Dundee & Angus College leads successful international project

Dundee and Angus College has successfully brought together the worlds of work, education and young people by engaging learners and over 100 employers.

In Scotland 32% of employers recruit young people directly from education. Therefore following recommendations for Developing Scotland’s Young Workforce to reduce youth unemployment, there is a drive to ensure closer collaboration between schools, colleges and industry. 

The Key Action 2 VET ‘Vocational Cooperative Learning Triangles: Using Cooperative Learning to Promote Employer Engagement’ project, led by Dundee and Angus College, has created ‘triangles’ to bring together employers, teachers and learners. This is to develop the transversal skills beneficial to both young people for their career development and relevant to employers who can fully utilise these skills to support company growth.

The project has engaged employers and learners in the design and delivery of training courses and produced a range of resources including a training guide on cooperative learning in the context of vocational education, a training video and co-operative learning short course.

Over 100 employers have been engaged across the five countries and training has been cascaded to over 75 teachers across regional and national VET networks.

Engaging with employers

Employers said it was a good experience to be involved in the learning process, as many of the key transversal skills recognised through project surveys were the most difficult to find in graduates and new employees. As a result of the project 75% of employers reported some or a noticeable improvement in students\' understanding of the requirements of the workplace.

The project also involved associate partners to ensure the outputs were relevant for the labour market. These included social care providers Angus Care in the Community, Dundee City Council and Dundee and Angus Chamber of Commerce to provide an insight into the employment issues of their respective sectors.

Alison Henderson, Chief Executive of Dundee and Angus Chamber of Commerce, said the project would bring radical benefits to employers and learners in Scotland by developing transversal skills.

She said: \"I would like to reiterate how strongly I feel that this is a very worthwhile project and one which could bring radical benefits to employers and learners locally here, across Scotland and beyond. It helps develop ‘transversal’ skills which employers recognise will help to more fully utilise trainees’ technical expertise and contribute to company growth or organisational effectiveness...this type of project is of real benefit and value.\"

You can read more about the project here and if you have any questions at all, the local contact at the college is:

Anne Cant
International and Marketing Manager
D&A College

Email: a.cant@dundeeandangus.ac.uk-Direct Line (01382) 834938