The three levels of apprenticeship achievement

Following on from the successful publishing of the NDT Engineer Apprenticeship standard, we (the Development Group) have been working hard on developing the apprenticeship assessment plan. As mentioned in last month’s NDT News, the NDT Engineer apprenticeship is likely to have several entry levels, depending on what the apprentice has already achieved in their career, and will include an NDT Level 3, a foundation degree, a BSc or BEng degree and a BSc or BEng (Hons) degree; however, this largely depends on the government approving this approach. The schematic on the right shows what we are trying to achieve.

It is a government requirement that apprenticeships have more than one level of pass, so we discussed at some length the number of levels we should have and the process by which we would determine the apprenticeship award. We concluded that, to tie in with the degree awards, we should have three levels of apprenticeship achievement: ‘pass’, ‘merit’ and ‘distinction’. If the apprentice achieves (after weighting has been applied) 25% for the degree, 14% for the NDT Level 3, 12% for the end-point assessment and 5% for the behaviours, resulting in 56% for the apprenticeship overall, then the apprentice will have passed the apprenticeship with a ‘pass’. Whereas, if the apprentice achieves (after weighting has been applied) 30% for the degree, 15% for the NDT Level 3, 14% for the end-point assessment and 6% for the behaviours, resulting in 65% for the apprenticeship overall, then the apprentice will have passed the apprenticeship with a ‘merit’. Finally, if the apprentice achieves (after weighting has been applied) 35% for the degree, 16% for the NDT Level 3, 15% for the end-point assessment and 7% for the behaviours, resulting in 73% for the apprenticeship overall, then the apprentice will have passed the apprenticeship with a ‘distinction’.

Next month, I will provide a detailed explanation of the interim funding arrangements that now exist until the new funding arrangements come into force in May 2017. However, it is worth giving you a summary to whet your appetite. The current funding arrangements require the employer to fund one third of the training costs up to the cap maximum allocated to an apprenticeship; the remaining two thirds will be funded by government. In addition, there are three incentive payments that can be claimed if employers meet the criteria. The new funding arrangements will be linked to the apprenticeship levy, which comes into force on 1 April 2017. If employers pay the levy (because they have an annual payroll in excess of £3 million), they will draw down all of the training costs from the government up to the maximum value of the apprenticeship cap. Small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs), with less than 50 employees, will only have to pay 10% of the training costs up to the maximum value of the apprenticeship cap. There will be much more information on this in the next instalment.

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