Brooksby Melton College
FE Course Handbook 2013/14
A guide to your course
Course Title: Ascentis Certificate in Progression to Animal Care
Contents
Welcome Statement
On behalf of all the Academic and Business support staff we would like to welcome you to Brooksby Melton College.
Our aim is to provide you with an excellent service and to make your studies with us as rewarding and enjoyable as possible. If you feel there is anything we should change to enhance your learning experience, we would welcome your suggestions.
We expect you to attend all relevant classes and enter into the spirit of College life so that you develop yourself and help develop others whilst here. You can do this by making sure you participate fully in all learning activities and join in with everything the College has to offer.
The college is a strong believer in equality of treatment and opportunity and thus expects all staff and students to treat each otherwith respect, consideration, and dignity (as you would expect them to treat you). In this context, we would welcome any comments which help us to maintain our equality policy.
Our 3Core values are:
· We believe that our students and customers should enjoy, benefit and be successful from the time they spend with us.
· We believe that all staff should contribute to improving the experience of our students and customers.
· We believe the College should be an open and respectful place to work and study that promotes and rewards achievement
Each of these values we look to embrace each year with ALL staff and students alike which we hope will support you and your studies.
Finally I would like to take this opportunity to wish you every success in your programme of study.
Your Course team contact details
The Programme Team Manager for your area is: David Motteram………
The Course tutor for your course is: ------Abbie Petty------
Brooksby Melton College Switchboard: 01664 850850
STAFF NAME / CONTACT DETAILSAbbie Petty / Email:
Telephone: 01664 855422
Internal Extension: 349
Maxine Harris / Email:
Telephone: 01664 855340
Internal Extension: 340
Fiona Fitzsimmons / Email:
Telephone: 01664 855422
Internal Extension: 343
Email:
Telephone: 01664
Internal Extension:
Respect campaign
Respect for All
The College is committed to providing opportunities for all, and respects that each person is different with regard to ethnic origin, gender, disability, mental health, sexual orientation, age, religion and belief and economic and social need.
The College wishes to help learners and staff understand and celebrate diversity by creating a culture of inclusivity, where all are valued. It will do this through a campaign known as: “Respect for All”.
As part of the Respect for All campaign, the college will:
· deliver a structured group tutorial programme that promotes respect, diversity and inclusion,
· embed respect for all within the college curriculum and showcase student projects that promote Respect for All,
· Carry out other cross-college campaigns that will support the Respect for All agenda.
Further information can be found on Moodle.
Term dates & Course timetable
At the start of your course you will be given a timetable that shows the sessions you have each week, who teaches them and where they are. This may change through the year as modules or units are completed and your course tutor will issue your with any changes. The dates of the terms for your course are:
Autumn Term2013 / New Learners - Monday 9 September - Friday 13 December
Returning Learners – Monday 16 September – Friday 13 December
Half Term/Reading Break: Monday 21 to Friday 25 October
Spring Term
2014 /
Monday 6 January - Friday 11 April
Half Term/Reading Break: Monday 17 to Friday 21 FebruarySummer Term
2014 / Monday 28 April - Friday 4 July
(May Day: Monday 5 May)
(Spring Bank Holiday: Monday 26 May to Friday 30 May)
Your Course Design & Delivery
To make sure you are ‘work ready’ or equipped to go on to further study we have built your course up from a series of elements. The following section shows you how your course is made up. Your Course Tutor will spend time in induction week going through this with you.
Main qualification
Course Title:Awarding Body: Ascentis
Year 1
Module / Unit No. / Module Title / Value/
credits
Level 1 / Building work relationships / 2
Level 1 / Principles of Animal Health and Welfare / 2
Level 1 / Principles of dealing with feedstuffs for Small Animals / 1
Level 1 / Assist with Handling and Restraint of Animals / 6
Level 1 / Principles of Dealing with Animal Accommodation / 2
Level 2 / Select and prepare Accommodation for Animals / 3
Level 2 / Prepare feed for Animals / 2
Short and additional qualifications
Additional qualification title: Certificate in Employability and Personal DevelopmentAwarding Body: NOCN
Module / Unit No. / Module Title / Value
459 / Searching for a Job / 1
460 / Applying for a Job / 1
461 / Preparing for an Interview / 1
462 / Interview Skills / 1
404 / Rights and Responsibilities in the workplace / 3
401 / Planning for progression / 3
409 / Work-based experience / 3
492 / Being Safe and Healthy at Work / 2
Functional Skills Design & Delivery
Being able to communicate and carry out basic numeracy is a vital skill that we all need if we are going to be able to work or complete further study. Your course has built into it timetabled sessions giving you an opportunity to develop these essential skills. These sessions will be staffed by a specialist tutor who will work with you to develop the skills you need to be able to achieve the functional skills qualifications that are part of your programme.
Assignment & Assessment schedule
You will be provided with information on and a plan of how your programme will be assessed. This will be given to you at the start of your course and show you how assessment will take place. It will include information on hand in dates and is planned so as to spread the assessment load out throughout your course.
You will be given feedback on each piece of assessed work as it is handed back to you. If it is a practical activity then initial verbal feedback followed by written feedback will be given so that you are clear of how you have done.
Your Course tutor will also keep an accurate, up-to-date record of your progress in relation to the course and this will be used in your one to one reviews and to inform parents of how you are progressing with the course.
Submission, marking & feedback policy
The college has put the following guide lines in place to ensure you are given adequate opportunity to achieve your justified grade in all assessed work. It is important that whilst you may want to aspire to achieve the highest possible grades, that is not always realistic. The time and effort you put in to any one assessment should not put your ability to pass all your assessments at risk. Your Course tutor will guide you on this.
· All work must be submitted by the submission date which is printed on your assignment
· If for any reason you are unable to meet the specified deadline you should:
Inform the assessor at least ONE WEEK before the original date and state the reason(s) why this is the case. If the assessor determines that the reason is valid then a new deadline will be set. An extension will normally only be granted once on any individual assessed piece of work.
· Any unauthorised late submission of work may result in disciplinary action.
· Pass Criteria:
If your work does not meet the Pass criteria you will be provided with guidance on what needs to be completed and a new deadline set. If the pass criteria are not met on the second attempt, other alternative methods of assessment may be considered.
· Merit and Distinction Criteria:
If your work does not meet the Merit / Distinction criteria, you will be provided with guidance and a new deadline set. You will only be allowed this one opportunity, per assessment, to upgrade your work to meet these criteria.
· If Merit and Distinction work is submitted late, without an agreed extension the work will only be marked once with no opportunity to resubmit. Significant delays in submitting assessments may result in alternative assessment tasks being issued.
· If Merit and Distinction work is not attempted at the time the assignment is set, you will not be allowed to attempt it at a later date.
· Plagiarism, or copying, is a very serious issue and will not be tolerated. Your work must be your own and any work found to have been taken from the Internet or other sources will be discounted from assessment decisions. Assessments failed for plagiarism can be re-attempted to an agreed deadline. Repeated plagiarism in any unit will result in your work being restricted to Pass in that unit and will result in disciplinary action being taken.
Some of your work will be sampled by another person (Internal Verifier) who will ensure that standards are being maintained in accordance with the requirements of the awarding body. This may involve someone watching your tutor assess you. Sometimes the awarding body send someone in to the College (External Verifier) and they may want to talk to you or see you being assessed. In both cases your Course tutor will inform you of this.
Appeals against assessment decisions
If you are not happy with how a grading decision is made about an assignment of assessment then you should initially raise this with your tutor to try to informally resolve. However if this is not resolved then there is a formal process of appeal in place. A full version of this policy can be found on Moodle.
Plagiarism & malpractice
It is important that in any work you do that is assessed that you don’t break the awarding body guidelines. If you do then this is called ‘Malpractice or Plagiarism’. The following are examples of how this might occur:
· Plagiarism is using another person’s work/research without acknowledging where the information came from. It is very serious and can put your college career at risk. Sometimes you may want to use an author’s exact words – if so it is essential that you use a quotation. Everything between quotation marks should be exactly as it is in the original source.
· Working together with other learners to produce work that is then submitted as all your own work. You should not be discouraged from teamwork, as this is an essential skill, but work submitted for assessment must show where this has happened.
· Pretending to be someone else in order to produce the work for another or arranging for someone else to do the work for you in an assessment/examination/test
· Making up of results and/or evidence
· Failing to abide by the instructions or regulations for an assessment or test.
· Misuse of assessment/examination material
For further detail please refer to the full policy on Assessment Malpractice which can be found on Moodle.
Progression / Career opportunities
Progression & career opportunities after your main qualification.1 / Academic routes (Internal)
These could be further FE , Apprenticeships or HE, please give some through and detail to this area
Academic routes (External)
2 / Employment routes
Highlight the type of jobs they might realistically get in to following this course.
3 / Unsure still
Why not meet up with your course tutor if you are unsure of the route within your chosen subject area. If you would like more general options/advice then why not book to see learner’s services.
Supporting you while you study and listening to what you want
Study skills workshops
Within your timetable we have put in a session where you will be able to work on assignments and receive help and support from your tutor in developing your study skills. Being able to work on your own and complete tasks to a timescale is an important skill that we need to help you develop.
Using Referencing for Assignment writing
Whenever you draw on another writer’s ideas, you should give a clear Reference to their original work. That is, you need to say which particular book or article you are working from. You should also give the page number and the date of publication so that your reader can find the same details. The details of the reference can be provided in a full list of references at the end of your assignment.
In an essay you often have to discuss other people’s ideas and when you do so you are expected to use a ‘citation’ that is, a brief reference to where those ideas came from. You could use phrases such as:-
· As Jones argues ……..
· As Smith states…….
· According to Williams……. etc.
Following these statements a reference is required e.g. (Smith 1998), (Jones 2002), or (Williams 2003).
A much more detailed explanation of the Harvard Referencing system can be found on Moodle.
Additional learning support
As part of supporting your success you will have taken an Initial Assessment as part of the recruitment process or in induction. We are able to use the results of that to provide additional help to those that are shown to need it.