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Birmingham Core Skills Development Partnership exists to ensure that levels of literacy, numeracy and IT key skills in Birmingham increase to exceed national target levels for all client groups.

Key client groups include:

• young children before school age
• school pupils
• young adults aged 16-25
• unemployed adults
• employed adults
• employers
• those wishing to invest voluntary activity

The Partnership forms part of the wider strategic planning and operating mechanisms between Birmingham City Council and Birmingham TEC, in conjunction with a range of strategic partners. The Partnership is managed via a company structure and can be contacted at:

Development Framework

The Core Skills Development Partnership will support activity which:

• focuses on the needs of specific client groups, especially at identified critical transition times
• identifies the common curricular basis for interventions, whilst still allowing flexibility of content and process
• trains staff in appropriate ways of embedding key skills in a wide range of mainstream programmes
• creates new roles for key staff - as decision-makers or support workers in the literacy/numeracy development within Birmingham
• links to the implementation of broader strategies
• has some targeting based on need, without defining people/organisations as failing
• supports the linking of varieties of interventions to produce learning communities
• supports the identification, and skilling, of key intermediaries or key workers
• is structured not just on pilots but on activity that has impact on whole structures
• allows some room for testing ideas and for creativity
• increases multiagency approaches and joint planning, with differing roles clearly defined
• expands the use of appropriate technologies to accelerate learning
• allows for the possibility of new links between voluntary activity, statutory learning settings and work activities
• assists organisations to identify what creates success and to make this the norm
• supports assessment and target setting, based upon disaggregated, reliable information
• increases the volume of voluntary activity
• enhances the existing professional development of staff to create whole-organisation approaches to core skills development
• adds value to mainstream activities by improving the quality and diversity of opportunities
• supports the development of libraries and schools as resource/learning hubs, with clusters of activity being developed into platforms for future developments
• sustains the changes long-term by creating new ways of working that become independent of on-going financial support
• contributes to planned outputs and contributes towards longer-term outcomes

Development and Business Plan 1997 - 1998

Contents

Click any Section below:

1. Context for 1997 - 1998
2. Raising the Baseline attainment levels on entry to school
3. Raising literacy and numeracy attainment levels at key intervention points with young people at school
4. Increasing the key skills levels of young people out of school
5. Meeting the needs of specific target groups and communities
6. Increasing the employability and job-retention of adults
7. Meeting the needs of employers
8. Increasing the individual commitment to core skills development
9. Company operations

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Section 1: Context for 1997 - 1998

Establishing new approaches to lifelong learning is at the heart of Birmingham's economic and social regeneration, with the development of higher levels of literacy, numeracy and IT at the very core of this learning. Single Regeneration Budget (Challenge Fund) resources provide the major organisations in Birmingham with a unique opportunity to change the education and training landscape around core skills issues. The unified nature of the funding stresses the need to jointly create a coherent framework, with common messages, if consistent impact is to be made. The impact of the activity has to be city-wide over the life of this particular external funding whilst at the same time addressing the particular needs of different client groups. To aim for patchy, fragmentary activity will sustain the history of inequalities - with access to expertise and high-quality learning experiences depending upon where one lives or upon past interventions.

The Core Skills Initiative is a regenerative set of activities. As such it is based upon those priorities judged to meet the needs of the city as a whole. There is much to be done. The needs are those associated with urban education and training in general, and include:

• low levels of achievement in literacy and numeracy
• low levels of participation in lifelong learning
• low levels of parental involvement in their child's success
• low levels of business competitiveness
• levels of key skills too low relative to those needed within a flexible workforce high levels of unemployment.

The Core Skills strategy brings together ideas from a range of groups of planners and practitioners and aims to carry forward the existing corporate strategies of the partners.

The city-wide needs were adequately described in the original SRB Challenge Fund bid. Within the ten months since the approval of that bid the need for a strategic approach to the development of core and key skills has been underlined by a number of recent national emphases. These include:

• The Dearing Report on post 16 qualifications. This identified the key skills of Number, Communication and Information Technology as playing an important role in all post 16 education and training. It is these skills that this Plan addresses, recognising that the other important core skills (e.g. presentation skills, working with others, problem solving and managing one's own learning) will be included not by direct delivery but by the ways in which the key skills are delivered.
• The focusing on new National Targets for the year 2000 whereby 75% of young people will be competent at level 2 in numeracy, communication and IT by age 19 and 35% will be competent at level 3 by age 21. There are no accurate records of current performance against these targets locally but estimated levels for Birmingham are being established from the extended Household Survey analysis.
• Calls by the CBI, and others, for businesses to pay more attention to training and particularly the development of core skills if they are to be competitive and contribute within a changing economy. There is an increased recognition that the future of societies requires ways not only of finding solutions to the problems of integrating young people into working life but also of addressing the needs of the 80% of the current workforce who will remain in employment over the next decade.
• The Skills Audit report on competitiveness. This described core skills in terms of broad transferable skills required at different levels and to different extents for jobs within all sectors. The raising of core skills levels has a direct impact upon employability and upon job retention. Whilst Britain is stronger in Higher Education than its major industrial competitors it lags behind them in the levels of basic skills. Employers may express the need for core skills in a variety of ways and there is no local or national knowledge about the precise levels to which the existing workforce possess core skills of the kinds, and at the levels, described by the National Council for Vocational Qualifications. What is known is that employers report percentages of recruits with skill levels below the requirements of the job as ranging from 11% (reading) and 19% (writing) to 30% (numeracy).
• The DfEE Lifetime Learning Policy Framework which identified six main developmental strands for the years ahead. These are:

  * investing in the training and development of employees

  * gaining the commitment of individuals to the benefits of continued learning

  * developing a high quality information and guidance infrastructure

  * improving the access to learning for particular groups

  * giving people of all ages the opportunity to acquire the basic skills on which further learning can be built

  * developing effective partnerships to give practical effect to shared responsibility and to make the best use of resources

• The announcement of new initiatives based upon the introduction of Numeracy and Literacy Centres, the support for extended work with parents, and the need to focus more closely on the initial training of teachers in relation to core skills.
• The continuing evidence from Basic Skills Agency programmes which demonstrate the effectiveness of sustained intervention through families, the need to look again at the quality of opportunities for those who speak other languages at home, and the need to find new ways of delivering basic and key skills both at work and in the community.
• The adoption, by Birmingham City Council, of a Lifelong Learning Strategy which has the development of core skills as an important component.
• The designation of 1997 as the Year of Numeracy for the Education Department and its partners.

The context is thus one of rapid change and the approach taken by Birmingham's Core Skills Development Partnership is, of necessity, one that will allow for flexibility and adaptability whilst retaining a clear set of year on year developments and targets. There is a danger in expecting the development of core skills to solve every problem. The development of core skills is vital but still remains one piece in a complex web of developments that will be carried forward through the wider sets of partnership arrangements for education and training within the city.

At the same time the Core Skills Development Partnership is creating an intense focus upon core skills development, by working on a number of fronts and in a number of ways. The Development Plan, which builds upon the solid achievements of 1996-97, will be carried forwards through joint planning activities, realignment of existing activities, staff retraining activities, support for a wide range of agencies to work in new ways or the direct support of initiatives that change the culture of schools, voluntary organisations, training providers and workplaces. This is beginning to build into a campaign for learning around core skills issues. Whilst the Business Plan part of this document relates to the planned developments within the financial year 1997-98, the development plan takes a longer view of three years or more. This takes us up to the onset of the Millenium and gives additional impetus to partners to set targets for the real improvement, year on year, of literacy, numeracy and IT levels.

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Section 2: Strategic Objective 1

(a) raise the baseline attainment, year on year, of children on entry to school

(b) create increased consistency of pre-school intervention across areas and communities

Context: Work with parents and families in the years before school is seen as a vital element in raising the future standards of literacy, numeracy and familiarity with IT. Whilst there has been an increase in recent such activity it has been characterised by issues of fragmentation, organisational and professional ownership, lack of agreement about content and methodology, and in some cases lack of connection to wider strategies.

The subsequent achievement of children rests very firmly upon the consistency and quality of what is provided in all pre-school settings including the home. The City Council has been working with partners in the statutory, private and voluntary sectors to promote interdisciplinary provision from birth to age five. This has been paralleled by work within each of the separate sectors e.g. development work both within the voluntary sector and spanning the voluntary/private sectors.

As far as possible developments will:

(a) be applied across the full range of services and initiatives

(b) seek to be inclusive rather than exclusive, whilst recognising the need for some targeting

(c) set a common foundation in terms of staff expertise and the expertise of parents.

This carries further the intention of working across agencies at a policy level, which is also supported by the adoption of an interagency Family Support Strategy and by the wider application of the Early Years Guarantee. All agencies have been encouraged to participate in ensuring that the targets for pre-school experiences are widely available to children.

• Work remains to be done to ensure that:
• the common messages are carried into other developments
• joint or common training is available to a wide range of under-fives workers
• developments build upon what exists but carry it further
• there is a co-ordinated approach to the development of initiatives
• materials produced have wide availability and broad endorsement

Whilst many of the pre-school experiences will rightly be concerned with the development of the whole child there will need to be, if the Baseline on entry into school is to be affected year on year, some focus on the foundations of literacy and numeracy. It is these elements of wider packages that the Core Skills Partnership will support

Specifically in 1997-98 support will be given to:

1. Promotion of the common messages
2. Implementation of Year 1 of a 3 year programme of joint and shared training across all Under 5s workers (initially in Family Support areas) - recognising that many of these workers will already be well experienced
3. Exploration of the need for supporting materials
4. Implementation of Year 1 of a sustained 5 year programme of direct intervention with parents by expanding current successful interventions, creating linkages to establish robust shared models, with the aim of promoting self-sufficiency of parents.

This includes:

(i) new workshops with parents of under 5s; new family literacy work, including new work through voluntary sector supporting the valuing of family reading/number activities

(ii) developing an enhanced model that builds on the best of Bookstart, Leading To Reading and other initiatives

(iii) extending the number of volunteers, supported via the voluntary sector, through the extension and alignment of existing mechanisms.

5. Training staff in core services to be able to extend their role with families and parents.

The activity supported will enable:

• 33 additional staff training weeks
• 200 new parent workshops at a range of community venues
• 300 new volunteers
• 6800 parents assisted
• 30 schools benefiting

Outcomes from this activity: By March 1998 the Baseline profile of entry to school will be:

• no observable evidence: 10.0%
• working towards level: 63.5%
• competent at level: 25.0%
• above average: 1.5%

Total Challenge Fund budget for this objective will be £130,252

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Section 3: Strategic Objective 2

Raising the literacy and numeracy attainment levels at key intervention points with young people at school

(a) raise, year on year, the attainment levels of pupils of school age

(b) produce a body of key staff who are highly skilled in the teaching and learning of the key skills of literacy and numeracy (including the supporting use of IT)

By:

• creating consensus about content and methodology re teaching and learning literacy and numeracy
• improving the knowledge and skills of the existing teaching force
• ensuring that newly qualified teachers have the relevant skills
• ensuring that Headteachers and English/Maths Co-ordinators give specific attention to the management, organisation and monitoring of reading
• creating whole-school approaches by the inclusion of teaching assistants, volunteers and parents within a common approach to literacy and numeracy

(c) increase pupils' access to an IT infrastructure to support learning

By:

• extending of pupil access to Integrated Learning Systems and accelerated learning
• increasing levels of self-diagnosis and self-motivation
• creating new links between mainstream and out-of-school activities.

(d) create closer links between the school curriculum and the needs of employers

By embedding core skills more effectively within academic and vocational programmes for 14-19 year olds

(e) engage parents more closely in the literacy/ numeracy development of their children

Context: Although there are some improvements in reading standards at Key Stage 1, by KS2 one third of children are not achieving the level that might be expected - with many already 2 years behind their chronological age. There is a further drop in achievement for significant numbers of pupils at the primary/secondary transition stage. There is a need for some targeting of higher level language/number skills needed to ensure access to wider curriculum range. Success at KS4 requires early intervention at the KS3/4 transition. The later focus is often on those succeeding with grades A-C at GCSE, but as well as an effort to increase the GCSE pass rates thought needs to be given to the wider range of accreditations. Any approaches will need to carry forward the LEA's support for inclusivity and success for all.

The Partnership aims to support an infrastructure change by identifying what creates success for schools/ supplementary schools and making this the norm. Birmingham LEA provides staff training and support for school-based developments, but not within a coherent framework and not of sufficient volume to transform schools rapidly. It is proposed that a coherent 'map' of staff retraining can be identified, which pays attention to the effective strategies for teaching and learning of literacy and numeracy to primary and secondary pupils - both bilingual and monolingual and those with specific learning needs. Any work on numeracy will be closely aligned with the work of the Numeracy Centre and any work on literacy will take account of lessons emerging from the national network of Literacy Centres.

This same framework can provide the basis for curriculum projects. This will include not only work within school classrooms but also work with children whose school education is disrupted for a number of reasons (requiring links with Social Services, Health etc. - but with the initiative for these coming from Education). Emphasis will be given to mid-KS2 and to the primary/secondary transition.

The local development work, supported by the Basic Skills Agency, has demonstrated the value of well thought out literacy work with families. There is the opportunity to extend one model of this work using GEST funding, but there is also the need to retain a variety of models appropriate to different needs.

Post Dearing there is an urgent need to find the most appropriate ways of embedding core skills into a range of vocational and academic provision for young people aged 14-19.

Specifically in 1997-98 support will be given to:

1. Establishing Year 1 of a 6 year programme to increase the knowledge and skills of teachers, based on emerging common consensus of what works re the teaching and learning of reading and maths.

This will focus upon those staff who are the key planners in school, and will be linked to other approaches (e.g. target setting/school improvement etc). There will be the expectation that all staff and assistants in school will be influenced in order to make the development of reading and maths a whole school issue. Target groups will be:

• Newly Qualified Teachers (300 per year)
• Language Coordinators/Numeracy Co-ordinators. (40 per year)
• Governors (no cost to Core Skills Partnership)
• New Headteachers (40 per year)
• Teachers at KS2 and KS3 (200 per year)
• KS1 and KS2 Classroom Assistants (20 per year)

Over the 6 year period this approach will have trained every head, every co-ordinator, every NQT, and a sufficient body of staff in each school to have produced the required cultural transformation.

2. Establishing Year 1 of a 6 year programme to expand the use, by pupils, of new technology/new methods.

This will create a partnership with private sector suppliers which will enable Integrated Learning Systems to be established in 40 schools in 1997-98 and 60 schools each year thereafter, with training.

3. Establishing a 6 year programme of curriculum support activities.

This will provide the opportunity for organisations to take part in curriculum development projects. 20 literacy and 20 numeracy projects will be supported each year, each to an average of £1000. Schools will be required to use the project to demonstrate that their provision for literacy or numeracy meets some of the requirements of any emerging Basic Skills Agency, or Local Authority, Quality Mark for schools. Organisations will be asked to collaborate with others and to disseminate the work through seminars or publication

4. Implementing Year 1 of a 4 year programme to create the conditions whereby schools become literacy and numeracy communities

The Year of Reading demonstrated the strengths of taking a wider perspective upon organisational development. In order to raise standards rapidly there will be an extension of successful models to schools which are currently underachieving. there will be a particular focus on the Early Years, KS1/2, and Years 5 to 7. This will build upon schools' own development planning and target setting; will provide a whole school community approach to raising standards in literacy and numeracy; and will be aligned with a number of other activities around these developments (e.g. the provision of adult literacy, the provision of parent workshops etc).

5. Implementing a programme that embeds core skills learning and assessment in a range of work experience, GNVQ, NVQ and A level provision, and enables learner progress to be recorded.

This will increase the links between school and post-school key skills developments. There is a need for joint staff training in order to get a coherent approach to the embedding of key skills in a range of 14-19 curriculum areas. Initially work will be undertaken with 27 schools and colleges.

6. Implementing Year 1 of a four year interagency development plan for family literacy

The development of family literacy opportunities across the city has been identified as a key objective within the City Council's Lifelong Learning Strategy. This development will build upon the foundation work undertaken by an interdepartmental planning group. The intention is to build platforms of momentum that have the capacity to become self-sustaining.

A bid to the DfEE has been made for 10 family literacy developments which meet the GEST requirements. In some cases there will need to be a build up to these substantial programmes through the provision of parent workshops and staff development activities at the selected sites. There is an additional intention to run a further 8 family literacy developments (which will not necessarily be the full GEST model) alongside a programme of 130 workshops for parents of school-age pupils, targeting key transitions.

7. Creating coherence of developments by focusing the learning through a school improvement framework

The LEA will encourage schools to work together to develop their capacity to improve their performance and to sustain those improvements. Support for school improvement methods will be built into the developments described above.

Although the above seven elements have been listed as separate initiatives there is the belief that they will interact to create a momentum for development across the whole of the school sector. The impact of all of the above initiatives will be maximised by building in the school improvement methodology to enable lessons learnt to be rapidly and effectively shared across families, clusters and consortia of schools.

This activity will support:

• 190.8 training weeks
• 40 schools benefiting
• 1500 parents assisted
• 5000 pupils benefiting

Outcomes from this activity:

By March 1998 :

(a) Core Skills attainment levels at Key Stage 1 will be

	English	Math
below attainment level 1	1.6%	2.6%
at attainment level 1	21.0%	18.3%
at attainment level 2	54.5%	64.2%
at attainment level 3	22.8%	14.5%
at attainment level 4	0.1%	0%

(with a reduction of one percentage point in the difference at level 2 or above in KS1 English between those for whom English is a first language and those for whom it is not)

(b) 54% 0f young people achieve equivalent of 5 GCSE (A-C), Intermediate GNVQ or NVQ2.

(c) 57% of young people reach the new Foundation Target 2 for Core Skills

Total Challenge Funding for this objective: £963,748

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Section 4: Strategic Objective 3

Increasing the key skills levels of young people out-of-school

(a) Establish Year 1 of a 6 year programme to improve the effectiveness of out-of-school/supplementary schooling

This will link the curriculum/methodology of supplementary education to the curriculum consensus re school-based reading/maths/IT but will also increase the use of accelerated learning and use of springboards/fast- tracks.

(b) Establish Year 1 of a 3 year programme for training staff to embed key skills work within the mainstream activity of raft of initiatives for young people via the youth service, homework clubs, 'second chance schools' etc.

It is recognised that the levels of key skills amongst young people will only rise if their voluntary activities are also harnessed, especially for those who are not totally engaged into effective mainstream learning.

Context: A predominant vehicle for out-of-school development will be the University of the First Age. This will build upon the core skills curriculum development work and the SpringBoard to Literacy work already funded in 1996-97 to create literacy/numeracy enhancing summer schools, distance learning modules and Saturday morning workshops for children aged 11-14. There will also be the opportunity to implement a programme of training for staff, volunteers and parents involved not only in the University of the First Age activities but also those engaged in supplementary schools and holiday activities, based upon reviews of current practice. There are opportunities to cross-reference the training needs for out-of-school activity with the staff training opportunities described in the rest of this section.

The Agenda for a Generation campaign has focused the statutory and voluntary youth services onto educational outcomes, including the need to strengthen the literacy and oracy skills of young people. Similarly the 'Investing in Children' Report from the Department of National Heritage recommended that library services play a wider role, within a strategic integration of the activity of a number of partners, in meeting the identified literacy needs of young people.

Specifically within 1997-98 work will be done to:

1. Extend the literacy and numeracy elements of University of the First Age developments.

(£84,000)

2. Raise staff and volunteer competence in supplementary schools

(£3000)

3. Extend the skills of library staff and youth service staff in order to create additional out-of-school opportunities

(£4000)

This activity will support: 2000 young people benefiting from projects

Outcome: 10% increase in the volume of young people from target groups using libraries; contribution to Key Stage attainment, in school, progress.

Total Challenge Funding for this objective: £91,000

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Section 5: Strategic Objective 4

Meeting the needs of specific target groups and communities

Context: Although the intention of the above developments is to create an impact on all schools, all pupils, all families, all areas etc. there is also the need, each year, to focus upon the specific needs of particular groups. Particular concern has been raised about:

• the disruption to learning of young people whose schooling is (for one reason or another) interrupted
• those young people and adults who have a range of specific learning difficulties
• those young people who find it difficult to engage with mainstream provision because of homelessness etc.
• the capacity of local networks to create coherence of opportunities at a locality level
• meeting the particular needs of communities, not on a simple geographical allocation but on a complex mixture of responses to the varying patterns of a range of needs. This allows for a recognition that there may well be particular locations where low levels of ability on entry to school, low levels of attainment in school, high levels of unemployment, low levels of engagement by parents and young people all coalesce. In these situations, in addition to investment through the enhancements described in the other sections of this plan, there may be a need for short-term focused development activity to ensure that agencies in the locality share planning information and align their existing budgets.

Whilst there is still the need to impact upon the whole structure, there are some situations which still require smaller scale interventions with particular groups. These projects will still be based upon the integration of key skills into mainstream programmes and the establishment of new methods for key skill enhancement. For those whose school education is disrupted there is a need often to find new approaches to continuing the development of their core skills, as well as a need to maintain some consistency of recording their progress.

Specifically within 1997-98 support will be given to:

• the use of at risk and excluded pupils as literacy/numeracy mentors with younger children, coupled with reading motivating activity.
• provision that keeps young people, who are at risk, engaged with education and training opportunities
• provision of advice to adults and parents of children with an additional learning need.
• establishment of at least 6 centres city-wide where people can use software to assess their own literacy/numeracy needs, can get advice and referral etc.
• staff development and training, across different agencies, in relation to assessment, guidance and information re additional learning needs.
• short-term development work that creates coherence and progression for post 16 literacy/numeracy/ IT provision within designated regeneration areas

This activity will support: 200 parents assisted

• 800 pupils benefiting
• 100 training weeks

This activity will provide the following outcomes:

(a) increased ease of access to information and self-assessment for those adults who are concerned about a range of particular learning difficulties, either for themselves or their families.

(b) increased levels of literacy amongst young people at risk

(c) more co-ordinated approaches to core skills development within post-school provision in at least 6 areas of the city.

Challenge Funding for this objective: £167,750

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Section 6: Strategic Objective 5

(a) raise the key skills attainment levels and increase the employability of unemployed individuals through post-school education and training provision

(b) develop the key skills of employed individuals in order to enable job retention and encourage career progression

By:

• establishing ways of embedding the relevant key skills into existing programmes
• producing a more skilled cohort of staff, in relation to guidance, assessment and delivery re key skills
• developing vocationally specific language and numeracy provision

Context: Employability and retention of employment are key aims for the Core skills Partnership. As part of the contribution to levels of personal and national competitiveness there is a need to accelerate progress towards the National Training and Education Targets. Raising individuals' Key Skills levels will contribute not only to those targets directly concerned with levels of literacy and numeracy but will also facilitate progress towards the wider targets. There is a need to give particular attention to those clients for whom English is an additional language.

At the moment key skills are often approached via discrete activities rather than creating access to key skills through a variety of academic and vocational programmes. Integrating key skills into a wide variety of curricula will require imaginative ways of delivery, without losing the key skills focus. This itself will require a large programme of staff development, and the development of appropriate assessment and curriculum materials. Good practice does already exist and this can be built into other programmes in a structured way.

The 1996 Household Survey, for the first time, included questions relating to residents' perceived levels of communication, numeracy and use of IT. Initial analyses indicate that women were more likely to consider their strengths to be in communication whilst man identified high skill levels in numeracy. There was relatively little variation in the level of core skills by age band although 16-19 year olds were consistently rated lower than other under-60 age groups across all key skills except use of IT.

For other age groups use of IT to support core skills was regarded as adequate or below for almost three-quarters of those surveyed. Without using Challenge Fund resources to provide wide-scale replacement of equipment, there is a need to explore the use of IT as a delivery tool for key skill learning.

Some of this work will involve explorations of the particular development needs of specific groups and specialist work with particular client groups to give additional access. This presumes a more robust set of intelligence data, disaggregated by client group, than currently exists.

The City Council Lifelong Learning Strategy identified as key objectives:

(a) improving the quality of core skills learning opportunities

(b) increase the number of adults participating

(c) increase the volume of family literacy support, in planned ways

(d) increased access to open and flexible learning opportunities, via a cross-agency development plan

(e) setting targets for adult participation and achievement

Specifically, within 1997-98, work will be done to:

1. Integrate key skills into existing training curricula for target groups of unemployed people currently underrepresented in training and employment

This will require the mapping of key skills against existing frameworks, the development of appropriate curricula with key skills embedded, and the training of staff to deliver and assess key skills in this embedded way.

2. Refocus existing literacy and numeracy provision for adults in the community by developing open and flexible learning opportunities

This requires the development of materials, the assessment of existing software, the training of staff in new approaches and some investment in equipment. Some of this development will focus on the specific needs of young people.

3. Training for frontline staff in a range of agencies to enable them to more adequately refer and assess people with core skills needs.

Training for staff in Careers Service, Employment Service, Business advisory services, PreVocational networks, Vocational training providers, Libraries, Employment Resource Centres, CareerSense suppliers, Probation Service, Neighbourhood Offices and referral agencies.

4. Extension of the existing curriculum for the own-time training of low skill employees.

The vehicle for this is Weekend College (including extension of the programme to offer increased voucher entitlement to those requiring key skills enhancement, including key skills development for managers, targeted work with employed deaf adults, and an extension of the supplier base).

5. Implement a collaborative city-wide plan for the development of ESOL

This will include developing Quality Standards in ESOL; developing ESOL initial assessment toolkit; train staff in ESOL assessment; developing uniform standards for tutoring; increasing the quality of information and guidance re ESOLprovision.

6. Ensure that developments meet the specific needs of particular clients

Key Skills development to enable 16-59 year old unemployed people with moderate learning difficulties; who are deaf; who are homeless or in hostel accommodation; or who need bilingual support to become more employable and more able to make realistic vocational training decisions as well as gaining the key skills necessary to succeed within selected vocational training.

7. Bridging work to link the key skills training needs of employees in localised networks of small employers to the entry capacity of mainstream training provision

There is some danger in targeting those small businesses that are in danger of failing, but there are existing sets of small businesses that are not linked into quality improvement processes, such as Investors in People, whose competitiveness can be improved.

8. Meeting the needs of employees for vocationally-specific core skills enhancement

Using existing processes of business improvement, through networks of companies and their supplier chains. The need is to produce effective methods of working, produce vocationally-relevant resources

9. Further development of adult records of achievement

Building upon current work in enabling adults to assess their own training needs, to produce learning plans and to build up individual profiles of their own achievements.

This activity will support:

• 6842 training weeks
• 70 businesses advised
• 1450 jobs safeguarded
• 3000 qualifications
• 200 unemployed people obtaining jobs
• 60 voluntary organisations assisted
• 10 new volunteers

This activity will lead to the following outcomes:

(a) More than 100 staff whose retraining focuses on core skills development

(b) A 1% increase in the number of adult learners engaged in raising their basic skills levels.

(c) More than 600 employees involved in work-related core skills activity

Total Challenge Funding for this objective: £402,250

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Section 7: Strategic Objective 6

Provide support for employers (and their employees) for key skills at work

Specifically within 1997-98 work will be done to support:

(a) working with cohorts of employers, at 3 levels (very local employer networks; existing networks/business groups; major employers and their supplier chains and networks), to establish what employers' needs are in relation to key skills. This can then add to the common messages being built into training provision enhanced by activities contributing to Strategic Objective 5. This will begin to establish models of employee development. There may be the opportunity to explore the identification of model employers; identifying the particular needs of e.g. 50+ workforce and identifying the needs of the self-employed.

(b) exploring the key skills levels amongst the vacancies ES carry for employers and using this to identify the implications of this for 'key skills for employability' work.

(c) increasing the volume of employee volunteering to enhance the core skills of others.

This activity will support:

• 25 businesses worked with
• 50 employee volunteers
• 250 students gaining from collaborative projects with employers

Total Challenge Funding for this objective: £50,000

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Section 8: Strategic Objective 7

Increasing the levels of individual commitment to core skills development

Context: An increasing number of voluntary sector organisations are engaging with education and training needs, to the extent that there is emerging a voluntary sector education and training forum.

The major volunteer support agencies have identified the need for links to be made between those organisations using volunteers and the providers of literacy and numeracy learning opportunities. The integration of appropriate core skills learning with volunteer support will be tested in three areas of the city.

The voluntary sector has the capacity to unlock new routes into work with parents, access to young people, access to trainees and the developments outlined in most of the other sections of this plan will draw upon these routes in addition to relying upon the usual statutory links. To facilitate the planning of these approaches, so that the Partnership is not left responding to an ad hoc set of fragmentary demands from separate small organisations, the voluntary sector has been able to make good use of small grants for joint planning and development activities. This will continue over a three year period and will lead to larger scale proposals coming forward from the voluntary sector through the major education and training strategy networks.

There are already a range of activities associated with volunteers and reading. This will be extended to include numeracy volunteers. Work will also be undertaken to ensure that the emerging volunteer organisations offer high quality volunteer training and that the various initiatives align their activities.

There may be benefits in exploring the idea of literacy development workers for specific ethnic minority communities where these are known to have literacy development needs at a number of levels. This would not imply long-term core skills funding for such work but a partnership between the core skills development funding and the resources of different faith communities. Such work could lead to self-assessment being available at a range of community venues and different communities setting themselves targets for improvement as literate and numerate communities.

Specifically within 1997-98 support will be given, in addition to voluntary sector contributions to the other objectives outlined above, to:

(i) voluntary sector literacy and numeracy developments arising from within the plans of the Voluntary Sector Education Forum.

(ii) volunteer development activity which leads to the creation of increased support for literacy/numeracy volunteers.

(iii) small grant activity to stimulate increased voluntary sector engagement with wider core skills planning and developments.

Activity to support this objective will involve: 10 voluntary organisations and 5 community organisations assisted

This activity will lead to the following outcomes:

(a) An active discussion of core skills issues within the voluntary sector

(b) 50 more volunteers supporting literacy and numeracy development

Total Challenge Fund Support for this objective: £47,000

Contents

Section 9: Development of the organisation and operation of the Core Skills Development Partnership

The following organisational developments will be made before March 1998:

(a) The Board will be brought up to full membership.

(b) The Operational Managers Group has worked well as a joint planning mechanism, enabling partners to contribute to this Business Plan and to its operationalisation. This mechanism will be retained and will be expanded to include a wider representation, including representation of voluntary sector interests.

(c) The attaching of development workers into a combined team has worked well in enabling them to act both in an interpreting role (carrying SRB Core Skills information into partners thinking and contributing to development ideas within a core skills team) as well as taking responsibilities for direct leadership of development areas within their own organisation.

Working across boundaries always carries with it the danger of lack of accountability and role confusion if not carefully managed. All of the systems and processes of the Core Skills Partnership are to be reviewed internally and externally to ensure that it retains a clarity of procedure, a clarity of accountability and probity in allocating public monies, whilst recognising that the Partnership is developing new ways of working.

Developments associated with each major Strategic Objective of this plan will be the responsibility of a member of the development team. Whilst some of their work will be within their own organisation, being based at a common venue as part of a joint development team enables the sharing across networks that is vital to this work if it is to be more than simply allocating funding to existing delivery bodies.

Strengthening the administrative and clerical functions before the start of Year 2, and building on the link with the SRB Co-ordination function of the City Council's Policy Division, will give the Partnership the continued capacity to report on qualitative and quantitative aspects of the developments and to ensure that activity and spend remains close to profile.