English and maths (Functional Skills)

Students

If you are keen to improve your English and/or maths grades and are undecided about your career goals, then you may like to consider joining one of our adult Functional Skills English or maths classes. We can help you work towards the English and maths qualifications you need in order to progress onto a university, vocational or apprenticeship programme.

Improving your English and maths skills can help you become more confident in your work and daily life, and help you to prepare for further study or training. This well-established programme offers you the opportunity to improve your skills within a supportive and friendly atmosphere. The courses will be assessed through assessments and examinations.

For English qualifications there are a total of four formal assessments to be completed in order to attain the full qualification: reading, writing and two speaking and listening assessments.  For the maths qualification there are 2 formal assessments: one calculator and one non-calculator assessment.

Students can progress through levels from Entry Level qualifications to Levels 1 and 2. The assessments are paper based at Entry Level and either on-line or paper based at Levels 1 and 2.

Classes run at various times across our three campuses as per table below (time slots are subject to change). Your level of English and/or maths, as well as group sizes may also have to be taken into consideration when determining which class times are available to you.

For January 2022 and February 2022 course start dates, you may have to join a group that has been running since the previous September.  Students with these later start dates, should  also be aware that particularly for English, with four assessments, this reduction in course length may mean you can only partially complete and you may need to re-apply to resume your studies the following September.