Childcare and Early Years Courses at NULC

NULC's Childcare and Early Years courses offer you the chance to benefit from imaginative and motivational teaching, high quality learning resources and secure yourself a great start in your chosen career.

Preparation for employment

The BTEC National Diploma in Children's Care, Learning and Development is a qualification recognised by Staffordshire County Council for employment in nurseries, and may also be used to progress to teacher training or degree studies.

This year, our students completed over 800 hours of work experience placement in four different early years settings. Our students go on to jobs including early years practitioner and primary teaching.

Fran Connell (Wolstanton Kindergarten) and Cheryl Evan (Knutton Childrens Centre) are on our business advisory group and help students find work.

Progression to university

Last year around 48% of students progressed on to universities including Manchester Metropolitan and Edge Hill University to study subjects such as Early Childhood Studies and Primary Teaching.

Contribution to the community

This year, our students took part in several fundraising events for charities including Relay for Life, Children in Need and Special Needs Adventure Playground.

Pass Rates

• In 2010, 81% of students achieved ‘high grades’ on the National Diploma course (any combination of three grades where the first two grades are Distinction or Merit, and the last one is a Distinction, Merit, or Pass - i.e DDD, DDM, DMM, DDM, DMP, MMM, MMP)

• 58% of students achieved ‘DDD’ on the BTEC National Diploma in Children’s Care, Learning and Development, equivalent to 3 ‘A’ grades at A Level and attracting the same number of UCAS points.

• The overall pass rate for the National Diploma course was 89%.

Blog/Photos/Videos

We have a blog for each of our subjects here at NULC. This is so that we can keep potential students, current students, or anyone who is interested up-to-date with the latest news.

Below is a link to our Childcare Blog:

http://childcarenulc.blogspot.com/

Kerry Taylor - Former Student

Kerry Taylor (BNC CCLD) is now working at the Field House Day Nursery in Stoke-on-Trent after having gained the necessary qualifications at NULC. More information to be posted here soon!

Steph Hammersley - Current Student

"I am on the second year of the child care course and I really like coming to college as the lectures are really supportive and friendly. I have gained a lot of skills from coming to this college and my confidence has increased loads. I made lots of friends and they are really supportive too. I would recommend this college to anyone."

Bev Alaimo

Qualifications: Diploma in Nursery Nursing (NNEB), BA (Hons) in Education (2:1), Cert Ed in Post-Compulsory Education, D32, D33, A1 (Assessors Awards), NCFE Certificate in Equality and Diversity.

Subject(s) taught: Early Years: Entry Level, Level 1, Level 2, Level 3 and Foundation degree.

Other responsibilities: Curriculum Leader for CACHE Awards (Early Years), Curriculum Advisor for Pastoral Care (FVS), Personal Tutor for Level 1 programmes and a Level 3 cohort of students.

Industry experience: 21 years industrial experience in early years.

Years spent at NULC: 7 years

What do you enjoy most about your job? This is a hard question because there are so many aspects of the job that I enjoy. My role as a personal tutor is very challenging but very rewarding. Some students experience problems - some associated with their course and some personal ones - but with the help of the excellent support services we have at NULC it is wonderful to see them dealing with these issues and moving forward to a bright new future. As a lecturer I want students to have a positive experience of further education and it’s wonderful to see the students learning about early years and themselves. I have watched students develop into amazing young adults, some have gone in to employment, whereas some choose to go on to university.

Why do you think this course helps students progress to jobs/university?

Our early years programmes provide students with lots of transferable skills. They gain knowledge and understanding and have the opportunity to develop practical skills. So whether they decide to become early years practitioners or go on to university to train as primary school teachers etc, these skills will help them should they, in the future, decide to have their own families.

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