News: Employment success for our supported learning students

The DFN Project SEARCH internship has proven to be a huge success and earlier this month we held a celebration event in recognition of our interns’ achievements and completion of the programme.

Over the past few months, learners took on a variety of roles across five NUH departments, including food production, food services, domestic services, security and logistics. They gained invaluable work experience, and, because of the programme 8 students are transitioning into paid employment and 3 are going through the application process and are already signed up with an NHS employment agency.

We have a long track record of supporting students with learning difficulties and/​or disabilities (SLDD) and offer a huge range of courses specifically designed to meet the needs of students between the ages of 16 and 24 who have a learning difficulty and/​or disability to help them reach their full potential.

Nottingham College Programme Lecturer, Debbie Brown who played a key role in supporting the students during their internship said ​“It has been an amazing year, a few bumps along the way, however the interns have worked so hard and have been rewarded for doing so. It has been a team effort and we couldn’t have done it without the support from the hospital.”

“Well done to all the interns who have successfully secured paid work; and we look forward to the next cohort of interns.”

Supported Learning Courses

We offer cours­es specif­i­cal­ly designed to meet the needs of stu­dents between the ages of 16 and 24 who have a learn­ing dif­fi­cul­ty and/​or dis­abil­i­ty, and to help them reach their potential.

Earlier this year we learned we had been successful in attracting grant funding which will unlock investment totalling £5m in its provision for Students with Learning Difficulties and/​or Disabilities (SLDD).

A gov­ern­ment grant of £4m has been award­ed through the FE Trans­for­ma­tion Fund, and togeth­er with £1m from the Col­lege, a new Inde­pen­dent Liv­ing and Employ­a­bil­i­ty Cen­tre will be devel­oped for up to 200 stu­dents who have learn­ing dif­fi­cul­ties and/​or disabilities.