Welcome to the Damar Training Blog

Many employees at organisations with more than 250 staff have the right to request time off for training. From April 2011 this right will extend to employees at smaller organisations as well. The employers that we work with are already supportive of encouraging learning opportunities for staff. However, it is worth all employers looking at the rules in detail at: http://www.direct.gov.uk/en/employment/employees/timeoffandholidays/DG_183635

We work hard with employers to ensure that learning is delivered efficiently and, in most cases, apprentices with Damar will only need to be released from work for about one day per month in addition to their regular 1:1 workplace visits.

Key to the success of any work-based learning programme is the support and participation of supervisors and line managers. We often say that a good work based programme looks a bit like a three-legged stool - with each leg represented by the learner, the assessor and the supervisor. Without support from any one of these three the programme is unlikely to succeed!

One supervisor who exemplifies the positive impact of strong workplace support for NVQs and apprenticeships is Helen Boyle, who works at long-standing Damar employer Supanet, based on the Time Technology Park near Burnley (http://www.supanet.com/). Helen has been an invaluable support to her colleagues and to Damar staff over the past three years. This was recognised earlier this month when we presented Helen with a certificate thanking her for her contribution to staff development.

This month, unusually, we were delighted to present two Damar learners with “learner of the month” certificates. The first was Kaylie Palmer at Argus Electrical in Wigan who is our learner of the month for April 2010. We helped Kaylie find her apprenticeship position and, with support from her supervisor, Sandra Finch and her assessor, Chris Barnard she has progressed really well and has now achieved her qualification.

Our second award was presented to Doug Marshall at St James’ Security, also in Wigan. Doug actually won a couple of months ago but diary commitments delayed the presentation. As well as achieving his NVQ in customer service, Doug has also supported Damar’s team in delivering NVQs to his team, many of whom work quite complex shift patterns. Doug commented that the programme has not only delivered benefits to him personally but has also delivered improvements in the service provided to customers by his team as a whole.

Jennifer Yates of Carlson Wagonlit Travel (www.carlsonwagonlit.com) and Charlotte Yates (no relation) of MSL Legal Expenses (www.msl-legalexpenses.co.uk) are Damar’s learners of the month for March 2010. The competition was tough this month as we had 39 learners successfully completing qualifications, but Charlotte and Jennifer both submitted excellent files and their assessors felt that they deserved particular praise for their hard work.

As well as completing all the units required for her NVQ in customer service, Jennifer worked with her Damar assessor, Alison Minay, to complete additional units relevant to her job role. Charlotte’s advanced apprenticeship in business and administration follows her apprenticeship in the same subject that she achieved in 2009.

Congratulations to both learners and thanks too to Carlson Wagonlit and MSL for their support.

Pictured below are Charlotte Yates and her assessor Nicola Clayton at MSL.

If you are a public or third sector employer you will probably have heard of the Future Jobs Fund. The Fund amounts to about £1 billion to support the creation of additional jobs for young people who have been out of work for some time. Jobs must last, initially, for a period of at least six months although it is hoped that many employees will then be retained.

Want many people don’t realise though is that employees engaged through the Future Jobs Fund can also study for apprenticeship qualifications. Damar is already working with some Future Jobs Fund learners - they are a perfect way to ensure that staff get the most out of their new roles.

To find out more about how Future Jobs Fund and apprenticeships can work together please call either your usual contact at Damar or Elisabeth or Mike on 0161 480 8171.

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.