AWC Training Ltd

AWC Training Ltd

Address: 40 Fore Street, St. Austell, Cornwall, PL25 5ER Unique reference number (URN): 1278603

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Safeguarding standards met

The safeguarding standards are met. This means that leaders and/or those responsible for governance and oversight fulfil their specific responsibilities and have established an open culture in which safeguarding is everyone's responsibility and concerns are actively identified, acted upon and managed. As a result, learners are made safer and feel safe.

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How we evaluate safeguarding

When we inspect providers for safeguarding, they can have the following outcomes:

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How we evaluate safeguarding

Met: The provider has an open and positive culture of safeguarding. Not met: The provider has not created an open and positive culture of safeguarding. Not all legal requirements are met.

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Inclusion Needs attention

Leaders do not foster a sufficiently inclusive culture. They are not curious enough about and do not assess well enough barriers to learning which affect apprentices. Processes for evaluating apprentices’ barriers to learning are too cursory and, consequently, leaders are unable to share information with staff about apprentices so that support can be provided or adapted to meet their needs.

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Inclusion Needs attention

Assessors know their apprentices well. They are vigilant in monitoring apprentices’ wellbeing. They take care to ensure that apprentices integrate into their workplaces well. When assessors independently identify concerns about apprentices, they make sensible referrals to appropriate agencies such as healthcare, housing and financial support. This helps a few apprentices to overcome practical barriers which impact on their studies. In the very few instances where apprentices require English language or mathematics qualifications, assessors do not put appropriate support in place swiftly enough to enable apprentices to do well in these subjects and achieve their apprenticeship on time.

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Inclusion Needs attention

Leaders do not ensure that assessors receive specialist expert training in how to identify and support apprentices who have special educational needs and/or disabilities (SEND). However, assessors do independently seek out information about SEND to keep themselves informed as much as possible.

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Leadership and governance Needs attention

Leaders recently adapted their mission to increase the focus on providing training in the priority sectors of engineering and manufacturing. They rightly recognise that they had previously failed to work effectively with a few large employers to ensure that apprentices completed their studies. Because of this, a high proportion of apprentices were withdrawn before the end of their apprenticeship. Leaders have recently improved how they work with employers, but it is too early to see the impact of this.

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Leadership and governance Needs attention

Leaders are insufficiently self-critical when using their quality assurance processes and assessing the strengths and weaknesses of the apprenticeship training. They do not identify the root causes of weaknesses well enough. They overstate their strengths and do not evaluate evidence rigorously enough to validate their assertions.

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Leadership and governance Needs attention

Leaders have not established arrangements that would ensure that they are objectively held to account or supported. The improvement actions that leaders identify are poorly defined and largely ineffective. Leaders do not have reliable oversight of the progress that apprentices make. They are, therefore, unable to make secure or swift decisions and interventions to improve outcomes for apprentices.

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Leadership and governance Needs attention

Leaders ensure that, in most instances, assessors receive appropriate professional development so they can update their occupational knowledge. However, assessors do not receive training in how to teach apprentices with special educational needs and/or disabilities or those who are disadvantaged. Leaders ensure that staff workloads are fair. Assessors receive one wellbeing day each week to acknowledge their flexibility in visiting and teaching apprentices whose job roles require them to work overnight and at weekends.

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Curriculum and teaching Expected standard

Leaders design curriculums that meet national skills and employment priorities in engineering and maintenance operations. Assessors plan apprentices’ training well to ensure that apprentices have appropriate opportunities to practise their skills before they apply them in their job roles. For example, apprentices learn about fault finding before making improvements to machinery and operations.

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Curriculum and teaching Expected standard

Assessors are very knowledgeable and experienced in their subjects. They successfully teach apprentices through a combination of online lessons and visits to their employer. They take time and care to observe apprentices throughout their working day, and provide apprentices with helpful insights into how they can develop and improve their technical skills and workplace behaviours.

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Curriculum and teaching Expected standard

Assessors ensure that apprentices understand technical vocabulary. Apprentices keep maintenance logs and produce complex technical drawings which require them to use specific vocational vocabulary to prevent errors and mitigate waste.

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Curriculum and teaching Expected standard

Assessors use effective activities such as observations, discussions and on-the-job work shadowing to assess the progress that apprentices make. They make effective use of information from these activities to inform employers about the progress that their apprentices make with their studies and so employers know how to support apprentices in the workplace. However, assessors do not set targets for apprentices that are sufficiently focused on the specific knowledge and skills that they need to improve, or monitor well enough how successfully apprentices achieve their targets.

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Curriculum and teaching Expected standard

Assessors monitor apprentices' behaviours well. They make astute observations on how apprentices work and communicate with their colleagues.

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Achievement Needs attention

Too few apprentices complete their training. Those who complete their apprenticeship generally achieve well, with around a half gaining merits or distinctions. The standard of apprentices' coursework is mostly at the expected level, with examples of high-quality work that demonstrate the positive impact of apprentices' contributions to the organisations in which they work.

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Achievement Needs attention

Apprentices develop the knowledge and skills that they need for their job roles. They become better at their jobs and gain additional responsibilities. The majority of apprentices who complete level 2 programmes progress to the next level of apprenticeship.

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Achievement Needs attention

Apprentices gain useful specialist digital skills such as how to use personal digital assistant devices to communicate engineering designs with their work colleagues. They improve their written English skills and handwriting through stringent technical drawing exercises and learn mathematical principles as part of their studies.

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Participation and development Needs attention

Apprentices attend online lessons well. They develop positive professional behaviours such as punctuality and teamwork.

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Participation and development Needs attention

Leaders have appropriate policies in place to ensure that bullying, discrimination and harassment are not tolerated. Apprentices understand how to raise concerns and are confident that these will be addressed promptly and appropriately. Assessors teach topics such as the 'Prevent' duty and fundamental British values at the start of apprentices' courses. However, few apprentices remember what they have been taught or how these themes relate to their job roles and personal lives.

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Participation and development Needs attention

Assessors provide well-planned and effective careers advice to apprentices about their next steps. They provide helpful advice to apprentices on, for example, courses they can study to develop their training and instructing skills and first steps into higher education after they complete their apprenticeship.

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Participation and development Needs attention

Leaders do not provide a planned curriculum for apprentices to develop their wider interests. However, assessors respond helpfully where there are individual requests from apprentices for additional training and advocate on their behalf to organise this through apprentices' employers. For example, apprentices complete oxyacetylene welding and forklift driving course. Leaders do not ensure that apprentices are taught about how to maintain healthy lifestyles and personal wellbeing.

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What it's like to be a learner and/or an apprentice at this provider

Apprentices who remain on their programme are committed to and enjoy their studies. They value the knowledge and experience of their assessors and how they use examples from the world of work to enliven topics. However, too many apprentices leave before completing their apprenticeship.

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What it's like to be a learner and/or an apprentice at this provider

Apprentices who complete their programme are proud of the quality of the work that they produce and how they make positive contributions to their workplaces. They gain confidence from implementing successful processes in their workplace, such as digital stock control systems, staffing rotas and welding services in maintenance workshops.

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What it's like to be a learner and/or an apprentice at this provider

Apprentices are not supported well enough to overcome barriers to their learning. Leaders do not know which apprentices are facing barriers to their learning or are disadvantaged. They rely on assessors responding to a need when it emerges but provide no guidance on what and how much support is needed or oversight of the impact of any support. Leaders have not provided assessors with training on meeting the additional needs that apprentices may have.

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What it's like to be a learner and/or an apprentice at this provider

Assessors ensure that apprentices have a secure knowledge of occupational and workplace health and safety. However, apprentices do not receive sufficient opportunities to explore topics such as how to recognise and keep safe from the risks of radicalisation and extremism.

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What it's like to be a learner and/or an apprentice at this provider

Apprentices are not provided with a curriculum to develop their knowledge of how to maintain healthy lifestyles and positive mental health. They do not have access to any planned opportunities to explore their wider interests or to gain additional skills.

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What it's like to be a learner and/or an apprentice at this provider

Arrangements to assure the quality of provision and hold leaders to account are not rigorous enough. Leaders are not sufficiently aware of the progress that apprentices are making, which impedes their ability to improve outcomes for apprentices.

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Next steps

Leaders should ensure that there are processes in place to evaluate and monitor the progress of apprentices who are disadvantaged and need support to help them overcome barriers to learning. Leaders should improve quality assurance and improvement processes and monitor and evaluate apprentices’ progress much more effectively. Leaders should identify and implement actions to ensure that a higher proportion of apprentices stay until the end of their apprenticeship and achieve their qualification. Leaders should ensure that assessors receive effective professional development, so they are more knowledgeable about how to identify and support apprentices who have barriers to their learning or are disadvantaged. Leaders should ensure that assessors set targets for apprentices which help them to improve their knowledge and skills.

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Team inspectors:

Mark Wardle, Ofsted Inspector Robert Busby, Ofsted Inspector

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Facts and figures used on inspection

The data was used by the inspector(s) during the inspection. More recent data may have been published since the inspection took place.

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Total learners

Leaders should ensure that apprentices are taught about British values and the risks of radicalisation more effectively, so that they know how these topics relate to their workplaces and personal lives. Leaders should ensure that they plan opportunities for apprentices to develop their wider interests and how to maintain their mental and physical health.

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About this inspection

Following our renewed inspection framework, all inspections are now led by His Majesty’s Inspectors (HMIs) or by Ofsted Inspectors (OIs) who have previously served as HMIs.

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About this inspection

Inspection activities: Inspectors spoke with leaders, staff and learners during the inspection.

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About this inspection

AWC Training Limited is an independent learning provider based in Cornwall and Merseyside. It provides apprenticeships from level 2 to level 5. Most apprentices are studying engineering and maintenance apprenticeships. At the time of the inspection, there were 45 apprentices. There were 18 level 2 engineering operative apprentices and 19 level 3 engineering maintenance technician apprentices. A few apprentices were studying level 2 waste resource operative, level 3 team leading and level 5 operations manager. All apprentices were aged 19 and over.

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national average

'This provider' and 'national average' figures are taken from the publicly available DfE achievement rates. Where the DfE have supressed the figures, usually due to small cohorts, this has been mirrored in the Report Card and will be shown by an 'S'.

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Year This provider National average

'This provider' and 'national average' figures are taken from the publicly available DfE achievement rates. Where the DfE have supressed the figures, usually due to small cohorts, this has been mirrored in the Report Card and will be shown by an 'S'.

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Exceptional

Practice is exceptional: of the highest standard nationally. Other providers can learn from it.

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Strong standard

The provider reaches a strong standard. Leaders are working above the standard expected of them.

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Expected standard

The provider is fulfilling the expected standard of education and/or care. This means they are following the standard set out in statutory and non ‑ statutory legislation and the professional standards expected of them.

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Needs attention

The expected standards are not met but leaders are likely able to make the necessary improvements.

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Urgent improvement

The provider needs to make urgent improvements to provide the expected standard of education and/or care.

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Urgent improvement

services providing education and skills for children and learners of all ages, and inspects and regulates services that care for children and young people.

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Urgent improvement

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Urgent improvement

You may reuse this information (not including logos) free of charge in any format or medium, under the terms of the Open Government Licence. To view this licence, visit www.nationalarchives.gov.uk/doc/open-government-licence , write to the Information Policy Team, The National Archives, Kew, London TW9 4DU, or email: psi@nationalarchives.gsi.gov.uk .

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Urgent improvement

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Urgent improvement

T: 0300 123 1231 Textphone: 0161 618 8524 E: enquiries@ofsted.gov.uk W: www.gov.uk/ofsted

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