Training Venue: Lowlands

When running training, we try when possible to use venues which are offered by Community Associations, to enable us to contribute towards economic growth within the community, information about our 'Lowlands' venue can be found below.

Lowlands - West Derby Community Association

 

Lowlands, home of the West Derby Community Association, is a beautiful Grade II-listed mansion house set in a rare Victorian city woodland garden. 

The building and its wonderful grounds provide an ideal venue for community groups

How to find Lowlands:

By Car:

When travelling from East/South Liverpool, follow the M62 West until the motorway ends, head North up Queens Drive until you reach Three Butt Lane. Turn right onto Three Butt Lane and continue to the end of the road. Turn right onto Eaton Road North and immediately left onto Hayman's Green. Lowlands West Derby Community Association can be found on your left.

When travelling from North/West Liverpool, travel East on West Derby Road until reaching Queens Drive, head North up Queens Drive until you reach Three Butt Lane. Turn right onto Three Butt Lane and continue to the end of the road. Turn right onto Eaton Road North and immediately left onto Hayman's Green. Lowlands West Derby Community Association can be found on your left.

Parking is available onsite but spaces are limited, on street parking is available in the immediate vicinity.

By Public Transport:

The following bus routes take you within walking distance of the venue, please refer to the Merseytravel site for details on times and bus stop locations. 

Bus Route            Coming From

62A                       Mossley Hill

18                          Liverpool, Mann Island

It is recommended if you plan to travel using Public Transport that you contact Travelline for extra information, particularly if weather conditions are not ideal. 0871 200 22 33.

Shops & Resources

There is a wide variety of shops and retail establishments available in the nearby West Derby Village.

Dementia Fund

LSCP has now begun claiming funding for the Workforce Development Dementia Fund (WDDF) which is available from Skills for Care.

In response to the Prime Minister’s dementia challenge, the Department of Health (DH) has commissioned Skills for Care to support the delivery of a national learning and development programme for the social care workforce supporting people with dementia.

Skills for Care will make £2.4million available to employers, to support the completion of relevant accredited qualifications by those members of the workforce who support people with Dementia. This funding is open to all adult social care employers who support people with dementia, whether this is in the early stages of diagnosis or following diagnosis of dementia.

The funding is offered as part of the Workforce Development Fund (WDF) and as such the WDF eligibility criteria apply. Click here to read more about the WorkforceDevelopment Fund.

How to Claim

First, you must meet the eligibility requirements set out in the Workforce Development Fund, once achieved, you must send copies of the certificates for each qualification you wish to claim. Enhanced payments will be paid out against this evidence as outlined in this document.

You must act today before our funding is reduced.

We understand that waiting for certificates to arrive can sometimes be a long process, and we are currently looking at other ways to ensure this funding can be claimed. If any member of your staff has recently completed any of the qualifications in the attached document, please contact me immediately and let me know your estimate of how many qualifications may be claimable.

It is critically important that we are aware of all potential claims so we can attempt to keep enough funding, without information about potential claims within your organisation we may lose part of our funding. Funding is distributed on a first come first serve basis, so any reduction in the amount of funding could result in your organisation missing out.

If you have any questions or queries regarding this fund, please do not hesitate to contact me.

John Callaghan

Administrator

Liverpool Social Care Partnership

5 De Havilland Drive,

C/O Crossroads Care

Estuary Business Park,

Speke, Liverpool

L24 8RN

0151-427-7044

Help & Guidance when Choosing your Training Provider

Choosing a Training Provider for your organisation can be a daunting and potentially expensive task. With the introduction of Workforce Development Funding, Social Care Employers and Training Providers must ensure that the correct evidence is being provided so that funding can be claimed for the Training taking place.

We have combined information from a number of Skills for Care documents to outline what you should know and what you should look out for before looking for a new Training Provider.

For links to download any documentation for Workforce Development Funding please click here.

Information for you as an employer

Funding Currently Available:

The Workforce Development Fund (WDF) for 2012-13 is a funding stream from the Department of Health disseminated by Skills for Care. It focuses on the achievement of qualification units and supports the ongoing professional development of staff across the adult social care sector.  The fund is distributed by Skills for Care via a network of employer led partnerships and large national organisations:

• An ‘Area or National partnership’ is a collection of social care employers who come together to ‘pool’ their workforce development needs.
• A ‘Large National’ organisation is a social care provider that operates in three or more Skills for Care areas of England. 

The fund can only be utilised by adult social care providers that employ social care staff within England.

Taken from 'Step by Step guide for Employers' - Skills for Care 2012-13

How do I become eligible for funding? 

There are three things that you must do before you become eligible for WDF:

1. Have joined a partnership by completing a partnership membership form and submitting to the lead partner. [For more information on how to complete a Partnership Form please refer to our earlier Blog Post by clicking here.]
2. Comply with NMDS-SC requirements or be prepared to complete this prior to claiming funding.
3. Have employees who are completing eligible Qualifications and Credit Framework (QCF) units or NVQ units or QCF units against which you want to claim funding, [Click Here to] see the list of acceptable units.

Taken from 'Step by Step guide for Employers' - Skills for Care 2012-13

What is the National Minimum Data Set for Social Care (NMDS-SC)?

For advise on NMDS-SC, what it is and how to get started, we recommend you visit the website:

https://www.nmds-sc-online.org.uk/

Specifically, you can find the Help & Guidance section and the Frequently Asked Questions section.

NMDS-SC also have a specific helpline available for NMDS-SC related enquiries.

For specific information on what data fields must be completed to be eligible for Workforce Development Funding please click here.

Information for Choosing a Training Provider

As a social care employer it is essential to consider legal requirements and guidance from key bodies when planning appropriate training and development. These include:

• Care Quality Commission (formerly the Commission for Social Care Inspection) in relation to regulations, including national minimum standards
• [Health & Care Professionals Council, Formerly General Social Care Council] and their Codes of Practice
• Skills for Care (including Common Induction Standards for adult social care)

Training Grants & Apprenticeships

Many Training Providers are able to offer courses either part-funded or fully-funded, this funding may come a variety of sources or may be part of an Apprenticeship Scheme.

Apprenticeships are open to all employees who wish to further their continued professional development by completed a Quality Credit Framework qualification. An Apprenticeship also uses any 'on-the-job' learning you may do towards earning your qualification.

Skills for Care has published documentation on Intermediate and Advanced Apprenticeships and also Higher Apprenticeships.

Even if your course is fully funded, you may be entitled to Workforce Development Funding

WDF is for Social Care Employers, and Skills for Care recognises that the cost of a course is not the only expense to consider when training your staff, you may incur costs for paying a member of staff whilst they study, or paying another member of staff to cover shifts which your employees are studying. These are legitimate costs that can be recouped via the WDF. This funding is often referred to as 'backfill funding'.

The method for claiming funding for these 'backfill' costs, is very similar as outlined above, however it is advised that any organisation intending to claim backfill funding keep a tight audit trail of funds, as you are not allowed to make any profit from this funding, and any funds you receive should be justified by relevant costs. Skills for Care will not ask to see this audit trail, it is for your records & protection.

Collecting Evidence

Unit Summary Sheets are the industry standard for Quality Control and evidencing that training has been Assessed and Verified correctly. City in Guilds state in their guidance:

[Unit Summary Sheet] Form used on completion of each unit to meet the Ofqual requirement for a statement on authenticity. If this form is not used, there must be a written declaration, at unit level, signed by the assessor and the candidate, that the evidence is authentic and that the assessment was conducted under the specified conditions or context. (See Supporting Customer Excellence Centre Manual.)

Evidence collection should be outlined in the intial training agreement

To prevent any further costs, it is a good idea for employers to discuss and finalise any costs relating to the supply of Unit Summary Sheets, as it is a requirement for the completion of units. Some Training Providers charge on a per Unit Summary Sheet basis, to cover administration costs, if this is not outlined in the training agreement it may result in the training costing much more than expected.

Not all 'Unit Summary Sheets' will look the same, Skills for Care has templates which Training Providers may choose to use, however bespoke documentation will also be accepted, providing that the following key information is present:

• ƒCandidate name
• Candidate registration number
• Name of Awarding Organisation
• Name of Training Provider or Centre number
• Unit code
• Unit title
• Verifier date
• Verifier signature (has to be dated between 1 January 2012 and 31 March 2013)

Evidence can be sent by Post, or Email

When sending in evidence relating to a claim it is important to make it clear which establishment the evidence belongs to. As the Unit Summary Sheets contain only the information of the candidate, and nothing relating to the employer, sending an unmarked envelope with no record of which organisation they belong to will result in those units not being claimed.

It is advised that you either:

• Write the name of the organisation on each sheet
• Include organisation information and attach firmly (staple, paper-clips would not be deemed acceptable)
• Email from an organisation address

For this reason, we prefer not to accept units by FAX, as often the quality of the document is too poor to be claimed and the risk of organisational information being separated from the unit is too high.

Questions & Comments

If you would like to get in touch with Liverpool Social Care Partnership to answer any questions to comments please feel free to email the team on admin@lscpinfo.co.uk or give us a call on 0151 427 7044.

I Care Awards 2012

We are delighted to invite you to participate in the ‘I Care Awards 2012 ‘ which promotes excellence in the social care sector. The event will take place on December 5th 2012 in the Liverpool Marriot Hotel.

We are asking Social Care providers in the private, voluntary and independent sectors, whose staff support people in Liverpool, to submit nominations for a range of categories, which celebrate best practice in the workforce. Additionally, you can invite people who use your services to nominate a worker under the Service Users Choice category.

Nominations have to be returned to Mikaela Williams-Brown , 5 De Havilland Drive, Estuary Business Park, Speke, Liverpool L24 8RN or mikaela@lscpinfo.co.uk by 5p.m. on Wednesday 7th November 2012. Shortlisting will be completed by 20th November 2012.

The aim of these awards is to recognise and celebrate achievements of the workforce, whilst acknowledging the everyday activities workers undertake to improve the quality of life of many vulnerable individuals.

The categories for the 2012 awards are: 

1. Outstanding Care/Support Worker working in a Nursing/Care Home environment 
2. Outstanding Care/Support Worker working in the Community 
3. Outstanding Care/Support Worker working with People with Learning Disabilities/ Physical Disabilities/ Sensory Impairment 
4. Outstanding Care/Support Worker working with People with Mental Health Problems 
5. Outstanding “Newcomer” to social care 
6. Outstanding award for continued professional development 
7. Outstanding Award for ‘Dignity’ 
8. The Service Users Choice – Outstanding Employee selected by Service Users & Carers 

This is your opportunity to ensure that someone from your organisation is recognised for their outstanding work that they do as a winner of one of the awards.

Complimentary tickets will be given to each shortlisted nominee and further tickets can be purchased at a cost of £40.50 per ticket. Tables can be purchased on request, please contact Mikaela Williams-Brown for further details 0151-427-7044.

For more information please take a look at the documents below:

Rules of Entry

How to Enter

Category List

Nomination Details

Service User Nominations

End of Life Conference

Bookings now available for a regional event hosted by the National End of Life Care Programme entitled, ‘Quality Care at the End of Life’. The theme is ‘working together’ and our focus is achieving quality support for the person and their carers at the end of life and building sustainable high quality end of life care support. 

The day will include presentations of initiatives in the region concerned with strengthening social care at the end of life and their integration with healthcare.  The day hopes to attract delegates from all parts of social and health care and there will be opportunities for discussion and networking which we know are often the most valuable parts of these events.   

09:30 - Registration       

10:00 - Start

15:30 - Close

to register, visit www.eventprouk.com and click “Events Registration” you will then be asked to log on using the details:

Username: EP2208 
Password: END201112

Then you can follow the instructions to register for the event on 20th November 2012 at The Met Hotel, Leeds

Your delegate type will always be “delegate” unless you have been previously informed to register as an alternative. 

Please ensure you press CONFIRM at the end of the registration process, this will finalise your registration. Once this is done you will receive an email to the address you submitted. If you do not receive this within 24hrs, please contact Eventpro UK 

Please note: there is no charge for the day but a ‘no show’ penalty fee will be applied if you fails to attend without prior notification.  If you have information about a project or initiative that you would like to present or circulate, please contact Rosie on admin@eolc.nhs.uk. 

Skills for Care Dementia Funding

LSCP have been granted the Workforce Development Dementia Fund (WDDF) contract which offers enhanced payments for employers whose staff have completed dementia related qualifications.

The requirements for this funding are identical to the Workforce Development Fund (WDF) contract which LSCP is currently administering, for more information about WDF and meeting the eligibility criteria please refer to our previous blog post.

Once you are eligible to claim WDDF/WDF you must send evidence of your completed units to LSCP, the evidence we require for WDDF is the certificate of completion for the qualification which you are claiming for. This evidence may be sent either by email (admin@lscpinfo.co.uk) or by post (Liverpool Social Care Partnership, 5 De Havilland Drive, Estuary Business Park, Speke, Liverpool, L24 8RN). We will not accept FAX submissions for evidence.

For a list of units which are eligible to claim enhanced funding please refer to this list. For a list of payment amounts depending on the qualification type,please refer to this document.

As usual if you have any questions you may email us at admin@lscpinfo.co.uk or give us a call on 0151 427 7044.

How to complete a WDF Partnership Form

To register for Workforce Development Funding you will need to complete a ‘WDF Partnership Membership Form 2012/2013”. Firstly you will need to download a copy of the form, it is best to download this form directly from the Skills for Care website to ensure that you have the most up to date version of the form. You can download the form from this website:

http://www.skillsforcare.org.uk/funding/workforce_development_fund/accessing_wdf.aspx 

At the time of writing this post the most up to date version is v1.1 and can be downloaded by clicking here.

Once the form has been downloaded you will need to open the .PDF file withAdobe Acrobat Reader. There are other .PDF reading software packages available, however if you wish to use electronic signatures it is advised that you use the Adobe software.

Once the document has been opened you will see something like this:

It is important that you read this document thoroughly before attempting to sign as there are a number of agreements that are being made by signing and submitting this document to join a Partnership. Once you have read through the document and you are happy to proceed you may begin entering your data as required.

The first piece of data in the top right corner of the document is the NMDS-SC ID Number, as shown here:

Your NMDS-SC ID is possibly the most important piece of information contained in this document. Skills for Care will need this identification number to ensure that you have adequately updated your National Minimum Data Set to reach the minimum 90% completion in order to obtain Workforce Development Funding. Failure to supply this number will result in your application for membership being denied.

Generally these numbers begin with a letter (usually F) followed by 5 or 6 numerical digits. If you have not yet obtained an NMDS-SC ID then you shouldvisit the NMDS website and register. If in doubt you may call the NMDS helpdesk on 0845 873 0129.

The rest of the information is fairly self explanatory, please note that the Name of our partnership is the Greater Merseyside Care Partnership.

You may also enter secondary address details which will be used as your preferred contact information. This may be helpful if you are registering an establishment but would still prefer all communication to go through a head office.

If you have multiple establishments which you would like to register for membership, there are additional pages provided (example below) which allow you to enter the basic information required to register these establishments (Name or Establishment, NMDS-SC ID and the address of the establishment. If you do not have multiple establishments you may ignore all but the first page.

Once you reach the bottom of the first page you will notice that there is a space for a signature, and when you hover over this space with your mouse it will say “Click here to Sign”, as shown below. 

Please note that at this point you may prefer to print off the document and sign it with ink by hand. This can then be sent via post to:

Liverpool Social Care Partnership,
C/O Crossroads Care
5 De Havilland Drive
Estuary Business Park
Speke,
L24 8RN 

Alternatively you could scan the document back on to your computer and email it to:
admin@lscpinfo.co.uk

OR you may fax your Partnership Form to 0151 427 7044. 

However, with this new version of the Partnership Form there is also the option to digitally sign the form with an encrypted code, to do this you will need to click on the signature portion of the form, the following window will appear:

If you have not done this process before you will need to click “A New Digital ID I want to create now”, then click Next.

You will be given a number of options about what type of Digital Signature you would like to create, we recommend you choose the PKCS#12 Digital ID File for maximum compatibility. Once selected, click Next.

Next you will need to enter all of your information.

The bottom three parts of this form (“Enable Unicode Support”, “Key Algorythm”, “Use digital ID for:”) do not need to be changed. Once this form is completed click Next.

You will now be asked where you would like to save your digital ID file. If you are unsure where to save this file you can leave the default location provided, however be sure to make a note of this location for future reference!

Be sure to choose a password you will remember and then click Finish. The “Sign Document” window will appear.

From this window you have the option of selecting one of the Digital ID’s that are registered to your computer (or creating a new one!). Enter your password and then press the “Sign” button when ready. You also have the option to Lock Document After Signing. This is advised in most cases but be sure that you have fully completed the document before selecting this option!

Once this is done the signature portion of the document will look something similar to my signature below:

You may close the document and attach it to an email to:

admin@lscpinfo.co.uk

Your application will be received and registered with Skills for Care, if there are any issues you will be contacted. For more information you can contact John on 0151 427 7044.