A Parent’s Guide to Traineeships

As a parent or guardian, you play a crucial role in supporting your child to explore the opportunities available to them for life after school. It can be difficult to know where to start but it’s important to arm yourself with the latest information and resources. This is where we come in.

You may not have heard of a Traineeship before but it offers a hands-on alternative to the continual demands of essays, exams and studying, that college and university entails. So what can your child expect instead? Read on to find out.

What is a Traineeship?

A Traineeship is a fantastic work-based learning programme that helps 16-18 year olds become work-ready, whilst gaining a Level 1 qualification (Apprenticeships start at Level 2). With your child having spent most of their time in school or college, our Traineeships give them a helping hand progressing from education to the workplace!

What qualifications are on offer?

We know it can be difficult for your child to decide what they want to do after school, and it’s okay if they aren’t sure which career path they want to go down. Our programme enables them to try tasters in different routes, with support from our Opportunities Advisors, before settling on the right one for them.

We offer a range of Level 1 qualifications to choose from, which are:

• Automotive Engineering
• Animal Care & Land-based Studies
• Beauty
• Business Services (Business Admin, Customer Service, Retail)
• Care
• Construction
• Hairdressing & Barbering
• Hospitality & Catering
• IT

What is involved day-to-day?

Your child will attend one of our Skills Centres and will have a dedicated tutor to help them progress through their qualification, as well as working on their employability and essential literacy and numeracy skills.

They will also be provided with an exciting work placement, which they will attend when not in the Skills Centre (how many days per week your child will be on placement varies by route and employer).

Your child will also have access to an Essential Skills Tutor to develop key literacy, numeracy and digital literacy skills, experience a wide variety of inspirational guest speakers and have the opportunity to go on educational trips.

Care, Support and Guidance

We have a highly skilled team with extenstive industry experience to ensure your child receives all the support and guidance they need to progress through their qualification. This includes extra support services to help all our learners make the most of their ACT experience.

All learners on ACT programmes can take full advantage of the following services:

Additional Support: Learners can access a range of additional learning support to enable them to complete their learning programme. This may include a post enrolment assessment, specialist software, personal support and reasonable adjustments during assessments, such as additional time, reading and/or scribe support.

Attendance and Wellbeing Officers (AWO): Each Skills Centre has a dedicated AWO to support your child with their attendance and wellbeing, and to ensure they are as engaged with their learning as possible throughout their time at ACT.

Learner Rep: We have a full-time Learner Rep who is there to represent your child and make their voice heard. If they have any feedback, concerns, or thoughts on their training then they can book in for a coffee and catch up with our Learner Rep.

In-house counsellor: Whatever your child may be experiencing, whether it’s an issue relating to their learner journey, or problems outside their qualification, our support team are on hand to assist with their welfare. Our experienced in-house counsellor will always provide the time and space needed for your child to talk privately about their troubles and help resolve any issues. Sessions are confidential, maximum an hour in length, and only the individual and the counsellor will be present during the sessions.

Safeguarding Officers: Similar to our in-house counsellor, our team of safeguarding officers are there for learners’ welfare and will support them with any problems. If your child has any concerns around this, they can contact their Assessor who will be able to put them in touch with an ACT Safeguarding Officer.

Owen James, father of Traineeship learner, Darren James

“I would strongly recommend ACT to anyone whose child is looking to find a way forward with education or employment. Staff were encouraging and caring with both our sons; they helped both boys, not only with their education and learning, but patiently helped them to overcome their various challenges. They were supportive and friendly to the young people and parents. Not minding if we contacted them to find out how our children were doing.

“With the support from his tutors, Darren was awarded learner of the year in the Motor Vehicle department and is now in his second year of an Apprenticeship with Edwards Coaches.”

Does a Traineeship sound like the right path for your child? Find out more here, or get in touch with our Opportunities team today on 029 2046 4727 or info@acttraining.org.uk

You might also be interested in our Parent’s Guide to Apprenticeships.