Ministerial Meeting
Last week our Chair Alan Sherry and Director Marion Allison, met with Mr Jamie Hepburn MSP, Minister for Higher Education and Further Education, Youth Employment and Training. Mr Hepburn’s remit includes responsibility for CLD. Discussions included the opportunities and challenges facing our Members and the wider CLD sector as we move towards COVID recovery.
Coronavirus (COVID-19): Advanced Learning Recovery Group
A Ministerial group chaired by Mr Jamie Hepburn Minister for Higher Education and Further Education, Youth Employment and Training has been established to help develop guidance on the operation of colleges, universities and community learning and development (CLD) providers for academic year 2021/22. Our Chair, Alan Sherry is the CLD representative on this group, with Dominique Carlisle-Kitz and Robert Hynd of CLD Managers Scotland representing the sector on sub-groups. Further information and minutes can be found on the Scottish Government website.
CLD COVID-19 Recovery Advisory Group
The purpose of this group, chaired by Alan Sherry is to bring together senior stakeholders from CLD organisations to advise on the impacts of coronavirus (COVID-19) on the sector and advise on possible steps needed for recovery. The group will ensure a balanced consideration of the four harms and feed into the work of the Advanced Learning COVID Recovery Group, as noted above. The group’s work will aim to inform guidance that impacts upon participation in CLD activities, which include adult learning (including adult literacies & English for Speakers of Other Languages), youth work and community development.
Coronavirus (COVID-19): advice for universities, colleges and CLD providers
As Scotland moves into Level 0 new operational guidance is now available. It provides advice on COVID-19 transmission risk-reduction mitigations to support the operation of universities, colleges and CLD services. Members are reminded that the Guidance is subject to review. Further information can be found on the Scottish Government website.
CARNival: Raised Voices
The Collaborative Action Research Network (CARN) is running an international online CARNival from 2 – 10 October 2021 on:
- Communities
- Heath and Well Being
- Education
There will be workshops, seminars and cultural events and confirmed speakers so far include:
- Andrea Cornwall is Pro-Director (Research & Enterprise) and Professor of Global Development and Anthropology at SOAS, University of London.
- Imogen Tyler is a Professor of Sociology and Head of the Department of Sociology at Lancaster University.
- Kaz Stuart is the Director of the Centre for Research in Health and Society and Professor of Social and Health Inequalities at the University of Cumbria.
The fee is £30 and bursaries and student tickets are available. For more information or bursaries, contact Karen McArdle k.a.mcardle@abdn.ac.uk
Register to attend on Eventbrite.
Christie Plus 10 – Watch on-demand
The Robertson Trust’s recent event “Christie Plus 10: Are we smoothing the hard edges?” which reflected on the ten years since the publication of the Christie Commission is now available to watch online. You can watch the event here.
Over the coming weeks, they will also be sharing a range of guest blogs looking at the impact of the Christie Commission, where we are now and what needs to happen going forward. To keep up-to-date with this, please check The Robertson Trust website, social channels or join the mailing list here.
Diversity & Inclusion in Education – University of Glasgow online course
The United Nations’ Sustainable Development Goal 4 aims to ensure inclusive and equitable quality education and promote lifelong learning opportunities for all (United Nations, 2015).
University of Glasgow is offering this 4 week course (approximately 18 hours in total) covering the following areas:
- Conceptualising diversity in education
- Responding to diversity in education
- Experiencing diversity in education: barriers and facilitators
- Developing inclusive, equitable quality education for All
During this course, you will:
- Develop a critical understanding of the concepts and assumptions about diversity and difference, including notions of ability and disability, socio-economic background, race, ethnicity, and cultural background, beliefs and religion, and gender.
- Develop awareness of historical and contemporary definitions of inclusive education, taking into account policy, theories and models.
- Develop the ability to critically analyse contexts in order to identify barriers to developing inclusive and equitable quality education for all learners.
- Develop knowledge about ways to develop inclusive and equitable quality education for all learners, taking into account their diverse characteristics and needs.
For more information and to enrol, please visit the Coursera website.
Accessible formats of online security messaging
Lead Scotland has been working with a range of partners to develop 10 new accessible formats of online security messages.
These alternative formats were chosen by practitioners and service users to promote cyber resilience advice to people who are Deaf or hard of hearing, visually impaired, people with learning or cognitive difficulties, people whose first language isn’t English, those using adaptive digital technology and others who experience other accessibility barriers.
In both text and audio formats, the National Cyber Security Centre’s 6 actions to online security messaging has been translated into 6 languages: Polish; Simplified Chinese; Arabic; Punjabi; Urdu; and Romanian. The 6 actions have also been made into text formats: a structured text document (for use with assistive technology), HTML, braille, and large print. The alternative formats are free to access and share and can be found on the Lead Scotland website.
Lead Scotland will also be running free webinars for members of the public and organisations about online security and accessibility. They will also be running ‘training for trainers’ sessions to support organisations and practitioners to pass on information to their service users. Details about the webinars and training for trainers sessions will be released soon.
And finally – Virtual Meet Up reminder
Practice Placements Thursday 29 July 1-2:30pm
Provision of practice placements for CLD students is an expectation within the CLD Plans guidance. Come along to our Virtual Meet-up to find out more about the benefits for your organisation and CLD students as well as what support CLDSC can offer.