Quiet Now, Settle Down...

Finally I've made some progress this week on the Adult Education teacher training I've been chasing so many people for. Despite another meeting with yet another training organisation since my last post on the topic, everything was indicating that my funding for the course was looking very unlikely.

By chance, my continued frustrations came up in conversation with my ECDL IT tutor (who works for North East Lincs Council) when he asked if I had approached them. I explained that I hadn't as I was being led by the "powers that be" to make sure I took advantage of any free funding available.

After a quick word with the secretary there, it appears that they do offer the course locally and the fee was about £120 - quite frankly, I was considering paying it just to get things moving. Then she suddenly added that as I am unemployed and claiming benefit, I would only have to pay the £20 registration admin fee!

To cut a long story short, it was only a couple of emails and a phone call later that afternoon before I had enrolled on the course, met my tutor, caught up on the two lessons I'd missed and paid my registration fee which was actually only £10! OK, I also have two assignments to complete before my first lesson next week, but that seemed a small price to pay (first one completed this afternoon).

Consider me one happy bunny.

Another observation though, the centre where the course is held is on the premises of a closed primary school. As was the other centre where I studied for my IT course. It occurs to me that if perhaps they had kept some of the primary schools open and as a result kept class sizes smaller and more effective, surely there would not be the same need to invest in converting them all into adult education centres now?

Not that I should really criticise the council who's employees have been so helpful in my most recent quest. Even more so if this training goes to plan as I happen to know for a fact they are in short supply of Adult Education tutors...