Glasgow Clyde College gained SCQF College Ambassador Status in November 2019, and since then has continued to ensure that the benefits of the SCQF are used to support the delivery of college and regional outcomes, particularly around widening access, collaboration and partnership working. Glasgow Clyde College is passionate about teaching and learning and how this can make positive changes in people’s lives. During the year where the education sector has adapted to many challenges we are proud to have embedded the SCQF into the way we work at Glasgow Clyde!

Developments

We have used the SCQF to support learners and recognise wider achievement, as well as increasing the College’s work with regional partners such as schools, communities and training providers, to support successful learner journeys.
The following are some examples of the work the College has undertaken, using the SCQF during the first year as an SCQF College Ambassador:

• Promoted the Framework on the College website, including information on a range of qualifications explained alongside the Framework diagram to provide context. This shows the range of qualifications we offer to school pupils to college students.
  
  
• The Community Learning and Development team has developed a second level of programmes to allow progression from the first suite of units credit rated between SCQF level 3 and 4, which proved such a success with learners, communities and schools.
  The first suite of units included Basic Sewing, Click 2 Connect and Supporting Parents Supporting Children: Numeracy and Mathematics Level 4, and will shortly have a second stage to which learners can progress and continue their learning journey.
  The unit Supporting Parents Supporting Children: Numeracy and Mathematics Level 4, and the planned follow up unit, were highlighted at Education Scotland events as strongly supporting the vision for Scottish Education of excellence through raising attainment and achieving equity through parental engagement.
  These units are aligned to improvement drivers outlined in the National Improvement Framework and Scottish Attainment Challenge.
  Also forming part of this second suite, in response to the current exceptional circumstances, is a unit introducing learners to Video Conferencing Apps.
  Sheila White, Community Learning and Development Manager, said
  
  “As a result of the COVID-19 pandemic the CLD team recognised the value in creating a unit around video conferencing platforms for our use within the college / community environment. Colleagues from both the voluntary and statutory sectors identified that there is a real need and demand for people in the community to be more confident and competent in the use of video conferencing platforms.”

• Credit rated third party provision, allowing more learners to gain credit for their learning at every opportunity. The College recently provided credit rating services to Emcare, a private training provider which delivers a range of short courses for health, care and safety across a wide range of sectors. Having two of its in-house devised courses credit rated at SCQF level 5 and 6 will give the company an enhanced and competitive training services product to offer clients. Both credit rated courses, Workplace Mental Health Champion and Moving and Assisting of People have recently been published on the SCQF database.
  
  
• As a Credit Rating Body, the College supported Workers Educational Association Scotland (WEA) in initial discussions to work with a school to deliver their unit, An Introduction to Science in Everyday Life. This unit was credit rated by the College at SCQF level 4, and is based on the exciting Science for a Successful Scotland resource, which is hosted on the College’s open learning website, My Clyde
  
  
• Worked in partnership with the SCQFP to make our Credit Rating Procedure documentation available as part of an initiative to share good practice with other Credit Rating Bodies.
  
  
  

Impact

The added distinction of Ambassador status with the SCQF Partnership demonstrates to learners, employers and organisations seeking third party credit rating that the College is committed to using the Framework to develop and widen the pathways available to learners on their lifelong learning journey.

The closer partnership working that exists between Glasgow Clyde College and the SCQFP means that both organisations will continue to look at new and innovative ways of working together to ultimately improve the learner journey for every student that enters the College.

Future plans for using and promoting the SCQF

Future developments include work on a diverse range of units recognising the valuable learning and teaching taking place in our Additional Support for Learning area. This will further embed the benefits of the SCQF Framework in to the College offering and increase both staff and students engagement with the advantages of the Framework.

More on the SCQF College Ambassador Programme

Download a pdf version of this case study.