9 Responses

1. what to charge

   I was looking at some evening classes recently for languages. They charge £80 – £90.00 for ten weeks per person. I guess that would be similar for your courses. I have no info on what the presenters/ teachers get paid from this.

   If you had 12 people that woud gross around £1000.00 whci woukd be around £33.00 per hour if 100% came to you?

    

   Cheers. 

    

   Nick     

2. Price to pay for Adult continuing education course.

   I paid £96 for a 10 week Sewing Machine course (machine was supplied) and similarily my husband paid, £110 for a film photography course (this did include some materials). It seems to be the going rate, bear in mind that those on income support/benefits may get this at a reduced price (half price).

   Hope this helps

    

3. Room costs
   Hi Wendy. From a delivery cost perspective, I’d expect you’d be looking at a charge of about £50 ph for the use of the library room. LA’s (like everyone else) are trying to generate revenue and that’s what my employer would charge for a room in London. You may need to add up to £20 ph on top if for AV equipment if required.

   If LA supported (through the advertising) , they’d likely want to have some form of quality control that you’ll need to consider. Additionally, how else would they be promoting it? And will they charge you for advertising it?

4. background

   Hi thanks for all the replies re. class prices and room costs.

   Here in Scotland where I live, it’s an area of deprivation (high unemployement).  Few people could afford £10 per class.  The going rate is £3.50 per class without concession, so running a class based on those prices and the room/equipment hire being charged at commercial rates (for a freelance trainer) would be too prohibitive financially.

   For a bit more background, I had spoken with a learning manager from my council who told me that different council department and the voluntary sector have funding for training.  He said I should submit my ideas to them.  He told me that the council can provide venue/materials/equipment and advertising but that I would have to prepare a breakdown of my delivery costs with the course outlines.  I have to email these to him and he will advise me who would pay for this training.  He also said that I can charge more for accredited training.

   I’m sorry I seem so clueless, but does anyone have any experience of offering courses to a local authority and iof so, how did you work out delivery costs?  I was thinking of the basic £300 per day.  Is that for an 8 hour day?  And should I therefore charge £37.50 per hour?  Each class would be 2-3 hours long.

   Thanks for any further info/discussion.

    

    

5. Contacts
   Hi again Wendy. You need to speak with the L&D Manager for Adults and/or Community Services within your LA. They’d likely be the fund holders for the type of service you describe.

6. L&D

   Hi Andrew,

   Thanks for this.  Yes, you are right – it is the Lifelong Learning Manager I have spoken to.  I have so far prepared 4 course outlines (with ideas for another 2), which I’m going to email to him, then hopefully meet up with him in the next couple of weeks.  Helpfully, he also said that the neighbouring LAs should work the same way, so that if I submit acceptable ideas to this LA, I will at least knnow how to approach the others if I want to put on courses a little further afield.

   I was also looking into getting some courses accredited.  I have a D32 (NVQ) but not sure that would be relevant…does anyone know how to get adult learning/community courses accredited?

   Wendy

7. a slightly off-the-wall suggestion….

   Hi Wendy

   Do you have a local U3A…University of the Third Age…this organisation is for mature people and they run lots of the sort of thing you are talking about but because they are (generally) retired people they are a little more cash rich than many.  I’m not suggesting that they are rolling on it or that they can provide you with a living but if you can arrange a course or two with them it might generate a bit of income and cred.

    

   Rus

   http://www.coach-and-courses.com

8. Getting courses accredited

   Hi Wendy

   I have designed and run accredited courses for the voluntary/community sector. In England you can get courses accredited through the National Open College network (http://www.nocn.co.uk) 

   and the Open College Network North Eastern region  provides accreditation and quallifications throughout Scotland. Its website is

   http://www.ocnner.org.uk I am not sure if there is a Scottish equivqlent but they would know. The  OCN’s will provide support with development of your courses, quality assurance systems etc for accreditation. They also have unit banks that might already have what you are looking for which would ease time and costs or at least meet some of your needs. They do charge registration and development fees. I woul;d also suggest contacting  Councils for Voluntary Services Network Scotland as they may be helpful: http://www.cvsscotland.org.uk 

   If you want to discuss this further then email me training@volunteercentreliverpool.org.uk

   Hope  this helps

    

9. accreditation info

   Thanks for this information – I’ll check it out, it sounds just what I’m looking for.

   And no, Russ, I hadn’t heard of the University of the Third Age!  Thanks for broadening my horizons with that suggestion too.

   Wendy