The second and final award ceremony for the Ecotec O3 Pan-London programme was held today and attended by CTL ECDL trainers, John Buttle of Social Care Works and Skills for Care, Sajida Kiyani of Ecotec plc and presented by Anne-Marie Bond CTL Contract Manager for the programme. In total 153 care home managers and employees from homes across London completed their BCS ECDL qualifications. A total of 46 successful beneficiaries received their certificates today.

"The Care Sector has traditionally been left behind other sectors in ICT training. The significance of these beneficiaries having achieved their awards today is that they now have a worldwide recognised ICT qualification. They are more efficient at work, multi-skilled, more employable and more valuable to their employers. We hope that they will all continue to progress onto further education in ICT, Care or Management", stated John Buttle of Social Care Works.

A special thanks goes to Anne-Marie Bond for her efforts in managing the programme and ensuring that all learners received the highest quality training. The project was funded by the European Social Fund and the Learning and Skills Council. Congratulations to all who participated on the day.

The project is funded by the European Social Fund and brings together specialist training providers and institutional partners to develop and promote the use of ICT as a way of up-skilling the care sector workforce.

?Knowledge of ICT is crucial to workforce development, particularly when CSCI and Skills for Care will require online returns and communication by newsletter and email. You need to know how to drive a car and use a cash-point machine in order to function as part of the modern economy. Now, in the 21st century you also now need to know how to use a computer, the Internet and email in order to function at work and to communicate effectively?, says Nigel Hall, Director of Studies.

Successful candidates from Shaftesbury Homes and Lifecare Consulting were presented their ECDL certificates by Nigel Hall and Anne-Marie Bond, ECDL Training Manager.

The NHS Vocational Awards presentation took place at North Herts and Stevenage PCT for 22 learners who have completed their A1, Admin and Customer Service NVQs as part of the North Herts NHS staff development programme.

Care Awards were formally presented to the Learners by the NHS Training and Development Manager. CTL were represented by Hilary Vogler (VLC Centre Manager), Nigel Hall (Director of Studies) and Alec Stephenson (Assessor).

The VLC team have had a very good year for 2005 in that a pilot for delivery of NVQ in Customer services and Administration was taken on last year and completed within a very good time frame.

This year we have been taken on by the Herts NHS to deliver much more learners that are across the Herts area and the increase of learners has provided the NHS with the ability to look at other qualifications that the team at CTL can deliver so this year we have had an increase in learners for Admin and customer services but also Management NVQs are ones that have been agreed too.

Our teams that deliver ECDL have had a good year in recruiting the learners for this we have been involved in presentations at Barbican that has spread the word of theis ESF project and we have made a web site for care homes that need to keep on track what is available to them on ICT4care.co.uk.

We can also add on this the report done by ECOTEC that went into the ICT for care web site if you do not have it I can did it up.(We have pictures that can be added on this)