With over seven million adults in the UK identified as having poor literacy and numeracy levels, promoting the benefits of life long learning has never been so important. The charity ‘Campaign for Learning’ is dedicated to doing just that. Originally launched in 1997, it aims to stimulate learning that will sustain people for life.

Campaign for Learning is involved in many projects to promote the benefits of learning, including co-ordinating the annual ‘Learning at work day’ as part of ‘Adult Learners Week’ which takes place each May. Employees spend the day learning new skills that will help them at work and in their own lives.

As the Campaign for Learning’s chief executive, Susie Parsons, says, “Every year, ‘Learning at work day’ reaches more and more employees, giving them the chance to break from routine and learn new skills that will help them at work and in their own lives. The energy, enthusiasm and excitement for learning generated on the day is exceptional.”

Numeracy
A key theme for this year’s ‘Learning at work day’ was numeracy, as Susie explains: “There’s lots of research about lack of basic skills in the workforce but much of it tends to focus on literacy so we wanted to highlight the need for people to improve numeracy skills.” Research undertaken by the Department of Education and Skills identifies that around 15 million adults have number skills below the level expected of an eleven year old.

As well as providing the opportunity for employees across the country to learn new skills, ‘Learning at work day’ this year provided the Campaign for Learning with the chance to find out more about levels of numeracy amongst today’s workforce. “We decided to benchmark people’s number skills against the level of a standard GCSE paper,” says Susie.

“Teaching people mathematical skills has a lot to do with building up their confidence,” explains Tricia Hartley, the Campaign for Learning’s northern regional director. “People use maths every day, but they don’t realise it. I have recently been teaching maths skills to people who felt they were not very good at it. Yet they have no trouble working out a complicated accumulator bet, which is something I can’t easily do.”

To highlight the need for confidence in numeracy, Campaign for Learning chose Skillsarena, a leading provider of online workplace assessment modules, to assist in gathering its research. The company had approached the charity previously, and offered its services free of charge for ‘Learning at work day’.

Jonathan Oldershaw, of Skillsarena explains: “We wanted to take part in what we felt was a very worthy cause. Campaign for Learning undertakes research into a very important area and we were glad to be of help. We often find that taking our tests highlights people’s strengths and boosts their confidence in their abilities, as well as showing areas that can be improved. We thought the Campaign for Learning’s plans for a numeracy day were an excellent idea.”

Assessment test
The ability to provide assessment tests that can be completed by participants online was an important factor in Skillsarena being selected for the task. “In order to collect data we needed tests that were accessible to people working in all industries: using the internet to administer the tests solved this problem for us,” comments Susie.

Displaying the tests online also provides other benefits. Costs are reduced as organisations like the Campaign for Learning do not have to waste time and money sending the tests out individually to participants. “People are also more likely to complete the test if they can send it back at the click of a button rather than having to take time out of their busy schedule to post it back,” comments Jonathan.

To gain the data needed by Campaign for Learning to carry out its research, Skillsarena specifically designed a maths test which was posted on the charity’s website. The test had to be constructed so that the questions were not so easy that they deterred people from taking part and not so difficult that they were impossible to answer.

Susie explains “Getting the right standard of questions was vital and we were very impressed with the way Skillsarena designed the test. Maths is not everyone’s favourite subject but the responses showed that people who completed the test found it fun to do.”

The maths test remained on the Campaign for Learning’s website throughout ‘Adult Learners Week’ and people can still take it by visiting www.campaignforlearning.org.uk and following the links to ‘learning at work’ and ‘online resources’ and ‘quizzes’.

Skillsarena provides a secure area which allows its tests to be administered easily and quickly. Using the latest technology it is able to deliver assessments with 99.98% reliability.

Designing a test which could be completed in a light-hearted way achieved the Campaign for Learning’s aim of encouraging people to face up to what is a very serious problem. The charity hopes to convey to employers how much they actually rely on the numeracy skills of their employees.

A numerate workforce can be essential to get the job done properly and by training its staff the company will benefit in the long term. Susie comments, “The test was an ideal way to get people to think about their numeracy skills. We hope it will encourage them to become more proactive and improve the way they deal with numbers both in the workplace and when they are out and about.”