The National Apprenticeship Service has just announced the creation of 5,000 Apprenticeship Grants for employers of 16 and 17 year olds. The grants are of £2,500 and are designed to encourage employers to take on unemployed 16 and 17 year olds as apprentices.

This is a great opportunity to benefit from:

·   Free recruitment
·  Support towards wage costs

·  Free training

Full details are set out at http://www.apprenticeships.org.uk/Employers/AGE16and17.aspx.
If your organisation could benefit from an additional member of staff, please call Elisabeth or Mike at Damar on 0161 480 8171. We will be able to guide you through the process in more detail and help you to manage both the recruitment and training of your new apprentices.
For more information on the business benefits of employing an apprentice, please see http://www.damartraining.com/literature/information-pack/DamarTraining_Using-Apprenticeships-to-Create-Value.pdf
NB…. To be eligible any new apprentices will need to have been recruited by the end of March, so if you are interested, please do not delay.

Samantha Denson, who works for Sim Trava Limited (which runs a group of Costa Coffee stores in the North West) has won Damar’s learner of the month award for November 2009. Sam, pictured here with Damar’s MD, Jonathan Bourne, works at the Oldham store and has just completed her NVQ in Team Leading. Congratulations to Sam, her assessor Sharon Adred and thank you also to Sim Trava for your support throughout the programme!

Damar is currently participating in a nationwide survey of work-based training. We are inviting all employers with whom we have worked over the last 12 months to take part.

Completing the survey only requires about five minutes of your time and is a great opportunity for you to feed back your views. We will get the results in January and will use these to make improvements in the quality of our service. The results will also be used by funders in assessing the performance of training providers. 

Although the survey remains open until 31^st December, the sooner you complete it the better. To encourage participation, on Friday 18^th December one of Damar’s own apprentices will draw participating employers’ names from a hat. The lucky winner will be featured on our website and will receive a magnum of champagne (or a suitable alternative!)

You can complete the survey in the ways set out below – online or automated voice responses are the easiest and quickest methods. You will need to enter your organisation’s personal identification number, which you can get by calling Andrea Parkinson at Damar on 0161 480 8171

Online: Go to the Framework website at http://www.surveys.com/employerviews and complete the survey online.

Telephone: Call the automated telephone line on 0800 856 0855 and answer the questions directly. 

By post: Complete the paper survey that was sent to you by the Learning and Skills Council in October. If you can’t find it, please call us on 0161 480 8171 and we will send you a further copy. 

A big thank you to all those who attended Damar’s annual celebration event which took place on 29th October at Edgeley Park in Stockport. It was great to see so many successful learners at the event and present them with their certificates and awards.

Photos of the event are available to view and purchase at www.bernadettedelaney.com/gallery until Friday 20th November. You need to click on “Private Gallery Login” and enter the event id and password, which are both damar.

It was harder than ever to choose this year’s award winners, who are:

Achiever of the year

Winner: Melissa Denny, Action Claims (http://www.actionclaims.co.uk/).

Runner-up: Emma Francis, Woodstock Leabank (http://www.woodstockleabank.co.uk/).

Employer of the Year

Winner: Expotel Hotel Reservations (http://www.expotel.com/).

Mark Aspinall Award

Winner: Mark Cook, Damar

Runner-up: Sonia Blake, PAS Limited (http://www.p11dorganiser.co.uk/)

Supervisor of the Year

Winner: Margaret Meynell, Clarke Nicklin (http://www.clarkenicklin.co.uk/)

Runner-up: Shal Anslow-Davies, Supanet (http://www.supanet.com/)

Congratulations to all the award winners and achievers!

At Damar we want to know what learners and employers think of our service and, importantly, how we can improve. As part of this process we are inviting all of our learners on Train to Gain and Apprenticeship programmes to participate in an online survey of learner views. The survey only takes a couple of minutes of your time and will give us great feedback on what you think. To participate, all you have to do is:

1. go to www.ipsos-mori.com/learnerviewssurvey/

2. input the code number for Damar, which is 10001831

3. input your personal learner number. You can get this from your assessor or by emailing info@damartraining.com. Take care to input the number correctly (don’t confuse upper and lower case letters or zeros from the letter “O”).

4. Complete the questionnaire. NB, when it asks “Please tell us if you are on: a course (in a college), a learning programme (as an apprentice or on a Train to Gain programme) or a training programme (being trained by your employer), please tick “A learning programme (as an Apprentice or on a Train to Gain programme)”.

5. Please print out a screen print of the final page and give this to your assessor.

Thanks!

PS: if there are any comments that you would like to make but which are not picked up by the survey, please email them to info@damartraining.com.

In partnership with AimHigher (www.aimhighergreatermanchester.co.uk) Damar are offering learners a chance to attend a free 1/2 day training session at MMU’s prestigious business school.

The “Cillit Bang Challenge” takes place on Tuesday 3rd November at Manchester Metropolitan University’s Buusiness School from 10am to 1pm.

What is it?

The Challenge gets participants working on a re-launch of an advertisement for Cillit Bang. This is a group-based, time-pressured activity. Participants have to examine critically the current advertising campaign and develop a new campaign having examined some numerical data that is pprovided. Teams then present and justify their campaign. This activity promotes group-working, presentation skills and some use of number, as well as an element of creativity. No prior knowledge in advertising is necessary!

What is included?

Chance to take part in the Cillit Bang Challenge; tour of the Business School; meet current students and find out their views and experiences, lunch included.

If you want to find out more, please email info@damartraining.com or speak to your Damar assessor.

This year’s Damar Training Annual Awards Ceremony will be held on Thursday 29th October at Edgley Park in Stockport (home of Stockport County and Sale Sharks). All learners and their supervisors who completed qualifications with is over the last 12 months have been invited. The evening starts with a Champagne reception at 5pm followed by the presentation of awards and a buffet.

 If you haven’t received your invitation or would like any more information, please contact Louise Marsden at Damar on 0161 480 8171 or email louise@damartraining.com.

Damar employer Easi-Drive (http://www.easidrive.com/) released the following press release today:

STAFF ON THE ROAD TO WORK-BASED QUALIFICATIONS

Employees at leading accident management specialists Easi-Drive are on the road to success after bosses enrolled them on a business training course to help them realise their full potential.
 
The company, based in Wythenshawe, which employs 150 people is committed to helping its staff build their qualifications and skills base encouraging them to advance through to higher positions within the organisation.
 
The training with Damar is offered to employees at no cost to them, as they work towards national vocational qualifications (NVQs) or apprenticeships and work in areas such as administration, accounts, and customer service.
 
Leah Hambleton from Fallowfield was one of the first employees to benefit from the training.
 
The 19-year-old, a former pupil at Buckley High School in Wythenshawe, started her career at Easi-Drive as an administration trainee doing basic administration duties and was keen to undertake the Damar training to improve her skills.
 
She picked three courses, including call handling and filing, and over a 12-month period produced a portfolio of work and achievements before sitting her exams.
 
She said: “I started at Easi-Drive straight from leaving school and really lacked in confidence. The training has really given me that confidence to do the job and progress in the company, and now I’m a fully-fledged recoveries negotiator.
 
“I’ve got a really good team around me, who have been really supportive, and the training has been a positive experience.”
 
Managing Director Simon Bellamy said: “Damar Training is a fantastic way to improve the skills of our workforce. As a business we are committed to the development of the team. We reward hard work and commitment and offer the opportunity for all employees to develop long-term career with Easi-Drive.”
 

MAGE CAPTION: Leah Hambleton, recoveries negotiator at Easi-Drive, with Angela Bown from Damar.

Against stiff competition we are deligheted to announce that Jenny Knott has won Damar’s learner of the month award for July. Jenny’s work was of extremely high quality and she worked very hard, achieving both her level 2 and 3 apprenticeships in customer service in the space of 9 months. Well done Jen!

A special mention too for Jenny’s workplace supervisor, Sarah Trinci-Lyne, who was one of Damar’s first ever learners way back in the 1980s….!