North East Local Enterprise Partnership (LEP), as part of its North East Ambition programme.

Silverdale School and ARP caters for students between the ages of seven and sixteen who experience emotional, social and behavioural difficulties. The team there has already successfully helped students into work at organisations including North Tyneside Council and Trespass.

Alan Henny, standards manager and careers leader at Silverdale School, said: “We know that businesses want to support young people and help them develop the skills, attitudes and behaviours that employers seek, which is why we are holding this event to create opportunities through new partnerships.

“We are very proud of the achievements of our students and know they can be a valuable resource for businesses looking for young talent. We hope lots of local companies will sign up to find out more.”

Emma Watson, Schools HR Business Partner at Engie North Tyneside said: “This is an amazing opportunity for businesses to support young people through working with Silverdale.

“We are evolving how organisations and businesses can support young people in their education and choices beyond education. Many businesses typically think that we want work experience placements, but this isn’t what we are looking for.

“We want to tap into the potential that the pupils at Silverdale have, and the best way to do this is to create shared experiences with local people and businesses. This provides opportunity and choices for our young people, while the organisations involved benefit from knowing that they have added value to a worthwhile careers programme and many of the individuals themselves.”

Businesses who would like to attend the free business breakfast from 9am on Wednesday 20 November can register here.

The North East Ambition programme, delivered by the North East LEP, aims to support every secondary school and college across the region to adopt and implement the government’s Good Career Guidance Benchmarks.

Find out more about North East Ambition.

At the start of October, a new digital strategy for the North East was launched. Digital for Growth brings together partners from across the region to maximise opportunities for growth and investment. North East Local Enterprise Partnership (LEP) Skills Director, Michelle Rainbow, talks about digital skills and how our workforce will form a vital component of this new digital strategy.

The North East is a region with a vibrant digital ecosystem that is packed with the potential to deliver economic growth and more, new jobs as it continues to flourish.

That’s not just jobs which might be typically defined as digital – for example, gaming design or software development – but roles across all areas of industry, as more and more organisations embrace digitalisation and the increased productivity it brings

To make sure we’re in the best possible position to reap the benefits of digitalisation for our region, we need to focus on the digital skills needs that we know exist in the North East. We must make sure that people in our area – both our existing workforce and the workforce of the future – have the digital skills that employers are looking for, and the skills that will allow everyone to fully take part in an increasingly digitalised society.

We want to completely dispel any myths and stereotypes that exist when people think about digital skills, or careers in the digital sector, and we want to empower people of all ages and backgrounds to upskill and take advantage of new technologies and digital job opportunities.

Part of our work around this will be to link employers closely with schools, colleges and education providers to ensure that young people, from primary-school age onwards, understand the range of possibilities open to them in our region, whether that’s a career in a digitally focussed organisation or a role in any sector which will require sound digital skills.

The Digital for Growth strategy focuses on the many digital hubs and networks we have in the region, plus our colleges, universities and training providers. Strong relationships between education and industry are already having a positive impact and we want to see more of this happening throughout the region, across businesses of all sizes and types.

We also believe it’s especially important that employers continue to look to the future, champion digital skills development and invest in training for their workforce. Lifelong learning, training opportunities, mid-career retraining and non-linear career paths are other examples of areas where employers can take positive action to upskill existing workers and help to secure a pipeline of appropriately-skilled people for years to come.

The North East LEP aims to create 100,000 more and better jobs in the North East by 2024, and many of these jobs will be within the digital sector, or they will require strong digital skills.

Working together to address our digital skills needs is vital if we are to make sure that people in our region can enjoy a better quality of life, if our businesses are to continue to grow and take on new staff, and if our young people are to build fulfilling and successful careers.

Read more about the North East’s Digital for Growth strategy here. If you’d like to join the North East LEP’s working group for digital skills, please get in touch at info@nelep.co.uk.

This week, the Confederation of British Industry (CBI) published a report into the importance of lifelong learning in our modern economy.

They’ve entitled it ‘An upskill battle’, which perfectly encapsulates the challenge we face as we respond to an ever-changing sector and skills landscape, and as we work to develop a more competitive economy for the North East.

The very nature of this challenge – particularly around technology, digitalisation and innovation – is that the landscape will continue to evolve and change. It is indeed an uphill battle. So how do we plan and prepare for a future that could change the very moment we think we’ve caught up with it?

The North East Local Enterprise Partnership has been working for some time now – with employers, training providers, schools, colleges and other partners – to explore these challenges and keep them at the top of the agenda when it comes to future planning around employability and skills in the region.

And as highlighted by the CBI in their report, lifelong adult education and careers guidance need to be a fundamental part of the solution.

The demands of today’s global, digitally-driven economy require a broader, more agile skillset than ever before. It’s a fast-moving landscape that waits for no-one. Employers and government need to recognise this quickly and work together to make sure that people can access the training and support they need to remain productive throughout their working lives.

Employers need to build training and skills development into their business models, and government needs to ensure that training is accessible and affordable for those who need to pay for it themselves.

We also agree with the CBI that we need to extend careers guidance beyond 19 and abandon the idea that teachers can equip young people with all the knowledge they need at the start.

Instead, we need to think about careers guidance as a journey from primary-age to retirement, and this is particularly important for those who experience loss of work or whose skills face becoming obsolete.

If we can put the right support, guidance and training opportunities in place in our region, we can revive, revitalise and extend working lives and create a workforce that’s adaptable and ready to take on whatever the future economy may throw at us.

An important part of this will be around supporting people to understand how they can map and transfer their strengths, skills and knowledge from one role to another throughout their career.

That’s why we particularly support the CBI’s suggestion that government should look to develop a nationally recognised skills ‘passporting’ tool as part of the National Retraining Scheme, so that informal training and skills are taken into account when looking for future employment. The Department for Education’s Get Help to Retrain scheme, piloted in the North East, is a good step towards this, supporting people to map their current skills and signposting opportunities.

This CBI report highlights some very stark realities; people will typically work up to twenty years longer than their parents, well into their 70s, meaning the growing need for adult education and a shift towards a lifelong learning culture is critical.

Working into our 70s and beyond is a challenge that many of us will personally face. The time to plan for that future, is now.

Michelle Rainbow, Skills Director, North East Local Enterprise Partnership.

Newcastle College is the North East’s largest college, with more than 16,000 students. It is also part of Newcastle College Group (NCG) – one of the largest not-for-profit education and training groups in the UK, made up of seven colleges.

The college is supported by the North East Local Enterprise Partnership’s North East Ambition programme, which helps every secondary school and college in the region towards achieving the government’s Good Careers Guidance Benchmarks.

In just 12 months, the college has successfully improved the coherence and visibility of careers guidance across the whole organisation.

A dedicated Careers Portal is now prominent on the college website and every newly-enrolled student receives a clear and user-friendly Skills and Careers Programme Plan.

More than 5,000 16 to 18-year-old students, including apprentices, received this during their induction activities at the start of their qualifications this year.

Ronnie Burn, Head of Student Services and Careers Leader at Newcastle College, explains how they achieved this success, including the challenges they have navigated along the way:

Supporting the progression and next steps for our students was always at the very heart of our work. We set out to create a plan that could and would be embedded at a college-wide level, to ensure that all our students would be fully aware of our careers guidance and curriculum offer and could make informed decisions for themselves, at every opportunity.

One of our primary goals was to ensure that ownership and responsibility of careers guidance within the college is a key feature for each and every staff member.

We started our journey by completing North East Ambition’s benchmarks audit tool. We also used the Careers and Enterprise Company’s Compass assessment tool.

Doing all of this gave us a great starting point for creating a three-year action plan.

What we did next

Through North East Ambition, we were given the opportunity to join the country’s only regional College Hub, and this gave us many opportunities to consult on best practice models, drawing from career guidance peers from across the region.

The external evolution of careers guidance development work over the last two years, both nationally and regionally, has provided a network to share and test new thinking in developing working career guidance models that operationally fit with the college.

One of our priorities was to identify those colleagues with a responsibility for the provision of careers guidance from across the college, and ensure they were included in the planning from the start.

We consulted right across the college to gain feedback on the first edition of the Skills and Careers Programme Plan, and this included discussions with NCG Executive Directors, members of the college Principalship Team, college Directors, Heads of Curriculum and Service Managers, the Quality Team, Central Support staff and Marketing services.

The impact of this has been that our plan reflects a number of aspects of curriculum content delivery and developing practice.

These include the development of ‘schemes of learning’ incorporating the skills, knowledge and behaviours required in the context of a job role, as well as a focus on the relevance of English and Maths.

The process has also helped us to look at the expectations around work experience and engagement with employers, which has resulted in us developing the role of Enterprise Advisors by curriculum area.

Our continuing collaborative work with staff ensures that our next Skills and Careers Programme Plan aligns with the quality assurance cycle and the student journey, becoming a natural development within the business planning process.

Initial indications suggest we’ve achieved positive reinforcement of careers guidance from all staff and students across the college.

Our biggest challenges

Our biggest challenges have been around developing a sustainable model that is embedded across the college and is accessible to all.

What we learned

It was vital to involve colleagues from across the college, to ensure that responsibility and accountability was transparent. We scheduled fortnightly meetings with curriculum directors and managers to promote the context of the plan and embed this into the business planning process.

Top takeaways

Acknowledge the diversity and social mobility of your students and recognise that ‘one size does not fit all’, so build flexibility into your programme.

Early buy-in and agreement from senior leaders provides a springboard for the careers leader to accelerate action plans.

Visit Newcastle College’s careers portal at ncl-coll.ac.uk/careers

Read the latest Skills and Careers Programme Plan for 2019/20

Find out more about North East Ambition at northeastambition.co.uk

Here in the North East, we’re leading the way in testing how we can offer inspiring careers guidance to primary school pupils.

The North East Ambition Career Benchmarks: Primary Pilot takes the Government’s Good Career Guidance Benchmarks, originally developed for secondary schools, and adapts them for primaries.

Over two years, 70 pilot schools will test how they can implement and achieve the benchmarks; examining what works, where extra support might be needed and what impact the work has at a pupil and whole-school level.

The project is being led by the North East Local Enterprise Partnership, supported by the EY Foundation and the European Social Fund.

Sian Browne, School to Work Lead for the EY Foundation, describes her recent visit to the North East to see some of the work that primary schools are already doing.

“The name ‘career enabling primary pilot’ is a bit of a mouthful, but it is something that I believe will have a massive impact. So, what does it mean? Put simply, it is a new programme designed to help children better understand possible future job opportunities available to them. It seems a long way off, but choices made at primary age can be crucial in shaping their future career.

“Developing this project with the North East Local Enterprise Partnership (LEP) has been a passion of mine for almost two years, so the chance to see it in action was a huge thrill.

“Arriving in Newcastle, I spent a couple of days with our fantastic facilitator team. We started off with an inspiring meeting with the teachers who will be leading on delivering the pilot in their schools. Each of them showed impressive commitment, asking lots of questions, bringing loads of ideas and sharing good experiences.

“That was followed by a visit to a primary school taking part in the pilot. I met with a careers leader and headteacher who are already achieving great results with their pupils by introducing careers into their curriculum – so they seemed to already be one step ahead! They also talked to us of their meetings with interesting people from different fields of work, who shared their experiences with the children, including a geophysicist and a female naval surgeon.

“Perhaps my favourite moment was when I saw the pupils setting out their aspirations in their career books, with one young reception pupil saying they wanted to be a “tooth fairy”, a job I certainly did on many occasions!

“Next stop was the global automotive supplier Unipres, who hosted 72 students. Watching the young people try out virtual reality to load trucks and donning their special protective gear provided a glimpse of the future and was so uplifting. The apprentices spent time with each of them and were terrific role models. I’m certain some of those pupils now have their eye on an engineering apprenticeship when they get older.

“After so much time in the planning it was brilliant to see the early impact on all the children I met. We are so looking forward to working with them and their teachers over the next two years as they continue along the journey of improving careers enabling experiences.”

For more information visit northeastambition.co.uk.

Hundreds of schoolgirls from across the region gathered at Northumbria University on Monday 16 September to attend Newcastle High School for Girls (NHSG), one-day biennial North East Women (NEW) Leaders Conference.

Supported by the North East Local Enterprise Partnership through its North East Ambition initiative, the conference brought together female leaders from both within and outside the region to share their knowledge and experience with the aim of challenging gender inequalities and inspiring young women to take a leading role in whatever career or profession they choose.

Michelle Rainbow, Skills Director at the North East LEP, said: “This event provided a great opportunity for young women to hear first-hand about the career journeys of exceptional, hard-working and brilliantly successful females.

“We want all young people to be ambitious about the career opportunities that await them, no matter what their background or gender. Through our North East Ambition programme, we’re supporting schools and colleges across the region to offer a range of high-quality careers activities and experiences and achieve the government’s Good Careers Guidance Benchmarks.

“North East Ambition also links schools and employers more closely together, to identify and meet the skills demands of the future and support our aim of driving an uplift of 100,000 more and better jobs by 2024.”

Speakers at the event included Ann Francke, Chief Executive of the Chartered Management Institute; Debbie Edwards, CEO of FDisruptors; and Sarah Glendinning, Regional Director of the CBI.

The young delegates attended a series of Power Up Workshops offering tools to boost the girls’ futures, focusing on areas such personal branding, jargon busting and getting the best out of people. They also explored what leadership looks like now and in the future, and how they can develop their own personal authentic leadership attributes.

The North East LEP’s North East Ambition programme aims to ensure all North East schools and colleges achieve the government’s Good Career Guidance Benchmarks by 2024. By doing so, every young person should have access to excellent careers guidance that enables them to identify routes to a successful working life, make more informed decisions about their future and be better prepared for the workplace.

For more information, visit www.northeastambition.co.uk.

Pupils from Bexhill Primary Academy in Sunderland visited global automotive manufacturer Unipres on Friday 20 September as part of a new pilot programme designed to build ambition from an early age.

The North East Ambition: Careers Benchmarks Primary Pilot, managed and delivered by the North East Local Enterprise Partnership and supported by the EY Foundation, is testing how the government’s Good Careers Guidance Benchmarks – eight clearly defined benchmarks for good career guidance – can be adapted for primary schools. It is funded by the European Social Fund.

During the visit, pupils worked alongside apprentices and staff at Unipres to discover more about the jobs they do and what skills they need for each role. They also got to try out some of the company’s state-of-the-art equipment, including its virtual reality crane and virtual reality welder.

Andrew Hodgson, Chair of the North East Local Enterprise Partnership, said: “This visit has been a great opportunity for younger pupils to experience what it might be like to work in the advanced manufacturing and automotive sectors, and I hope it has inspired some ambitious ideas.

“It’s fantastic to see significant regional employers such as Unipres actively involved in supporting the skills development of our young people from the very earliest age, and I am certain that these children will gain a huge amount from what they’ve experienced here today.

“Improving skills, access to employment and supporting career progression is at the heart of the North East Strategic Economic Plan.

“We can help to do that by ensuring young people of every age have meaningful encounters with a broad range of employers; and that they understand the link between the subjects they study in school and the career opportunities available to them. It may sound simple, but it’s a huge culture change for many schools.

“The North East Ambition: Careers Benchmarks Primary Pilot is part of our commitment to improve social mobility by supporting age-appropriate careers-related experiences from primary age.

“The pilot is about exploring how we offer young pupils consistently high-quality, careers-related learning that will spark curiosity, self-belief and hope for the future. Today’s event is an excellent example of just that.”

A total of 70 primary schools from across the North East LEP area are involved in the pilot. Each school has the support of a Facilitator to help them implement and achieve the benchmarks and an Action Researcher to capture the impact.

They can also access seed funding, provided by the EY Foundation, to help finance careers activities in or out of school.

The schools also get to be part of a community of Primary Careers Leaders, helping to deliver a shared vision for achieving the primary benchmarks.

Sian Browne from the EY Foundation said: “Research shows that decisions made at primary age can impact future work opportunities. So, raising awareness at an early stage about the employment options available is crucial. That is why the EY Foundation is delighted to be working with the North East Local Enterprise Partnership as they begin their pilot to develop and embed career-enabling benchmarks in primary schools. We hope these benchmarks will be rolled out across the primary sector, better preparing all pupils for the next stage of career and employment support at secondary school.”

The Careers Benchmarks Primary Pilot follows the North East LEP’s successful delivery of the Gatsby Careers Guidance Benchmark Pilot in 2015, which led to government launching new statutory guidance for schools on how to deliver careers education.

Maureen Askew, Unipres Training Academy Senior Controller, said: “It’s fantastic to welcome the pupils from Bexhill Academy to Unipres so they can discover what the engineering and manufacturing sector is really like, gaining an insight into the variety of exciting careers we offer.

“We believe it is essential that companies like ours from across the region work directly with schools to demystify industry, capture the imagination of these young people and show how the automotive industry remains a vibrant and vital sector in the North East.

“Unipres is absolutely committed to working with schools to support the Career Benchmarks agenda and help excite pupils about engineering and the many other opportunities on their doorstep.”

Laura Carr, Year Six teacher and careers lead at Bexhill Primary Academy, added: “We were keen to take part in the Benchmarks Primary Pilot as it is going to really help us to structure and build on the work we’re already doing in school around careers and skills.

“It’s been fantastic to visit Unipres today and the pupils have learned so much about the work that happens here, from accountancy to engineering, and the skills you need to do those jobs.

“Hands-on learning opportunities like this really excite and inspire the pupils, and I know they’ve all really enjoyed today’s visit, as well as gained a huge amount.”

Year Six pupil, Molly, said: “Today has been really exciting and I’ve learned all about the different kinds of jobs you can do here. The shop floor was the best bit, with the big machines. You could see everyone was working really hard.”

The North East Ambition: Careers Benchmarks Primary Pilot is delivered in partnership with EY Foundation, an independent charity that helps young people overcome barriers to gaining fulfilling employment.

In 2016, the EY Foundation and the Chartered Management Institute (CMI) undertook research with 1500 young people about the challenges of getting into work in the 21st century. This identified the need for interventions at primary school age to develop employability skills and forge links with employers to better prepare young people for the world of work. Building on the success of new career guidance benchmarks for secondary schools (following a two-year pilot by the North East LEP and the Gatsby Foundation), the EY Foundation believes these benchmarks need to be adapted to the primary sector to enable a seamless transition from primary through to secondary education. The EY Foundation believes the pilot project in 70 primary schools across the North East is critical step towards achieving this. For more information visit www.eyfoundation.com.

The visit was brokered by EngineeringUK, who matched the school with Unipres. EngineeringUK is a not-for-profit organisation which works in partnership with the engineering community to inspire tomorrow’s engineers and increase the talent pipeline into engineering. Unipres works closely with EngineeringUK across the year to develop and promote work experience and skills development opportunities for local pupils. For more information visit www.engineeringuk.com.

For more information about the work the North East Local Enterprise Partnership is doing to improve skills and the quality of careers education in the region, visit www.northeastambition.co.uk.

Students from Berwick Academy in Northumberland visited a key site in the North East energy sector to learn about the range of careers available to them in the future.

During a day spent at InTEGRel in Gateshead, where academics and engineers work to deliver breakthroughs in the decarbonisation of heat, year 9 students explored roles ranging from Company Director to Technician.

Neil Willis, Regional Lead: Education Challenge at the North East Local Enterprise Partnership (LEP), said: “We know that encounters with employers can help students to understand how what they learn at school applies to their future careers and can have a positive impact on their ambition, motivation and attainment.

“That’s why a vital part of our Education Challenge programme focuses on supporting schools and employers to bring the world of work into the classroom.”

Students visited the InTEGRel control room, learning about the technology being used to tackle the UK’s energy challenges, while staff from Northern Gas Networks, Newcastle University, Northumbrian Water and Northern Powergrid introduced the students to a wide range of career paths within the energy sector.

The visit built on an earlier in-school event which saw businesses visit Berwick Academy to talk to students and lead a range of hands-on activities relating to the energy sector.

Rupert, a student at Berwick Academy, commented: “Having Northern Gas Networks come in to see us at school was great, but having the opportunity to see first-hand the work that they are doing right here in our region has made everything so much clearer for me. I now know even more about all the different careers that are possible and also a little bit about how to get there, with university as a likely option.”

Neil Willis added: “The North East energy sector is a strategically important sector in the region, full of opportunities for young people and it’s vital that we work closely with employers to help schools, parents and pupils to visualise a successful path into their future education and careers.”

This event was part of the North East LEP’s Education Challenge programme, which aims to reduce the gap between the North East’s best and lowest performing schools and to integrate an understanding of the world of work and career opportunities into the curriculum.

Find out more about the Education Challenge programme.

Category: Skills

Newcastle pupils learn how to prepare for the world’s toughest rowing challenge

Silverdale School looks to boost talent pipeline with business event

Harnessing digital potential in the North East

Planning for our region’s ‘upskill battle’

Bringing careers strategy into reality, and into life

In conversation with Sian Browne, School to Work Lead for the EY Foundation, about the North East Ambition Career Benchmarks: Primary Pilot

North East LEP supports conference aimed at inspiring next generation of female leaders

North East pilot programme to raise career aspirations of primary schools pupils

Visit to North East energy site unlocks learning for Berwick pupils