Induction
Steps that must be completed before you start

There are only three short steps to your induction.

The following paragraphs are summaries of the policies and procedures, and each paragraph contains a link to open up the actual document.

We take health and safety very seriously. Individually, we must each take resposibility, not only for our own health and safety but also for theat of people around us, those we work with, care for, have under our remit. etc. This undertaking and commitment is eveident from our Health, Safety and Welfare policy which can be accessed on our Health & Safety page which also contains othe important documents as well as links to other health and safety related sources of information.

You are entitled to support from a number of sources in order to help you complete your programme or qualification as time efficiently as possible. The level of support needed is assessed at the induction stage of your programme and where any additional support is identified and justified this will be agreed with you directly, and where applicable, with your employer. Support is available directly from;

• Your Assessor (wether this is your line manager, another person appointed by your employer or a c4mpd assessor.
• In the event that you are unable to obtain the support from your Assessor or you need additional support than can be provided at Assessor level, then you may request this from either the programme manager or the programme's Internal Verifier.
• Where applicable, from your employer and agreement from the centre.
• The Website has all the references we consider necessary to complete the programme 'on plan' however if additional support is needed in addition to hat described above, or the information resources within this site, then contact the centre on admin@c4mpd.org.uk explaining your requirements and providing your contact details.

Material and documents to be assessed is referred to as "Evidence". The standard for submission of evidence to be assessed is by email and attachments. There are a number of reasons for this including time and cost efficiencies, but more important, doing so by email allows an audit trail, security (and back-up in the event of loss of originals) and more readily allows compliance with teh Awarding Body's regulautory requirments.

Such evidence is listed, referenced, saved into an electronic portfolio (which we build for you), assessed and reported upon before presentation to the Awarding Body. Although this may initially sound a little daunting, it is actually verty straightforward, and there is a simple step by step procedure for submitting evidence for assessment.

Confidentiality is most important, irrespective of wether you are working in sensitive areas or not.

Another reason for electronic portfolios is the ability to keep such information backed up and password protected on a secure system. For physical evidence, our documentation is kept in locked cabinets, in a locked room, within a restricted access building, "behind the wire" of a restricted access site with access by prior arrangent only.

Only the following people will have access to your evidence.

• Your assessor
• A cross assessor or additional specialist assessor if required
• the internal verifier
• The centre administration
• The Awarding Body's External Verifier.

Despite these safeguards we require you to always bear the following rule in mind: Unless specifically required to do so, when writing about a client, say in a case study, only the first name can be used. The persons surname or anything else that can be be used to identify that person must not be given. In order for an authorised person such as the internal or external verifier to look at a case file, they can only have "reasonable access" to check authenticity and can do so only with permission of the holder of that information.

Assessment is basically the comparison of your work, abilities, knowledge, understanding and "competences" against a set of benchmarks. These benchmarks are the "National Occupational Standards" or "Standards" as we call them for short. These standards are written by industry and are used as the foundation against which work related activities can be measured or assessed.

These standards are broken down into "Units", which are made up of "Elements", which are in turn made up of "Performance Criteria" (shortened to "PCs") which need to be covered between one or three times depending on the qualification's requirment. In addition to covering each PC the required number of times, you will be required to demonstrate your "Knowledge and Understanding" of the subject or topic in which you are being assessed.

Tools used to do this assessment include;

• A plan of the programme
• An index of all the evidence used. This allows referencing and significantly cuts down the amount of work you will need to do.
• An Assessment Plan (AP) for each module or case study.
• A Personal Statement (PS) - a narrative or report that you write to describe how you function in your job.
• A Witness Testimony (WT) - a supportive statement by a line manager or pre-approved peer or manager..
• An Observation Report (OR) - a report by your Assessor who writes up what practice or activity of yours that he or she has observed.
• Assessor Questions - written or verbal questions asking you to address or explain your work in more detail as well as your knowledge and understandng.

At the end of the day, assessment is a judgement call, by the Assessor on what he or she reads or observes and compares aganst the standards. All assessors are required to practice "standardisation" - a process by which we try as much as humanly possible to get all Assessors to assess to a common formula. However, occasionally you may not agree with the assessment. The appeals procedure facilitates you to query the assessment decision and discuss it. You are able to discuss the Assessors decision and explain why you think the decision is either wrong or in error - it may be a simple misunderstanding, or a difference in vocabulary or experience/reference. If your assessor agrees with your argument, the assessment is amended there and then.

If however the Assessor does not agree, you have the right to ask for a second opinion from another Assessor.

If this does not result in a mutually agreeable resolution then the appeal goes up the chain as follows. The Internal Verifier is called in to make a judgement. If this does not solve the query, then the case is put before the centre's management board, with the employer present if that helps. In the event that the parties can still not agree, then the matter is referred to the Awarding Body.

For further information please refer to our Appeals Procedure.