North Hertfordshire College and The Consortium for Business have been named Train to Gain Provider of the Year in the East of England at a presentation today (16 September) at Ickworth House, Bury St Edmunds.
In a time of recession they have continued to grow the number starting on Train to Gain, up by 75% on 2007/08 with success rates of 83%. Robust processes combined with support and development of consortium members and sharing best practice has enabled a growth in employees achieving qualifications of 62%.
North Hertfordshire College is the lead partner in the Hertfordshire Train to Gain Consortium covering NVQ delivery in the workplace in Bedfordshire, Hertfordshire, Cambridgeshire and Essex. This allows the Consortium to offer a huge range of qualifications covering most sectors. They continue to explore opportunities for new provision and have established an unfunded rapid response service for employers to help them with downsizing.
Caroline Neville, Regional Director for the Learning and Skills Council East of England presented the Award to Fintan Donohue, Chief Executive and Principal of North Hertfordshire College and said: “The consortium has been chosen to receive this award in recognition of its outstanding performance and responsiveness to the needs of employers throughout the academic year.
“Feedback from skills brokers has been consistently positive with the consortium praised for the responsive and dynamic way they manage enquiries and keep them updated.”
Fintan Donohue, accepting the Award said: “This award means a lot to North Hertfordshire College and its excellent partners. Two years ago, with support from the LSC, we committed to major investment in our employer responsive capacity, which has paid off.”
“Our Goldsmith Centre for Business has become a recognised Centre of Excellence for training and the outstanding success rates are a testimony to the quality of providers that make up the Consortium. This Award will give all of us in the Consortium a strong incentive to do even better in the future. We hope that more employers will see the Consortium as their partner of first choice.”