What is happening with the 2357?

[electricalqualifications]

What really is happening to our qualification?

Well if you don't know, where have you been for the last 6 months? To shorten the story somewhat, it's pretty simple, it's going to change. Drastically. I am not talking about content, a circuit will always be a circuit; there will always be a potential difference somewhere; there will unlikely be a discovery in the near future that proved Mr Ohm was completely on the wrong tracks. No, we are not talking about content, we are talking about different changes.

The changes at the moment are somewhat difficult to fathom. Summit Skills, the Sector Skills Council responsible for the Electrotechnical framework, are responsible for bringing the course into line with the new QCF qualification list. The QCF is an attempt by the government to standardise and unitise qualifications and structures. Summit Skills themselves are the people that decide on why, what, who and how we currently train future electricians. There is a popular myth that the City and Guilds are always the bad guys when it comes to problems with the qualifications but many times they are tied by Summit Skills as to what they offer. Summit Skills seemed to have become the 'Gods' of Electrical Installation. They are tied in with the industry bodies, ECA being a noted and large supporter. This means that while they are few, they have the influence and ears of many; when they say something, it is said to the right people. This does not necessarily mean that what they are saying is right, especially this time round. Let's take a look at what has been mentioned so far.

There are too many partially qualified people

As of September 2010, no one will be able to become an electrician unless they are on an apprenticeship. Sounds fair perhaps? Should that not be the case? Well consider this scenario: Currently an adult, let's call him Dave, is looking for a change in career. He is a mechanic for a popular and well advertised national company changing brakes and tyres. The pay is poor and the hours are many. Up until now, this hasn't really bothered him, he's been enjoying life and an income that supports this. Dave hits 25 years young, meets a girl and decides this girl is the one. They date, everything is great, they get close and move in together. They still have two incomes, rent is covered, bills are paid and nights out are enjoyed. Dave hits 27, pops the question, she accepts and they tie the proverbial knot. Dave hits 29, is due to be a father, realises that his income really isn't that good and begins to panic thinking he won't be able to afford life on his income alone. He needs a change of career but has no qualifications or experience. He goes to his local college, likes the look of being an electrician, enquires and subsequently enrols on an evening course. It's tough doing two nights a week, but he thinks about the extra £7 an hour he could be earning having a trade behind him so roughs out the journey, balancing work, home life and studies. The tutor explains that this current qualification will not give him graded electrician status but may be useful to get him a job as a mate or an improver. It can give him the technical background to use as a carrot-on-a-stick to employers to take him on and give him that chance. Once working as a mate or an improver, he could actually start and complete the NVQ. Within a couple of years, he could have all the necessary qualifications to work as a fully qualified and graded electrician doubling his previous income. The industry gets a well motivated and mature candidate, skills shortages are being addressed, the correct qualifications are attained (rather than a 7 day domestic electrician course!). Everyone wins. The problem with this wonderful opportunity is that Summit Skills would not record that as a success, it is not an apprenticeship but a series of qualifications strung together. They would record it as a partially qualified person, someone who had completed the technical certificate at college without being apprentices or JIB adult trainees, even though that person could join the JIB Register of Electricians. Under the new Summit Skills scheme, Dave could not become an electrician, he would not have the opportunity. This land that people flock to for opportunity will no longer offer the opportunity.

Now consider the full time student. With a massive decrease in apprenticeships offered by companies over the last few years coupled with the "Credit Crunch©", we have more young people than ever out of work. Lots of these young people still want to be electricians but cannot find the elusive placements. Many of them think that they might want to be electricians but are unsure. Some of them just have no idea what they want to do but didn't get the grades to do A Levels and wanted to do something with their hands. Whatever the reason, the outcomes are very rarely as clear cut as Summit Skills seem to think they are. They say we are turning out too many partially qualified people. What they don't take into account is that many of these students use the qualifications to help them get the apprenticeship in the first place. A lot of employers like taking these students, they are a little more mature, often have driving licenses (useful for rural areas) and a little bit of background knowledge. They can ask the colleges what the students are like, they can ultimately vet the detritus beforehand by simply selecting the best on offer. Other students use the qualification to go on to higher level qualifications and then on to university. Others move to related industries, engineering, electronics and the ilk, all again aided by having a solid level 2 qualification that combined a heady mix of practical and theory.

To say we are churning out part qualified people is simple ignorance of the larger picture, a deliberate avoidance of the facts. If the industry were truly concerned with part qualified people, then the focus would have been on the churning out of domestic electricians after a week long course. They should be concerned that after a week, an individual who has never even worked on a construction site can slap a Domestic Installer sign on their van and go out installing, inspecting and testing electrical work.

What the changes mean to colleges and training providers

Jobs. There are a lot of us in the teaching and assessing game and the majority of us like it thank you very much. I suspect the job is a lot different these days compared to what it used to be, we no longer just teach apprentices, we teach on engineering courses, foundation courses, general construction course as well as traditional adult evening courses and sometimes dipping into Plumbing courses. In fact, for a lot of us, our teaching strengths and abilities have stretched us and now we are probably going to pay the price for it. We may have a group of apprentices in on a Monday but may also have a full time group in on a Monday, Tuesday and a Wednesday. We might then have adults in on a Tuesday and Thursday evening. That would equate to 5 days worth of teaching yet under the new proposals, we would only be able to run the Monday class and no others equating to 1 days worth of teaching. It doesn't take a level 3 lecturer to work out what that means to the shop floor workers, especially with the government slashing more funding than Freddy Krueger slashes teenagers.

We have already seen through the Smartscreen forums and through friends, contacts and anecdotal incidences that people are going back onto the tools. The ill prepared introduction of a new qualification being the catalyst that has pushed them over the edge in an already tight and frustrating education environment. It's took years to persuade people to come into teaching, when the going was good outside, no one wanted to take a wage drop and increase in workload to enter the teaching game. This often meant those that did, actually wanted to, they had an innate desire to make a difference, to impart their knowledge and experience. Those will go leaving the befuddled and downright uninterested behind.

Change is good

It's a bold statement. Is change really good? Well, yes, in the majority of situations it is. Change brings fresh ideas, fresh people, an opportunity to make things better again. It is the force behind improvement which with careful introduction and thoughtful application, benefits everyone, students, lecturers and industry alike.

The problem is that it is looking like this new change is not going to have any of those superlatives attached to it and as history shows, change has not been particularly productive within our industry. Many people sing the praises of the 2360, and content wise, I am sure it was a good qualification. I am one of those that sat the 2360 as a student 20 years ago, all the way up to the "C" certificate and I can tell you that as a student, it really wasn't that great. It's not that the content was bad, it was more of the fact that you sat there for a year pretty much unaware of how well you were doing then all of a sudden, bang, exam. There were few official warnings that you were perhaps going off track and a lot of the less motivated students got frequently caught out. Then came the 2351, put in place I assume because not enough people were passing the written-as-opposed-to-multi-choice 2360 level 2. I really do not need to write anything about the 2351. The introduction of the 2330 in my opinion addressed the progression issues through the course whilst having pretty much the same content as the 2360. Planned correctly, the students have regular external assessments which are good indications of progress and some good, solid, practical assignments. I know that the launch was not without teething problems and there have been some issues, but they have been ironed out and have left a good qualification in its stead which has served us well over the last few years.

Change is bad

We know things have to change, we are after all living in the information age and technology is increasing at an exponential rate. There are new items being invented that the electrician uses daily or installs now that they never would have done ten years ago. This brings new challenges to the industry and the opportunity to use continual training to ensure we have the strongest and most qualified workforce available to us. Change also gives us the opportunity to look at what we offer at the fundamental level, to make tweaks and improvements over what we currently deliver. We shouldn't ignore change as it is a window of opportunity.

The Government want the QCF system to work and have put pretty aggressive deadlines in place to make sure that it does. This means that, once again, we have to accept changes to our qualifications. This is something, for reasons stated above, that should be seen as a golden opportunity. The 2330 and the 2356 are not bad qualifications, they appear to satisfy the industry and keep it open enough that it offers opportunities and progression routes for a wide variety of entrants, but we also know it's not perfect. We should be using this enforced governmental change to look at what is right and what is not so right with the system. We should elicit the utopian ideal of the industry meeting with those doing the training. It would be brilliant, a real opportunity to bring everything together. We are realistic enough to know that this will not really happen but we should also not be using it as an opportunity to destroy what we have worked so hard to produce over the last few years, finding excuses for changes that don't exist and seemingly threatening the skills gap further.

Conclusion

We are all worried about what the future brings. There are a lot of concerns and as Johnny Nash coined, there are more questions than answers. No one is listening though, and even if they are, they don't want to engage us. We hear snippets, rumours, piecemeal information that we cannot discern. Conjecture is running rife, as it does in these situations. A comment becomes the truth, de facto even. All I can think of is the misquoted Churchill line, "Never was so much owed by so many to so few". And it won't be quite in the same spirit.
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[phil7677]

good post, I was the type of electrician in the post, 30+ years old with two children and wanted to get a trade. I struggled being taken on a course the local building college would not take me because i was over 19. i managed to get on with the local tech college. I did the course over three years and grabbed as much experience as i could. no one would take me on but i was lucky enough to have an ex boss who bought pubs. so i managed to line up a team and went along on the jobs with them. without the course and with the new one coming in i would have no chance. i did the first year and took my 16th in the june after the first two exams i studied at home and just took the exam. did the second year and when i started on the third i did the 17th when it came out again i studied at home for it. also whilst doing the 3rd year i did a teaching qualification at the same time alongside the nvq. i have now got my assessors award re done my gcse english and maths and signed up for uni in September. without the guidence and support of one of the lecturers in the first year and the qualifications of the 2330 i would not be in the position of uni or the quals i have now. it will be a great shame if adult learners are not able to do the qualification and i feel the industry will suffer because of it.

[amer]

just done my level 2 and now i can not get onto level 3 because i have not got a job in the industry.Any tips on what route i should take now. thanks I really want to be an electrician.

[electricalqualifications]

Hi Amer.

Sorry I missed your post, please look at the latest news for an answer:

http://www.electricalqualifications.co.uk/phpBB2/viewtopic.php?p=156#156
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Thank you for visiting Electrical Qualifications. Please feel free to ask questions here or email us at info@electricalqualifications.co.uk.

http://www.electricalqualifications.co.uk