BTEC Diploma - Government Funding

Train To Gain
Train to Gain Skills Brokers will provide a free, independent and impartial assessment to identify what skills your business needs now and in the future. They can then help you arrange training and provide information about possible sources of funding.

What will it do for your business?
If your business is to be successful you need to compete, and to compete you need to train your employees. For businesses, getting the right skills advice is essential in choosing the best and most appropriate training. Train to Gain helps you to do this by using experienced Skills Brokers who can:

• offer free impartial and independent advice to businesses
• match any training needs identified with training providers
• ensure that training is delivered to meet business needs.

One of the key goals of the service is to make sure that both the training and the skills advice are impartial, flexible, responsive, and offered at a time and place to suit businesses. This marks a cultural shift in how skills training will be delivered, and will ensure that the delivery of training is much more responsive to the needs of every business.

How it works
By ensuring your employees have the right skills to do the best job, Train to Gain can help boost productivity and keep you ahead of the competition. Working closely with a highly experienced Train to Gain Skills Broker, you can provide quality, affordable training for your employees. Together you can:

1. Identify the skills your business needs
2. Pinpoint the right training
3. Agree a tailored training package
4. Find available funding
5. Review the progress you are making

Step 1: Identify the skills your business needs
Based on a clear understanding of your business goals, your Train to Gain Skills Broker works with you to carry out a free review and analysis of your business to assess what skills your business has right now, and what it might need in the future.

All Train to Gain Skills Brokers are trained by the Learning and Skills Council. They are all specialists in training and have a proven track record of providing effective advice to business. If you need it, they can also provide access to a wider network of business support services.

Step 2: Pinpoint the right training
Your Skills Broker makes training recommendations based on the agreed skills analysis explained in Step 1. The recommendation will help you:

• pinpoint the type of training that best suits your needs
• select the most appropriate Training Providers (all Train to Gain Training Providers meet national
quality standards)
• choose how and when the training is delivered
• determine which qualifications your employees will benefit most from.

Step 3: Agree a tailored training package
Together with your Skills Broker and the Training Provider that you select, you agree a training package.

Step 4: Find available funding
Your Skills Broker can recommend the best ways of funding your training, explaining all the funding options available to you. Train to Gain provides some funding itself. This might include:

• Free training to help employees gain their first full Level 2 qualification
• Wage compensation for companies with less than 50 employees.
• Funded programmes, including Apprenticeships and Advanced Apprenticeships, NVQ Level 3
and above, such as higher education.

Step 5: Review the progress your are making
Your Skills Broker provides continual support and works with you to review how your training is progressing.

What do I do now?
Contact the Train to Gain team on 08456 047 047 and a Train to Gain adviser will make an initial assessment. This will establish what sort of training may be best suited to your business and your employees. The adviser will talk you through the options of how your training is delivered and you can choose a training provider that best suits your business needs.

Once you are happy with the suggested choice, your adviser will make arrangements for the training to be delivered.

Eligibility Criteria for level 2 NVQ funding
For an employee to be eligible to do a fully funded NVQ under Train to Gain they must have a contract of employment, be over 19 years of age, be a British Citizen or EU resident for 3 years or more and not already be qualified or working towards NVQ level 2 or equivalent (5 GCSEs level A-C).

Click here to Download Train to Gain Information Brochure