Newcastle College – Providing flexible aviation qualifications to the
airline and airport sector
Lifestyle Academy Background
The Lifestyle Academy comprises courses in Hospitality and Culinary Arts,
Travel and Tourism and Aviation, Beauty, Spa and Complementary Therapy
and Sport courses at Newcastle College operates over three sites:
1. £8.6m was invested in creating a state-of-the-art training and
commercial centre at Sandyford road in 2007.
2. The £17m Lifestyle Academy was opened by The Chairman of the CBI
in December 2006.
3. The £3.3 million Aviation Academy based at Newcastle International
Airport was opened in 2009.
Training facilities at the at the Aviation academy include and outdoor Boeing
737 passenger jet and inside the purpose built 12,000m² aircraft hanger, a
BAC 111. This is one of the largest training schools in Europe. The Lifestyle
Academy currently has 163 staff, 1370 Further Education (FE) and 420 Higher
Education (HE) students over a range of full and part time courses from level
1 to level 6.
The Aviation Sector
Around 8 years ago One North East purchased a Boeing 737 for Newcastle
College to allow it to expand the aeronautical engineering qualifications. With
such a resource parked landside at Newcastle Airport it was an ideal base
from which to develop cabin crew and airport related qualifications.
Several employers within Newcastle Airport showed interest in developing HE
qualifications in the shape of Foundation degrees in 2004/5. The companies
were Swissport and Servisair (Ground Handling Agencies), Newcastle Airport
itself which includes Security, Car parking, Ground Maintenance, Air Traffic
Control etc plus other companies such as the catering provider both landside
and airside. They were concerned that a traditional full time qualification would
not be possible for their staff because of the variety of shifts that their staff
work during a typical week. In addition Newcastle Airport is a seasonal airport
so it was decided to design a blended learning programme between October
and April (low season) where the learning materials would be on line and thus
accessible wherever a student had an internet connection. In several
meetings with employers the module subjects and learning outcomes were
agreed.
“We
have built an excellent relationship with the Aviation Academy at
Newcastle College over recent years, where they have assisted us in meeting
with the learning and development needs of our employees. We have found
the Academy to be highly responsive to our needs, in that they offer holistic
solutions to help support the achievement of our business objectives.
Furthermore, they always adopt a flexible approach to teaching and
assessment and this assists us in balancing the need to maintain an effective
operation, with the need to further develop our staff”. I have no hesitation in
endorsing them as a learning provider”.
(Keith Faley, HR Manager, Newcastle International airport Ltd)
The Foundation Degree
The programme Foundation Degree Airline
and Airport Management was approved and
validated by Leeds Met University in summer
2005 and a pilot programme ran 2005/6. The
college recruited the necessary staff to teach
all the specialist and technical modules and in
order to offer this programme, the delivery
materials were written by the staff themselves
as at that time there were very few textbooks in this field. These delivery
materials have been improved year on year and now include video clips,
podcasts, journal articles, textbooks as well as the lecturer’s own knowledge
and industrial expertise. All the blended learning materials are posted on the
College’s Blackboard Virtual Learning Environment which can be accessed by
staff and students 24-7 via the internet.
The Programme
Tutorials are arranged on one day per week at the Aviation Academy which is
situated landside along the side of one of the runways at Newcastle Airport.
This means there is easy access for those students employed at the airport.
Students are expected to attend approximately 2 hours per week for tutorials
with the relevant tutors, on one specified day per week. Those who cannot
attend in person are encouraged to use a webcam either EPop (available
through Blackboard) or Skype/MSN outside normal college hours. Other
students are contacted by the tutors via email or phone. The programme is
organised on a ‘roll on roll off’ basis which means that students study one
module for approx 6 weeks and are then assessed and move on to the next
module – the work based learning module and personal and professional
development module are year long.
The Students
Students are expected to spend a significant period of time outside the tutorial
sessions engaged in further study such as reading, research and work based
learning. There is a strong emphasis on work based learning as in the original
discussions with employers it was important that this programme provided
students with a better understanding of their own organisation in order that
were equipped to develop practical solutions to work based problems.
The Assessments
Students are expected to create draft assignments, which are emailed to their
tutor who marks these on line and which are then emailed back to the student.
All assessments are run through the plagiarism software Turnitin.
World wide students
Initially the programme recruited students from Newcastle Airport. Since then
the students have come from Dubai, Abu Dhabi, Cyprus, Pakistan, East
Midlands Airport, London City Airport, Manchester and Edinburgh airports etc.
In addition to those students employed by the individual airports students are
now employed by BMI Baby, Emirates, Etihad, KLM and BA. The aviation
world is now the market.
BA (Hons) Airline and Airport Management
When the first cohort of students completed the Foundation Degree they
wanted to progress onto the top up qualification. A similar exercise then
ensued i.e. various employers at the airport were contacted for their input into
this qualification and it was approved by Leeds Metropolitan University in July
2007. It has been very successful, with 6 students gaining first class honours
in 2010 primarily because they were the ‘captains’ of their own particular
industries.
“There is nothing else out there like this for the Airline and Airport industry.
The Foundation Degree and the top up in Airline and Airport Management
provide the students with a flexible framework for improving their job
prospects and the employers with highly qualified airline and airport
managers”
(Dave Shields, UK and Europe Commercial Manager for Swissport & BA
Airline and Airport Management graduate 2010)
Benefits
It is very apparent that these qualifications fill a big gap in the provision of HE
qualifications within the aviation industry. In addition, this form of delivery ie
blended learning, specifically designed for those in work looking for part time
study, is proving very relevant in a number of other Lifestyle Academy
vocational areas i.e. BA (Hons) Hospitality and Culinary Management, BA
(Hons) Travel and Tourism Mgt, BA (Hons) Business Travel Management and
also on the FdA Hairdressing Management.