- Mental Health Awareness
- Safeguarding Awareness
- Equality and Diversity
- Dyslexia Awareness
- County Line Awareness
- Finance Awareness
- Gambling Awareness
- Healthy Living Awareness
- Relationships Awareness
- Prevent Awareness
- SEND Awareness
- LGBTQ+ Awareness
- Staying Safe Online
- Data Privacy and Cyber Security
- British Values
- Improve your Spelling and Grammar
- NUS Apprenticeship Extra Card
Mental Health Awareness
In many ways, mental health is just like physical health: everybody has it and we need to take care of it. Good mental health means being generally able to think, feel and react in the ways that you need and want to live your life. But if you go through a period of poor mental health you may find you’re frequently thinking, feeling or reacting, which will become difficult to cope with. This can feel just as bad as a physical illness.
Mental health issues can affect every day life. Whether at home, work, Appris or elsewhere. Our staff have completed mental health awareness training. However, to be able to offer specialist support, we have teamed up with Unmasked Mental Health, a local business that specialises in supporting young people’s mental heath.
Through a dedicated counselling services, Appris apprentices can access the services throughout their time on programme.
How to contact Unmasked Mental Health:
By telephone – During the hours of 8.30am and 4.30pm, Monday to Friday, apprentices can call the dedicated helpline on
01422 356945 (option 2)
Online – Click here to complete a quick online form, this will be sent to the Unmasked Mental Health team. One of their trained Mental Health team will then contact you during normal working hours for a confidential discussion.
Useful links:
Safeguarding Awareness
Appris is committed to discharging its statutory and moral duty to support all learners. We are also committed to discharging any additional duties to promote and safeguard the welfare of all learners engaged in our activities.
Should you wish to raise a safeguarding issue, please do not hesitate to contact either of the Designated Safeguarding contacts below during normal working hours (Monday to Friday, 8.30am to 4.30pm).
Kenny Stoddart (email: k.stoddart@appris.co.uk or mobile: 07779 139526)
Mick Frost (email: m.frost@appris.co.uk or mobile: 07784 359108)
Both are supported by Designated Safeguarding Officers, Bob Buxton, Yasmin Qauser and Aimee Robinson. All can be contacted on the office telephone number, 01274 668149.
Equality and Diversity
It is against the law to discriminate against someone because of a protected characteristic. It is against the law to discriminate against someone because of:
- age
- disability
- gender reassignment
- marriage and civil partnership
- pregnancy and maternity
- race
- religion or belief
- sex
- sexual orientation
These are called protected characteristics.
Dyslexia Awareness
Dyslexia is a common learning difficulty that can cause problems with reading, writing and spelling. It’s a specific learning difficulty, which means it causes problems with certain abilities used for learning, such as reading and writing. Unlike a learning disability, intelligence isn’t affected.
Have you heard the phrase ‘county lines’?
A ‘County Line’ is a term used to describe gangs and organised criminal networks involved in exporting illegal drugs into one or more importing areas [within the UK], using dedicated mobile phone lines or other form of “deal line”. They are likely to exploit children and vulnerable adults to move [and store] the drugs and money and they will often use coercion, intimidation, violence (including sexual violence) and weapons”. For more information regarding Criminal Exploitation, you may find these further links useful:
https://www.nationalcrimeagency.gov.uk/what-we-do/crime-threats/drug-trafficking/county-lines
https://www.nspcc.org.uk/what-is-child-abuse/types-of-abuse/gangs-criminal-exploitation/
Finance Awareness
Citizens Advice, publishes a major report Unsecured and Insecured?, said people aged 17-24 years old came to them with 102,296 debt issues in the last year – 21 per cent more than the previous.
The charity says this increase comes against a backdrop of exploding unsecured borrowing among young people which risks trapping a new generation in problem debt.
The consumer champion has analysed official data which shows young people have an average unsecured debt of £12,215 – more than three times what it was (£3,988) before the financial crash between 2006-08.
The average total debts of young people grew by more than 200 per cent between 2006 and 2012, the last year data from the Wealth and Assets Survey is available.
Useful Links:
https://www.citizensadvice.org.uk/wales/debt-and-money/
https://www.childrenssociety.org.uk/information/young-people/advice/money-problems
Gambling Awareness
There are many forms of gambling, and you may not immediately realise that some activities are indeed gambling. The Gambling Act 2005 sets out how gambling is regulated in Great Britain, and it covers arcades, betting, bingo, casinos, gaming machines, society lotteries, and online gambling. For most gambling activities, the legal age is 18. However, there are some which do not have any lower age restrictions, like playing on a 2p slot machine or making a private bet with one of your friends on the outcome of a game of FIFA, for example In 2019 47% of people in the UK had gambled in the past four weeks. That number remains at 32% when you take away the national lottery. Gambling Commission 2019
Different types of gambling activity:
- Arcades
- Sports betting
- Bingo
- Casinos
- Lotteries
- Private bets
- Gaming machines
- Esports betting
Source of information – www.ygam.com
Healthy Living Awareness
Advice, tips and tools to help you make the best choices about your health and wellbeing.
Useful links:
Relationship Advice
Aged 16-25 and need help dealing with relationships, whether its breaking up, getting together or common problems.
Useful links:
https://www.relate.org.uk/relationship-help/help-young-adults
https://www.changegrowlive.org/advice-info/under-21-advice/relationships
What is Consent?
Legally, the definition of consent is when someone “agrees by choice and has the freedom and capacity to make that choice.”
The age of consent (the legal age to be able to consent to sex) in the UK is 16 years old. This law is there to protect young people from abuse and exploitation. The law isn’t designed to prosecute under 16s who are engaging in mutually consenting, non-abusive, sexual activity.
In another protective law, a person in a position of trust (for example a teacher, youth worker or carer) can’t engage in sexual activity with anyone under 18 who is in the care of their organisation.
Useful link:
www.fpa.org.uk/information-for-parents-sexual-health-week-2018
Special Education Needs & Disabilities Awareness
Special educational needs and disabilities (SEND) can affect a child or young person’s ability to learn. They can affect their:
- behaviour or ability to socialise, for example they struggle to make friends
- reading and writing, for example because they have dyslexia
- ability to understand things
- concentration levels, for example because they have ADHD
- physical ability
Useful links:
Information about mental health support for people who are lesbian, gay, bisexual, trans, intersex, queer or questioning (LGBTIQ+).
Useful Links:
https://www.stonewall.org.uk/help-advice/faqs-and-glossary/list-lgbtq-terms#n
Staying Safe Online Training
The Education and Foundation Training (EFT) provide resources with modules on:
- Radicalisation and Extremist
- Staying Safe Online
- What Can You Trust | British Values
Data Privacy and Cyber Security
Have you considered how safe your information is online? Click the link below to access a presentation with embedded videos that will make you think twice about sharing your information (Disclaimer: Strong language used in some cases)
Check to see how secure your data has been compromised (link promoted by the Police)
Additional links to a growing number of educational resources aimed at young people and students to help promote the safe, lawful and constructive learning of cyber skills.
British Values
What can you do for Appris?
– Abide by Fundamental British Values
– Never tolerate a lack of respect for individuals
– Celebrate difference and promote diversity
– Be inclusive and accepting of difference
Improve your Spelling and Grammar
www.grammarly.com is a very effective way of checking spelling and grammar of reports and assignments, before submitting to Tutors and Assessors.
NUS Apprenticeship Extra Card
The NUS Apprentice extra discount card has been developed by the National Union of Students (NUS) and provides apprentices with the same discounts and benefits as University students.
For only £11, apprentices receive a whole year of savings from more than 140 top high street and online retail partners including Amazon, PizzaExpress, Jack Wills, 16-25 Railcard, The Co-op and more!
Money generated from sales of the card funds the National Society for Apprentices, who represent apprentices and offer them support during their vocational training.
