This suite of qualifications is the first of its kind and is intended to complement (progression both to and from) the Higher Education provision that exists for level 4 – level 6 in Wales. It has been specifically developed with the sector to provide the vocational aspects of this level of learning. The qualifications are specifically designed to also be available as the first and only apprenticeship available for learners in Wales at this level. It allows for the progression of learners from the existing lower level qualifications and apprenticeships.
The Design Industry employs around 200,000 people in three main areas – product and industrial design, stage and set design and in communications.
The UK Design Industry is relatively young, fragmented and has a huge variety of talents. UK designers are generally well qualified – currently, 41% are educated to BA (hons) level or above – and their skills and creativity are valued by clients in the UK and abroad.
However most of those not qualified to degree level do not progress from more junior roles. Design can have a significant impact on business productivity, as well as addressing social and environmental issues. Our world class creative skills could help give the UK a competitive edge in the world economy. In recent years, designers have brought their processes and insights to bear in new areas, including high-tech innovation, environmental sustainability and education and health services.
Higher level qualifications within a framework would enable young people to gain payment during training allowing for more talented young people getting into the design sector and provide them with skills which would better meet the needs of employers. This would allow non-graduates to progress to higher levels within the design industry.
In response to these challenges employers are keen to increase the level of work based learning in order to change the culture of graduate recruitment to the industry. They created the Design NOS to meet their current and future skills. This suite of level 4 and level 5 qualifications has been directly mapped to these during development.
The High-level Skills for Higher Value report (Creative & Cultural Skills and the Design Council, 2008) outlined the Design Industry Skills Development Plan, showing a way forward for UK design. It was generated in response to current and future skills needs of UK designers and was based on two years of consultation with the design industry and design education. The report outlined a number of skills challenges for the sector including:
- the increasing emphasis on multidisciplinary teams comprising business managers, social scientists, technologists and designers;
- the deeper appreciation of business practice needed to provide strategic inputs within enterprise and innovation;
- meeting consumer demand for creative design solutions which meet environmental, social and sustainability criteria;
- developing leadership skills, which includes business management and strategic skills;
- ensuring designers make the most of fast-emerging new market opportunities and understand how to translate these into practical design strategies;
- training to meet the continuing professional development needs of those already working in the Industry;
- the increasing technical knowledge of materials and product lifecycles and customer behaviour change;
- widening the talent beyond graduate entry and open up an entry route for those without formal qualifications.
As well as identifying challenges and opportunities for the sector, the report identified significant gaps between the skills required by employers in the design industry and those being taught and learnt in schools, colleges and universities.
‘Pathways to Design: Young People’s Entry to the Design Sector’ (awaiting publication) states that 31% of young people entering the sector are undertaking unpaid internships. This restricts entry to the sector to those who can afford to work for nothing whilst they gain experience rather than those with a talent for design.
58% of employers who currently employ young people stated that skills such as communication (16%), commercial awareness (14%) and basic business and workplace skills (11%) could be better developed using entry routes to the sector.
Agored Cymru Level 4 Award in Working Practices in Design
TQT - 100 hours
GLH - 53 hours
Agored Cymru Level 5 Certificate in Working Practices in Design
TQT - 330 hours
GLH - 111 hours