Molenet - Guildford College

Year 3 Micro Project- Increased independence through mobile technologies to enhance independence and employability skills through a personalised curriculum 2009/2010

This project aims to develop a person centred, value for money training programme which supports learning whilst developing independent skills for travel and employability through the use of mobile technologies to the individual.

Aims:

• To decrease reliance on human interventions within travel training curriculum for learners with learning difficulties, by enabling young people to take responsibility for their travel, journey planning and developing their skill set to reach and negotiate their journey to the chosen destination.
• To decrease reliance on human interventions within employability skills curriculum, by developing priority young people in the NEET group to empower them to take responsibility for their own time management and employability skills.

Objectives:

To develop young peoples ability to manage their own travel, and economic wellbeing by developing the use of mobile technologies. Most if not all young people are familiar with and regularly use the social fun aspect of their mobile phones. With the reliability of mobile GPS this technology could be made available and used effectively to reduce the support costs of young people from two priority categories (LDD and NEET). This project would use existing mobile devices (software and hardware) where appropriate to enable individuals to apply the technology to mobility and employability training.
To ensure sustainability the project would move the individuals from a tablet pc to handheld device which could be funded by the individual. Mobile devices will be loaned to individuals where their current handsets do not have GPS capability.
The technological and successful outcomes of this project will be cascaded to other curriculum areas to support learning.

Contribution to Local and Regional priorities

Guildford College Priority:
• A key College priority is to increase and widen participation to meet the education and skills needs of young people, adults and employers in response to local, regional and national and government priorities.

Regional LSC priorities South East:
• Young people not in education, employment or training (NEET) remain a priority in the South East.
• To build local capacity for Learners with Learning Difficulties and /or Disabilities in collaboration with other agencies.