A holistic approach to learner well-being, health & safety
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Information about the setting
The Greater Gwent Adult Learning Partnership, which is led by Coleg Gwent, was established in 1990. There are five main delivery partners, all of whom are local authorities. They are: Aneurin Leisure (Blaenau Gwent), Caerphilly, Monmouthshire, Newport, and Torfaen. The partnership offer includes provision that is franchised through the college, direct grant funded provision, and a range of full-cost recovery courses and clubs. The franchised provision includes courses in essential skills, English for speakers of other languages (ESOL), independent living skills (ILS), and information communication technology (ICT). The grant funded provision includes essential skills and employability courses, non-accredited engagement programmes, and a range of personal interest courses.
Context and background to the effective or innovative practice
Mental health awareness plays an important part in the Gwent Partnership’s continuing professional development (CPD) offer and in ensuring that learners have access to a good choice of health & well-being courses. The COVID pandemic presented a unique set of challenges for adult learning and staff were redeployed across the partnership delivering schools meals and manning COVID testing centres. However, learners required increased levels of digital and well-being support to enable them to continue their learning. Therefore, the partnership had to explore how it could support its learners when many local authority staff were redeployed.
The partners agreed that a cohesive approach to mental health and well-being was needed, and a well-being strategy was developed for its learners and staff, with a clear aim “to contribute to the positive well-being and lifestyles of our adult learning communities”. Adult support funding, first introduced in 2021/22, was instrumental in enabling the partnership to plan a comprehensive range of CPD and events for tutors, as well as learner focused activities.
Description of nature of strategy or activity
Welcome to wellbeing for learners was an online module developed for learners by an external training organisation. The content was offered in different formats to suit all learner needs, and sessions were recorded so new learners could access the module at any time.
Learner health and well-being fairs, which were held in each local authority, were attended by representatives from health boards, leisure centres, youth academies, sports centres, employment and training organisations, Gwent Police, and MIND. The event also included sessions on Indian drumming, karate, singing, sign language, healthy eating, gardening, storytelling, and health checks. Due to the success of this event, it is now held annually.
To further support learners’ mental health,17 tutors across the partnership successfully achieved the L2 Accredited Mental Health First Aid qualification, seven of these then progressed to the L3 Award in Supervising/Leading First Aid for Mental Health. These courses enabled staff to have a better understanding of mental health conditions and to signpost learners to appropriate organisations. Six tutors also attended an Introduction to Supporting Learners with post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD), a course that was aimed at those tutors who work with refugees.
To provide learner and tutor support with digital skills, digital mentor roles were established in 2020/2021. These mentors provided in-borough training, targeting tutors from all subject areas to help them to use digital tools and technologies in their teaching, and to encourage their learners to develop their digital skills. The digital mentors also provided support for learners on digital well-being, online safety, security, and responsibility.
Gwent Police have visited partnership’s digital skills classes to give talks on on-line safety. There are many examples of collaborative working with external partnerships, such as Growing Spaces for gardening & cookery courses with a focus on the correct and safe use of garden tools, kitchen safety, and food hygiene.
A tutor conference was held in Spring 2023, which focused on mental health & well-being. There were two keynote speakers who delivered presentations on stress management and financial literacy. The conference also included workshops on well-being, everyday mindfulness, wasteless homes, and alternative therapies. Seventy-one tutors and managers attended the event.
What impact has this work had on provision and learners’ standards?
As a result of the Welcome to Wellbeing course , 98% of learners said their knowledge had increased and 98% knew where to go for support on mental health issues.
The 2022/2023 learner questionnaire outcomes showed that 93% agreed that their course contributed to their own personal well-being and 93% agreed that the course had a positive effect on their general mental health.
During observations learners were also asked what additional skills they had obtained during their course. All groups shared that they had gained additional skills that contributed to their well-being, with the most frequently mentioned being confidence, communication skills and digital skills. Learner comments included:
“We have learnt so much and use our IT skills all the time”.
“The tutor supports us to move forward and explains things in more than one way. The knowledge and skills we are learning are giving us more confidence and choices”.
“The support of our tutor, and each other, makes the course so enjoyable that we are motivated to continue”.
How have you shared your good practice?
All CPD offered through the adult support funding have been uploaded to Hwb and translated into Welsh. In addition, whenever the opportunity arises, good practice is shared beyond the partnership, for example, with other departments of Coleg Gwent and with other adult community learning and further education providers, through regional or national training and meetings such as JISC workshops and network meetings.