How to put people off

[deebee]

Are you a teacher? Do you want to teach your eight year olds to Orienteer in the playground? What you need is a Level 1 coaching award. Colleague of mine has just been on the course. The school paid £140 for a supply teacher for the day, plus the cost of the course. End of the day - would you like a certificate of attendance? That'll be £5 please. Would you like to have a qualification? That'll cost you £50 for someone to come and assess you, plus half a day's supply whilst you're out of the classroom. Total cost, in excess of £250. All this in a school where the PE budget is about £50 per annum. What are we playing at? Needless to say, my colleague said no thank you and wrote the day off as a pleasant day out learning about Orienteering BUT her boss, scared witless by Health and Safety scares, will now not let her Orienteer with her class. So who has lost out, the teacher, the children or Orienteering?

[awk]

So - avoid supply expenses by going on a training course outside term time.

How else do you expect costs to be covered ?- Assessors aren't volunteers (nor are they usually very well paid). Assessment can be built around a teacher's timetable, so there shouldn't be need for supply cover there either.

[ifititches]

Hmm, as I understand the level 1 courses for teachers, they get a certificate of attendance, but don't have any need to do the level 1 assessment unless they are working under the insurance cover of an organisation such as BOF. If they are going to use it for school activites under their school's cover, or under that of another indemnifying organisation, which already has approved them on their generic instruction skills, then they don't need to do the assessment.

This acknowledges that teachers and leaders from youth organisations don't need to be assessed on their crowd control and communication skills, which is part of the level 1 assessment. All they need is to gain the factual knowledge and insight into the sport that the level 1 course conveys

So she/he only needed to do the assessment if she/he was planning to do level 1 coaching outside her/his job. So i would say the way that the offer of assessment was made (if it was indeed made as reported above) was very misleading.

I'm sure someone else will help correct this if I've got it wrong!

[Nottinghamshire outlaw]

interesting posts above - some comments from a Level 1 Tutor/assessor:

1. Teachers and others who attend the Level 1 Coach Training Course can receive a training certificate without being assessed which is fine if all they want to do is to teach beginners on a safe, eclosed site and the fees is £.75 if all the certificates go to the same address e.g. the school or the administartor who organises the course. I also call this fee a 'registration and certification fee' which is not just spin to make it sound better but actually reflects the fact that BOF keep attendance records so that someone who wants to progress on to a Level 2 course does not have to go on the Level 1 component again.
2. Divide the total cost of the course by the number of attendees for the cost per person. Many School Sports Partnerships (SSP) find the cost from their huge Big Lottery grants, CPD budgets etc.
3. Most schools round here send 1 teacher on a course like this - the Primary Link Teacher (PLT) on their day off curriculum so no extra cost as they would be being covered anyway by the SSP fundingOR they split up the class amongst their coleagues and do not have a supply cover in
4. Have a look at what other NGB courses cost - ours are very competitive
5. Tremendous value from a good tutor as this is a very practical course with photo-copiable resources included
6. Do we want teachers to be confident about teaching the sport in a fun way - of course!

[Nottinghamshire outlaw]

sorry about the typos in the above - fee mentioned should have said £3.75

[rosco]

I believe you are now out of date - everyone now has to be assessed for level 1. Anyone can get a certificate of attendance if they don't want to be assessed.

It used to be that teachers didn't have to be assessed.

[JackTheLad]

According to the BOF website under "Information for Prospective Level 1 candidates" posted 01/06/06 it looks to me like Nottinghamshire Outlaw is correct that Level 1 Coaches do not need assessment if they are operating "in a safe enclosed area under another bodies insurance" and that was my understanding from a Level 1 course not many weeks ago.

[HOCOLITE]

We had the experience the other way round when two juniors wanted to do their level 1. They found it very difficult to find a course to go on because they could not go during the week, all the courses seemed to be during the week so teachers could go to them 'as teachers don't do courses in their own time, but get curriculum time allocated to courses'.
Eventually there was a combined 1&2 course put on in the region. It wasn't cheap though but fortunately there was no extra charge for level 1 assessment. Awaiting a8th birthdays for level 2 don't know if there will be assessment charge for that.

[ifititches]

Rosco, from coaching committee minutes March 2006, available on BOF website

"There was a healthy debate regarding the Level 1 coaching award as to whether or not the Level 1 Certificate of Attendance (non assessed route) could be ‘expanded’ to incorporate other trained personnel with teaching skills e.g. teaching assistants; it was agreed that it should be. A ‘new’ Level 1 Training Attendance Certificate (for those following route A - the non-assessed route) is to be produced incorporating “This training contained no element of assessment and this Certificate is only valid if the holder is working under the insurance and policy of an outside agency e.g. LEA�.

It was also clarified that the new Level 1 Orienteering Coaching certificate will be awarded to all those candidates following route B e.g. for those not holding any teaching qualification etc. (e.g. orienteers). If teachers etc. wish to receive this certificate they would need to undergo an assessment. The office procedure for Level 1 to be updated."

So, back to the original post, if a headteacher still won't let her member of staff coach orienteering that's really an internal matter for the school. No-one in BOF is saying that the assessment was needed for that teacher..