Apprenticeship trailblazer scheme to include hairdressers

Hairdressers, barber shops and beauty salons are to be at the forefront of the next wave of a government apprenticeship trailblazer scheme, helping to map out the future of apprenticeship training. The Department for Business, Innovation and Skills has announced its second wave of trailblazer employers who will work to develop and test new models for more employer-based and employer-led standards for apprenticeships. The ambition is to develop apprenticeships that can be explained on a single sheet of A4, work for both small and large businesses and which, crucially, will include relevant, practical testing and grading at the end of the training. A 'strategic group' of 10 individual trailblazer hair, beauty and barbering salons or salon chains, all leaders in their fields, have been drawn from a broad mix across the industry, drawing on employer groups already working with the National Hairdressers’ Federation (NHF) and the industry standards setting body Habia. Hellen Ward, managing director of Richard Ward Hair and Metrospa, will be leading the strategic group on hairdressing, and George Hammer, chairman of beauty salon Urban Retreat, who will be doing the same for beauty. This strategic group will be supported by working groups in hairdressing, barbering and beauty. The NHF and Habia will provide practical support in terms of arranging meetings and helping to write the apprenticeship standards and developing ‘trade tests’, assessments done at the end of the apprenticeship programme. The trailblazers are a key element of the government’s ambitions, in the wake of the 2012 Richard Review, to develop and introduce new structures for apprenticeships during 2015/16 and 2016/17. NHF chief executive Hilary Hall said: “We are absolutely delighted NHF members will be at the heart of our industry’s involvement in the government’s reform agenda for apprenticeships, both in terms of being trailblazers themselves and in helping to lead the working groups.” Stuart Turner, Group Director of Qualifications and Standards for Habia said: “We’re pleased to see the second wave of Trailblazers includes service industries and also a sector which is dominated by small and micro-businesses. Habia has been the industry standards setting body for over 26 years and to be asked by the employers to be part of this exciting new proposal is an absolute honour.”