The Vice Chancellor of The Open University has signed the Skills Pledge, demonstrating the institution’s commitment to supporting its staff develop their basic skills.

The Skills Pledge is a voluntary public commitment made by organisations to help employees who need to gain skills in areas including literacy and numeracy - and work towards Level 2 qualifications (the equivalent of five good GCSEs).

The signing of the pledge took place on Wednesday, June 24, which coincides with VQ Day (Vocational Qualification Day), the official celebration of the millions of people who gain qualifications in the UK each year.

The Vice-Chancellor Professor Brenda Gourley said: "The signing of the Skills Pledge reinforces The Open University’s commitment to developing the skills of our staff at all levels. This has always been at the heart of our duty to staff as an employer.

"Staff who have taken part in the courses to improve their literacy and numeracy can then go on to take up other national vocational qualifications (NVQs) offered by the University as well as other OU courses."

Among the 46 who took part in the English for Work programme, offered by Human Resources Development, which leads to a level 2 adult literacy qualification, were academic staff who have English as a second language, as well as staff in the faculties, student services, Open University Validation Service (OUVS) and the library.
NVQs have also been awarded for Business Administration; Advice and Guidance, and Customer Care.

The courses have been offered by VQAC (The Open University’s Vocational Qualification Assessment Centre). For more details about the centre, visit www.open.ac.uk/nvq .
Among those who attended the signing of the Skills Pledge were David Rowland, Chief Executive of Skills South East Ltd, Veronica Barnes, Head of Human Resources Development and Una Lawson, Head of the VQ Centre.
Una said: "It’s fantastic to see so many internal people from Walton Hall and across the regions celebrating the achievement of their vocational qualification on National VQ Day.

"This demonstrates the University’s already strong commitment to the principles of the Skills Pledge and the development of its employees."

The benefits of signing up to the Skills Pledge are that the Government will provide funding for employees to help gain basic literacy and numeracy skills as well as their first full Level 2 qualification.

Further literacy and numeracy courses will be run from September. For more details visit/contact Stephanie O’Halloran, s.k.ohalloran@open.ac.uk,

On Thursday, 27 February, Carol Baume, Head of Planning and Development and Bethan Norfor, Senior Strategic Partnerships Manager from The Open University received the prestigious Quality Award from the Secretary of State for Innovation, Universities and Skills, John Denham MP.

The award was given for the OU’s Recognising Achievement course, developed together with Leeds Unite (T&G section) and a reception was held to celebrate the work of over 18,000 union learning reps throughout the country.

The Open University is one of 25 education providers which have received the award since it was launched in June last year.