Employer briefing looks at three key topics
1/7/2009

The latest employer briefing from Skills for Care looks at three key topics:

1.  apprenticeships

To date, apprenticeship opportunities within social care have been slow to develop because government resources and promotion has been targeted at industries that have a long standing tradition of supporting apprenticeships.

Skills for Care has been asked by the Department of Health to rectify this situation by promoting apprenticeships and the opportunities and advantages they offer to social care employers.

2. LeaRNS

LeaRNS is a national web-based information system supporting the professional development of social workers at pre and post-qualifying levels. LeaRNS has been developed by Skills for Care with employers of social workers and social work education providers. The initiative is funded by the Department of Health.

The LeaRNS system was piloted with five HEIs between November 2008 and April 2009; following this KPMG were commissioned by Skills for Care to evaluate the LeaRNS system's readiness for use by HEIs and their partners. This briefing looks at the outcomes of the review.

3. career pathways

The career pathways tool has been developed as part of the Skills for Care CPD strategy. The CPD strategy identifies that employers can contribute to recruitment and retention in the sector by providing a range of opportunities to progress careers. People are more likely to be encouraged to develop a career in social care if they have opportunities to develop skills and qualifications that are transferable to other settings.

To improve recruitment into the sector people need to know how to enter the workforce, what type of jobs there are, how to progress and what experience or qualifications they need.

Skills for Care have developed a careers pathways e-tool for those already working in the sector who are keen to see what career development opportunities