Borders College demonstrates best practice in Modern Apprenticeships provision

Borders College Business Development Unit (BDU) has received a glowing report in a review of their Modern Apprenticeship provision for Social Services (Children and Young People) Awards.

Commissioned by the Scottish Government in early 2019, the Education Scotland review examined specific areas relating to apprenticeship provision and awarded grades in five areas:

• How well are apprentices progressing and achieving relevant high quality outcomes?
• How well are the needs of apprentices and stakeholders met?
• How good is the delivery of training?
• How good is the management of training delivery?
• How good is the strategic leadership?

Borders College achieved grades of a high standard across the board, with one excellent grade for ‘How good is the management of training delivery,’ outperforming the majority of providers in the sector. The College was also singled out for demonstrating best practice in delivery of tutorials.

Leading on from this, Vocational Manager for the BDU Katharine Mathison was recently invited to speak at an SDS-Education Scotland – SSCYP Effective Practice Workshop, where she exchanged ideas for improving MA programmes with other providers.

This all began in October 2017, with the Scottish Government launching a campaign to substantially expand the early learning and childcare workforce, to support the increase in funded childcare from 600 hours to 1,140 hours for each child per year, by 2020.

This expansion created the need for a dedicated, skilled and well-qualified workforce across Scotland.

The review commenced on April 2019 and ran until June 2019, with the report being published in November 2019.