Hazel Ostle tells us why they use EduCare at Durham County Council

Approximately 17,000 people work for Durham County Council and over the years we have put many of our staff through a variety of EduCare’s programmes including Child Protection Awareness, Health and Safety, Stress Management and Working at Personal Safety.

More recently it has been the Suzy Lamplugh Trust - Working at Personal Safety programmes that we have ordered most. The programme is now open to any workers within the Social Care and Health Service (previously Social Services) of Durham County Council. Social Care and Health has approximately 3,500 staff.

The programme was recommended by our Health and Safety Manager who had come across the EduCare training methodology when doing some research into Lone Working and Personal Safety. We needed a cost effective way of training staff in personal safety in a flexible way. The package we get from EduCare was able to meet the requirement. The flexibility of the package was the main benefit for us really. It means that staff based anywhere in County Durham can learn at a time and place convenient to them. People could access the programme either at home alone or at work with other colleagues.

Staff reported that they enjoyed using the programmes and also that they were easy to access and to use. Programmes could be completed quickly as they passed on only the essential information, and the EduCare staff were always very helpful.

We now recommend the course in our training guide that goes to all our staff in the Social Care and Health Service. We would also recommend the training programme to any other organisation with staff with lone workers or whose personal safety at work is ever compromised.
 

Hazel Ostle
Staff Development Officer (HR Development)
Durham County Council 

Jo Mortimer tells us why they use EduCare at PGL Travel

'We run residential activity courses and adventure holidays in the UK and overseas. These are summer camps for kids, children and teenagers as well as family activity holidays. We also offer complete school and group travel service including educational school tours, curriculum based activity, adventure and study courses and water sports.

'We put our Group Leaders - who look after children when they are not doing activities and our responsible for the pastoral care of the children, through the EduCare/NSPCC Child Protection Awareness programmes. Training staff have also all done the same qualification to be able to support staff in this sensitive area, and deliver in-house Child Protection training.

'Our core business is working with children and in-house we have Child Protection included in every member of staff's induction, however, we also deliver apprenticeships and NVQ's (in Activity Leadership) to staff. The unit entitled "Support the protection of children from Abuse" within the NVQ relates to Child Protection and as it is difficult to gather evidence, we needed a way to prove that members of staff have the competence to deal with this issue.

'Even though the programme is distance learning, we can also incorporate it into a delivered session to ensure NVQ requirements are met.

'For us, the main benefits of EduCare were that it covered the NVQ requirements and was a useful, flexible training tool to reach people who need the information but could not always attend a training session. We found the methodology useful as people could work through at their own pace which means minimum staff downtime as they don't have to take time away from work to gain the essential knowledge on the subject.

'I would definitely recommend this programme to other organisations who have staff with a responsibility for children's wellbeing. It focuses on the essential knowledge they need when dealing with Child Protection issues. As it is such a sensitive issue, people sometimes find it hard to talk about; this format gives them the high retention of knowledge without having to be involved in deep discussions, which for some can be unbearable.' 

Jo Mortimer

Apprenticeship Programme Manager

PGL Travel Ltd

Tel: 08700 551 551 ext 376 

Bill Whillock tells us why they use EduCare at The New School at West Heath

The New School at West Heath is an independent specialist school catering for secondary age students whose mainstream schooling has broken down. The majority of our students have suffered significant trauma in their lives and some have social, emotional and behavioural problems.

'I was made aware of NSPCC EduCare whilst in position as Principal Child Protection Training Adviser at Kent County Council and when I came to West Heath, with the agreement of the school Senior Leadership team, we undertook a free trial of the programme with a representative group of staff.

'We decided that as Child Protection training was of such major importance to all staff here, and that this need was comprehensively met by EduCare/NSPCC's Child Protection in Education programmes, that we would feature them as part of our staff induction process. The obvious advantage of the programme was that it is flexible in its application. People worked through it at their own pace, in their own time, at home or at work (being paper-based and online) and both individually and within a learning group.

'We wanted to evaluate our investment in the EduCare programmes so we designed a questionnaire that was put to all staff to elicit their views about how confident they felt about handling child protection issues and also to help us decide if we were going to continue with this particular method of staff training and development. An excellent return of these questionnaires gave us some great feedback. Amongst this feedback were the following examples:

 

• 98% of staff say they are now comfortable recognising signs or symptoms of possible abuse.
  
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• 90% say they know how to respond to a child who may be suffering or have suffered abuse.
  
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• 88% said they had found the modules to be a useful source of reference since their initial training.
  
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• 86% of staff reported that they found the training programme a good training method.

'On this basis we decided we would continue to use the programmes as part of our induction procedure and would recommend them to others in a similar environment. The degree of confidence staff expressed in knowing how to respond was very impressive. These results were borne out by qualitative information gleaned from the schools three Child Protection Officers and satisfied our School Leadership Team that EduCare programmes represented not only excellent value for money, but more importantly, that our school is pro-active in making sure other people's children are well looked after when they are residing with us and in our care.'

Bill Whillock

Vice Principal - Care

The New School at West Heath 

Liz Bennett explains why they use EduCare at Mencap

Mencap is the UK's leading learning disability charity working with people with a learning disability and their families and carers. It helps people to live their lives in a way they choose and in a home that they choose, providing the support they need to live full, fun, independent lives, as valued members of the community.

We used to run courses covering England, Northern Ireland and Wales which became a rather expensive option. This meant that staff had to travel a great distance to attend lectures and seminars. Therefore, given the number of people who are regularly in training with us, it made financial sense to use a distance learning programme.

We have now been using EduCare to develop the knowledge and skills of teams for over six years. Each month, we send out around 110 Health & Safety, 120 Basic Food Hygiene and about 80 Suzy Lamplugh Trust – Working at Personal Safety programmes.

Depending on an individual’s role within Mencap, they will do some or all of them. We have a small number of staff who are involved with the support of children and therefore complete the EduCare/NSPCC Child Protection Awareness programme; however, they are a minority. Staff involved in a residential environment, for example, will all complete the Health & Safety and Basic Food Hygiene. Anyone working on their own, visiting people in their homes or traveling out and about will take the Suzy Lamplugh Trust – Working at Personal Safety programme.

A huge advantage of EduCare is the flexibility it offers. People can do them when and where they want; the night shift seems quite a popular time to study! Some managers of our residential homes use them as team-building exercises and work together as a group to complete the programme. We have had good feedback from our people. Even when they have been completed, the subjects are still discussed and the advice and information contained within them are put into practice. I would definitely recommend EduCare to other organisations.

Liz Bennett

Accreditation & Assessment Senior Administrator

Mencap 

Maxine Reeder explains why the YMCA Fairthorne Group use EduCare

YMCA Fairthorne Group is a children’s charity which actively supports the needs and development of children and young people in and around South East Hampshire, from bases in Portsmouth, Gosport, the Isle of Wight, Dorset and at Fairthorne Manor near Southampton. Our mission is to champion and add value to young lives by providing experiences that challenge, enable and develop the individual.

We currently have 6 nurseries, 4 after-school clubs, 4 holiday play schemes as well as numerous activity weeks. As we are involved in childcare, it is important that all staff take our in-house child protection training. However, once they’ve completed that, we get the permanent and long-term staff to supplement this training by taking the EduCare/NSPCC Child Protection Awareness programme.

The NSPCC connection is important because we feel it validates the programme, gives added value to our in-house training and Ofsted are certainly happy with it. The staff enjoy the programme as well, especially getting the certificate at the end of it! Having taken the in-house training, it’s an opportunity to go at your own pace and take the time to understand and absorb all the facts and information.

From my point of view, I like it because it’s so reliable and so low maintenance. Like a lot of HR people, I find I don’t have much free time. When I put an order in, I know it will arrive within 7 days and when the completed programme is sent off, I know it will be dealt with promptly and back with me in 2-3 weeks time. I’ve built up a relationship with EduCare who let me know about offers coming up and are always there at the end of the phone should I need them. I think it’s a training programme that other organisations should consider.

Maxine Reader

HR Administrator

YMCA Fairthorne Group

Nicole Jeffries tells us why she uses EduCare at Stonham (North)

Stonham is the largest provider of housing and care in England for vulnerable adults and young people.

We have a network of 578 services which provide support to in excess of 14,000 peole each year. We are a non profit making organisation and a part of England’s second largest housing association. Home Group Ltd.

Our services users include single homeless people, vulnerable mothers and their babies, women and children escaping domestic violence, young people leaving care, refugees and asylum seekers, people with physical disabilities, people with mental health problems, people with learning difficulties, people with drug and/or alcohol dependence problems and people who have been in prison or court.

We found the EduCare programmes to be very useful used in addition and as a support to our existing training programme. Our National Training Manager referred the programmes to us and we have now distributed it to all of our staff who come into contact with children and young people within the 17 such services in Stonham’s North area.

Then programmes are simple to use and cover all of the essential information people need when working with children to help safeguard them from abuse. It is also useful to keep the programme as reference material. We would recommend the NSPCC programmes to other Housing Associations. Join us in safeguarding children and young people by committing to promote Child Protection Awareness within your organisation. 

Nicole Jeffries
Regional Training / HR Administrator (North)
Stonham (North)

Visit: www.stonham.org.uk

Stonham is a division of Home Group Limited, a Registered Social Landlord (Housing Corporation Register No. L3076) and charity registered under the Industrial & Provident Societies Act 1965 (Register No. 22981R) 

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