A Northern Region Partnership     

   

• Partners

• Purpose

• Funding

• Operations

The partnership

8 workplaces / employers

11 ULRs

3 FTE staff

£1.07m 2009-2012

Health and Social Care sector

Target 2010 -2011:

28 learners from IMD quintile 1:

27 achieved

Widening Participation in HE

Newcastle City Council– 13 learners – Home care workers– Residential care workers– 6 – K101 only– 7 – K101 + NVQ 3– Recruited by Union Learning Reps– Interviewed by ULRs and employer

Progression route

Newcastle City Council– 6 learners progressed to KYJ113– 6 registered for K270 (February presentation)

– Next course will be L3 option– Practice based SW courses

– 2nd cohort of K101– Self funding

Progression route

Newcastle City Council– Future cohorts of K101 – Independent progression through K101, KYJ113,

K270 and optional L3 module

Interview

– Practice based SW courses → Social work degree

OR– Other L2 and L3 course → Open / named degree

Progression route

Newcastle City Council

Eventual aim:K101 and progression route to be offered to all Social

Care staff

Funding:FAF, National Scholarship Scheme, Student loans,

Salary Sacrifice (?)

Progression route

Newcastle City Council

Speaking for themselves

Progression route

Why evaluate?

• Employer driven evaluation to establish extent of impact on practice

Evaluation

• In depth interviews with all 13 participants

- transcribed and analysed for key themes

and dimensions

• Participant questionnaire (61% response rate)

• In depth interview with Care Services Manager

COURSE CONTENT AND MANAGEMENT

SUPPORT PERSONAL BENEFITS SKILLS ACQUISITION

CHANGES IN PRACTICE

-Recruitment

-Course content

-Integration of K101 and NVQ3

-Flexibility

-Support from tutors and face to face tutorials

-On line support from helpline and student forum

-Peer support

Management support

-Support from Bridges to Learning and UNISON

-High sense ofachievement

-Increased selfconfidence

-Increased selfesteem

-IncreasedMotivation

-Positivere-evaluation ofown role

-Moreknowledgeable

-Wider horizons

-Future orientated

-Computer skills

-Numeracy skills

-Cognitive skills e.g. more analytical and reflective; able to see relevance of knowledge and evidence as a basis for practice -Increased skills in time management

-Increased sensitivity to and awareness of the experience and needs of service users-More detailed approaches to care and report writing-Changes in ‘mindset’-More confident about own role in service user advocacy -Raised awareness of impact of contextual issues related to professional and political change

TABLE 1: OVERALL THEMES AND THEIR DIMENSIONS

Impact on practice

“..we just go in, we open the door and we see what we see half the time, but it just gets you to think and just take a step back, and this person’s a wee bit angry, why are they? They’ve got something..it just makes you think. It’s not what they are now it’s what they have been and the biggest thing that I took away is to just step back and look at the whole picture”

“I think sometimes you get yourself in a mindset because you’ve been doing the same thing for years and now I find I take a different approach, . Now I would be looking at it and saying ‘Oh right, mobility’s a bit poor, I’d be asking the question well what’s wrong with their mobility, do they have any aids, do they need any aids, have they been assessed by OTs, it makes you think just to ask for that little bit more information [..] So I just found reading through the K101 stuff has helped me manage it a bit better, and helped me get a bit more flow and just take a step back and look”

The management perspective

“You’re looking at different staff at the end of this, they walk taller, they talk with more confidence”

“To have that greater understanding treats people with respect. It treats staff with respect and understanding, and if you treat people with respect they treat others with respect. They understand the context of the service user and why they may be in the situation they are in..”

The academic perspectives

Drawing on social theories of situated learning:

Lave and Wenger (1991)

Wenger – communities of practice

The academic perspectives

“while education and practice settings each have both theories and practices, they have very different cultures and very different discourses” (Eraut 2004)

codified vs non codified knowledge

Academic perspectives

Developing an ‘expansive’ learning environment at work.

Pedagogical/organisation factors along

the ‘expansive-restrictive continuum’

(Fuller and Unwin, 2003 and 2004)

The academic perspectives

Emotional resilience:

Shifting the emphasis from resilience as an individual trait or acquired skill to:

“a more interactional definition, incorporating wider social, cultural and organisational factors”

(Brigham and Smith 2011)

Recommendations• Briefing of both managers and potential students on amount and

level of study and level of computing skills required.• Briefing of managers about the importance of organising flexible

study release time.• Importance of participants having a high level of personal motivation

rather than being directed by line managers.• Lead in time for some students to acquire level of computing skills

and/or other study skills.• Importance of creating an infrastructure to enable peer support e.g.

facilitated group work and mentoring by ULRs.• Importance of embedding learning from the course in supervisory

and management processes i.e. as a tool to encourage reflective practice

• Consideration of strategic priorities in relation to categories of staff selected to study K101