To celebrate Adult Learners’ Week and encourage more people to get the learning ‘bug’, East Midlands Trains, in a partnership with Rail Union Learning organised a Learning Open Day for staff last week. This was the latest in a series of projects between East Midlands Trains and the trades union organisation to deliver life long learning in the workplace.
Over the past three years the by working together in partnership East Midlands Trains (and previous operator Midland Mainline) and Rail Union Learning have made the following contribution to adult learning;
– Offering over 30 courses
– Attended by some 350 learners
– Courses have been wide ranging, covering a variety of subjects from Business Administration to Indian Head Massage
The Learning Open Day, held at Nottingham station, on 22nd May, was an opportunity for staff to;
– Meet Union Learning Representatives
– Discuss their learning needs
– Have their say about the courses they would like to see offered in the future
– Meet a Skills for Life tutor
Jackie O’Brien, Head of Training and Development for East Midlands Trains said “We were happy to support Adult Learners’ Week. We’ve made some significant achievements in partnership with the trades unions to encourage more adults to return to learning. There’s been a fantastic response to the courses offered. Once staff have made the first step into learning, they are more likely to continue to improve themselves and indeed will be more receptive to work related courses they are required to attend to do their day to day job. It makes great business sense for us to encourage staff to get the habit of life long learning, hopefully we managed to whet some more appetites at the open day.”
Chris Nutty, Lead Learning Representative for ASLEF said "The learning partnership has developed a lot in the last three years. At the beginning we only offered English and Mathematics, since then we've gone on to offer a range of courses from academic subjects like ITQ and Business Administration to fun courses like singing and basic plumbing. Our learners come back into education for a range of reasons; personnel development, helping their children with homework, or just learning for fun. I never imagined when we started that we'd now be talking to universities about courses for our learners. But it seems once you get adults back into education there's no stopping them. East Midlands Trains has been very supportive of the project since the start of their franchise last November.”
Adult Learners’ Week (ALW) is the UK’s largest and longest running celebration of adult education and life long learning. ALW encourages thousands of adults, whatever their age and background, to give learning a go: whether it’s learning for pleasure, catching up on skills missed out on at school or getting that new job or promotion. It also celebrates the learning achievements of those adults already learning and brings their inspirational stories to a wider audience.