YMCA Training
Here’s how the YMCA improved identification and scaled learner support with Cognassist.
YMCA
Cognassist has been a real game-changer for us. It gives us the certainty that we’re doing the best we can to support our learners from day one and the ability to evidence the support consistently. We have also strengthened our ability to identify hidden needs and provide tailored support as well as facilitate an environment where our learners can reach their full potential.
Bevin Currie
YMCA
The context
One of the biggest challenges we see education providers facing is how to accurately identify, evidence and support learners with additional learning needs. Many organisations are acting on gut instinct, relying on learners self-disclosing to identify needs and spending countless hours and days supporting learners to attain their qualifications.
We all know and love YMCA. They’re the largest and oldest youth charity in the world. Each year globally they help 68,000 people engage with education and learning, from basic life skills to apprenticeships and further education.
Central YMCA had a question. “We’ve got a significant national apprenticeship provision and a desire to provide outstanding support for our learners. How do we best scale learner support?”
The challenge
What Central YMCA found, was a desire to identify a better way to accurately evidence additional learning need support.
If a learner didn’t disclose a need upfront in their onboarding process. Tutors were rolling up their sleeves and investing many extra hours to support them by customising learning materials.
Learning plans were being created manually, with tutors using their knowledge to break down course material and make them accessible to the learner. Central YMCA’s tutors were pouring their time and energy into supporting learners to achieve their goals.
Cognassist provided a more suitable and qualitative platform to support these learners
The solution
Using Cognassist, the Central YMCA team can identify and evidence additional learning needs across their apprenticeship provision
By embedding the assessment into their onboarding process, they’re able to identify individual needs as early as possible.
Using our personalised learning journeys, they can provide expert and tailored support to their learners from start point all the way through to end-point assessment.
Not only that, they’re able to access unused learner support revenue to drive their success.
The outcomes
Empowered tutors, accurate identification and evidencing of ALN and improved support for their learners.
Cognassist gives Central YMCA a better way to identify learners with additional needs, delivered digitally in under 30 minutes. We’ve assessed almost 1,000 learners in the last two years, and every learner now completes a digital cognitive assessment when they start a course.
Personalised learning strategies provide more accessible and intuitive resources for learners, tailored to their individual needs and programme level. Helping them to understand how they think and learn and improve their engagement and overall attainment.
By using Cognassist, Central YMCA has been able to evidence learning needs and the support they offer their learners. Allowing them to draw down additional funding to ensure learners receive full support across their educational journey.
Here at YMCA we’ve worked in partnership with Cognassist since 2017. The assessment, its report, and associated intervention modules have been a fantastic resource during this time. Collectively they enable our tutors to support learners and assist learners in understanding their neuro-differences, resulting in successful outcomes for all. Following the cognitive assessment and report, the Cognassist intervention modules are a key part of the support we give to the learners. After speaking to the learners and producing their support plan, we tailor the intervention plan on the Cognassist platform, so that the interventions they are accessing support their needs at the click of a button. Thereafter we complete learning support monthly reviews where we gain feedback from the learner. These sessions and the impact of the Cognassist interventions have had a really positive impact on learner wellbeing and achievement rates. Here at YMCA we utilise the Cognassist report for applications of additional time in end-point assessment settings, where required. To date we’ve used multiple awarding bodies for the various programmes our learner are completing and all have accepted the requests.
Helen Jones
YMCA
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