Attending the 2024 Apprenticeships Conference? Here’s what you need to know...

With the start of a new academic year impending, anyone and everyone involved in apprenticeship delivery will be focusing on what makes their team tick – booking assessors, reviewing standards and implementing strategy.

However, if you have time for one more event in your calendar before that season gets into full swing, then it should be the Apprenticeships Conference in Birmingham (September 19^th).

We will be there along with our assessment technology partner risr/… so why should you? Read on, and you will see.

1) You won’t learn what you already know

You don’t need us to tell you that the apprenticeship and skills training landscape is transforming – if you work in further education, you will already be adapting to every change.

However, what you will learn is that you aren’t alone: just like you, disruptors within the industry are navigating these changes, and we can all learn how their fresh approaches can be a model for our industry at large.

Who’s who?

With over 15 confirmed speakers and many more industry influencers in attendance, there’s no better opportunity to network with people whose ideas will define the direction of travel of our sector.

We know this because we have had the privilege of speaking to a number of them, such as:

• Speaker: Steve Smith (SIAS) whose approach to end-point assessment is rooted on making the sector ‘less transactional’ and repositioning the way EPA facilitators engage with one another to deliver the best apprenticeship journeys (read our interview with him here.)
• Speaker: Laura Topliss (DNA Awarding) whose ‘no-surprises’ approach to EPA is vital for providing stability, confidence and inclusion, especially in a context where the very model of EPA is changing beneath our feet (read our interview with her here.)
• Attendee: Libby Timms (Skilltech Solutions, formerly City & Guilds) who knows that any assessment technology needs to be combined with the all-important human touch, which is why end-user/customer success should be at the heart of EPA technology (read our interview with her here.)

With representatives of Ofqual, the NHS, NCFE and IfATE (and more), it will also be a chance to ask those ‘in the driving seat’ about the reforms that will impact all of us.

2) Old assessment habits die hard

If you are an epaPRO user, you will already know that having a streamlined, centralised platform for managing EPA changes everything – including the old habits that were making organisational agility and compliance nigh-on impossible.

As many more look to create an all-inclusive EPA offer by delivering assessments in-house, some of those same barriers are rearing their heads again: juggling multiple systems for different assessment types; manually uploading test results; and scouring spreadsheets for apprentice credentials.

If assessment is one of the three pillars of growth for apprenticeships, then we need to ensure technology doesn’t create more problems than it solves for administrators or test-takers.

We collaborated with leading assessment technology provider, risr/, to help EPAOs deliver assessment entirely within epaPRO, with ‘epaPRO assess’. If you want to learn what that technology is capable of, the Apprenticeships Conference is the place to be.

You will be able to meet Tad Chapman (representing risr/), Samuel Riley (Construction EPA Company, who use epaPRO Assess) and of course, us (Skilltech Solutions) to talk about how this assessment technology can deliver a transformative assessment offer at your EPAO.

• For a sneak peek of how epaPRO Assess is already transforming EPA delivery at a leading EPAO, you can read our interview with Ryan Williams of Construction EPA.

3) Good conversations matter more than ever

Whether this is your first apprenticeship event, or simply the latest in your packed calendar, you will know the value of networking.

You don’t need to tell us how even a single conversation can spark partnerships that transform the way you deliver apprenticeships.

However, as we stressed in our ‘look-ahead’ to the previous event we attended, EPA 2024, it’s more important than ever to build resilient networks within the sector.

With potential reforms on the horizon ranging from regulatory upheaval to an uprooting of the very model of EPA itself, every conversation will matter – from those with like-minded providers with whom you can grow centre partnerships, to technology partners (like us) who can provide the Ofqual-required systems to help you adapt to the ‘new normal’ in our sector.

There’s no doubt that as a sector, we are at our strongest when we unite around a common cause. Improving apprenticeship delivery is at the heart of what Skilltech does, and if your EPAO, training provider or further education body has the same, we would like to invite you to join us at the Apprenticeship Conference in Birmingham (Millenium Point, September 19^th, 2024).

You can learn more about the conference and book your tickets here.