The COVID-19 pandemic is continuing to have a huge impact on the number of people being forced into unemployment and, with the Government’s furlough scheme now closed, one in five businesses are planning redundancies according to a recent British Chambers of Commerce survey.
As part of the government’s Autumn Budget and Spending Review 2021 Sector-based Work Academy Programmes (SWAPs) are receiving an injection of government funding and focus to help tackle this crisis.
Alongside our flexible SkillUP offer for unemployed learners, we have introduced additional off-the-shelf SWAP sector packages to support providers to meet the demand for helping newly unemployed learners back into work or into self-employment.
What are Sector-based Work Academy Programmes (SWAPs)?
Sector-based Work Academy Programmes are designed to help improve the job prospects of unemployed learners and help employers fill vacancies where there is local demand. SWAPs are short, sharp programmes lasting up to 6 weeks and have three main components:
- pre-employment training
- work experience placement
- a guaranteed job interview
The pre-employment training element is funded through Adult Education Budget (AEB) local flexibility and usually lasts 2-3 weeks. Gateway Qualifications has put together a range of off-the-shelf packages to meet the needs of providers delivering this training in the most in-demand sectors.
Off-the-shelf SWAP Sector Packages
The off-the-shelf packages focus on areas that are having the greatest number of referrals from Jobcentre Plus and sectors will be added to meet the needs as the situation continues to develop. We are also seeing an increase in people moving into self-employment so we have added a package for Centres to use to support budding entrepreneurs.
Resources to support delivery
Each of our off-the-shelf sector packages is accompanied by a free set of resources to support your teaching and delivery. They can be used alongside any other published or self-created resources.
Each set contains:
- Teacher Delivery Guide – This guide summarises the delivery of the units and helps provide a structured, blended approach to the delivery of the units for face-to-face, remote delivery, or a mixture of both. The teaching and learning activities included can be adapted to meet the diverse needs and profile of learners.
- Learner Pack – This pack includes guidance for learning activities which will help learners to think about what they have been discussing with the teacher and the rest of the group. There are also assessment tasks which can be used as evidence for the qualification. Finally, there are checklists where learners can assess their own skills development and progress and record sheets for activities observed by the teacher.
- Teacher Resource PowerPoint – a ready-to-deliver PowerPoint presentation for each unit, featuring videos and activities for learners, along with comprehensive notes for teaching staff.
These resources are available free of charge to Centres approved for SWAPs with Gateway Qualifications. They can be downloaded from our Prism system and can be found on the “Documents” tab of the relevant qualification.
To help you get a flavour for what’s included in the teaching resource packs, we have made the full set of resources for the Level 2 Award in Employability Skills available to download for everyone.
Claim your free sample set of Employability Skills resources here