Anisa Ali, Entrepreneur/Sole Trader
Nigel Akers, IT Diploma Co-ordinator, Nottingham City
Gareth Billings, International Procurement Administrator, Experian
Matthew Hopkins, ICT Development Officer, Lincolnshire Voluntary Sector Consortium
Mike Ryan, Managing Director, Idaho Technology Ltd
Renata Eyres, Head of Business-led Learning and Development, University of Salford
Gordon Fletcher, Senior Lecturer in Information Systems, University of Salford
Narrator: Mentoring is a valuable way of supporting learners on the Diploma in IT. Nottingham City Consortium provides this through a combination of face-to-face and email contact with employers.
Anisa Ali, Entrepreneur/Sole Trader: It’s up to you guys how ever you want to do it. Any ideas, any questions anything, email me and I’ll get back to you straight away.
Nigel Akers, IT Diploma Co-ordinator, Nottingham City: When we have business challenges I try and establish an email link with them so that the youngsters as they're going through the challenge, like with Anisa and the express lunch activity, like with the band, there’s an email address that the youngsters have access to. They can send any drafts of work they’re producing, they can ask any questions. We also use, as part of the Young Enterprise element of the work we do, business advisers who act as mentors and come in, in our case, once a week from Experian and work with the youngsters and give them that little bit of support, again available over email if need be.
Narrator: Regular face-to-face contact helps to develop a supportive relationship between the employer and the learner.
Gareth Billings, International Procurement Administrator, Experian: I’m there to give them advice as and when they need it. Give them some guidance. Act as a resource. I’m not here to do it for them or to tell them what to do but just to facilitate the learning, I guess. To help them make their own choices, give them a little bit of guidance and obviously they’ll learn from the results they get from the choices that they’ve made, so, just to act as a sounding board really.
Student: Oh, I think it helps us an awful lot. Gareth he comes in every board meeting. He sort of helps us to get it along smoothly and he’s the one who, like, motivates us.
Student: He makes it, like, a little bit easier, because like, if we get stuck or something we can just ask him because he knows about what he’s doing and stuff. It makes it a lot easier.
Matthew Hopkins, ICT Development Officer, Lincolnshire Voluntary Sector Consortium: My job, for instance, is to go out to groups and help them with ICT. What I’m looking forward to is perhaps using some of the experience I’ve had with running ICT projects and seeing them develop in themselves. At the end of the day you’ve got some very young people who are exploring new skills that they’ve never come across before and I think the need to mentor them is very, very important.
Mike Ryan, Managing Director, Idaho Technology Ltd: I think mentoring generally is incredibly valuable and I think it’s now a two-way thing, because mentoring anybody really opens up the opportunity for any knowledge I’ve got and experience I’ve got, to be conveyed to somebody else. But likewise it’s refreshing for me to see what new views people have got and how they tackle and solve the problems that they’ve got in their curriculum.
Narrator: Mentoring does not have to be limited to employers. Peer-to-peer support can be useful too. At Salford University, students provide mentoring for younger learners.
Renata Eyres, Head of Business-led Learning and Development, University of Salford: Our students go out into schools and colleges and work on real, live projects with pupils in the schools, and they act as mentors for the students to see then how their skills and knowledge can be used, get them to think about how they might take their learning forward. And we’re hoping to develop that further then with our IT Diploma line and bring employers into that as well as business mentors.
Gordon Fletcher, Senior Lecturer in Information Systems, University of Salford: Mentoring is one of those things that bring out all the, sort of, hidden qualities, not just of individuals but of, you know, courses and environments that I don’t think you can bring out in any other way. I think sometimes having someone who is a peer, or a near peer, describing something to them, I think sometimes gets through a little bit more rapidly, and it sort of hits home in a different way. So it does sort of create that communication between lots of different people, which can only be a good thing.
Narrator: Mentoring learners does have associated risks, and while safeguards are essential they should not be a barrier for employers' involvement.
Renata Eyres: Our staff and our students who work with younger students all have criminal records bureau checks, CRB checks, and we have clear training and guidelines for them, as well as staff who work in these areas, and we have a university policy around that so they are well supported.
Nigel Akers: In terms of email mentoring, obviously there may be concerns about the sort of relationship between youngsters and an adult in terms of email. What I’ve done when I say I’ve established an email link, I’ve actually set up a separate email account, don’t tell the youngsters this, but they all come through me and I then forward them on, and so there is the possibility for me to vet everything should it be needed. So there’s that. The only one I don’t do that, is with the business adviser for the Young Enterprise company, but they’ve been CRB checked by Young Enterprise.
Gareth Billings: I did have to do a CRB check but, really simple process, just a case of filling in a couple of forms, giving them back to the organisers, and within a couple of weeks I got my clearance back to say everything was fine and yes, no hassle at all really. I’d recommend anyone whose thinking of helping out, the process is really simple. You can pretty much give as much or as little time as you can so, I think it’s something that’s really worthwhile. You actually get a lot out of it personally as well.
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