This award is commonly known as the Registered Manager Award or RMA. It is the management qualification promoted by Skills for Care for registered managers (along with a L4 care/professional qualification), in order to meet the National Minimum Standards.
The ARC Management Centre has registered over 1,000 candidates to date for the RMA, and many have now successfully completed the qualification.
There are two routes offered by ARC to support registered managers as they work towards the RMA. The first is for candidates who have registered for the full award (10 units); and the second is for candidates who have already gained most of the units through other awards and who have registered to follow the unit route.
Whether candidates are wanting to achieve their award by registering for the full award or through the unit route this can be done by having the support of a workbased assessor (WBA) or a peripatetic assessor provided by ARC. Organisations can put groups of managers or individual candidates forward for the award - ARC will provide a suitable programme for both.
Workbased Assessment
If the organisation is able to provide a WBA for their RMA candidate(s) ARC will allocate an Internal Verifier (IV) to support them. The IV will carry out an induction with the WBA and advise them how to support their candidates. They will then verify units as they were completed and feedback to the assessor on their assessment. All WBAs need to attend a standardisation meeting once a year and be observed carrying out an assessment task to meet the awarding body requirements.
Their are various advantages to having a WBA including being able to carry out assessment at the most convenient time for th candidate, assessor and organisation; being able to capture naturally occuring performance as and when it happens, even at short notice; less time away from the workplace.
ARC will provide an independent assessor to assess one of the core units to meet the awarding body requirements.
Peripatetic Assessment
If ARC provides a peripatetic assessor the registered manager attends five learning sets/support days. S/He will also have a day of individual attention, when the assessor comes to the workplace to carry out direct observation, personal support and assessment. This programme takes place over a 6-9 month period, with sessions every 1-2 months.
Candidates are sent a pre-course information pack, and have an introductory session all about the award and how to collect evidence of competence and build their portfolio. Thereafter, they are expected to bring evidence to each session. At the learning sets, they have one-to-one time with their assessor for planning, review and feedback on evidence produced. There is also time for small group work, and individual work away from the distractions of the workplace. Between sessions, the assessor may take evidence to assess, and provides telephone support if required. It is envisaged that the registered manager will complete the RMA within three months of the end of the programme though this is not always possible for various reasons and if candidates need further support then this can be arranged. Final assessment, verification and certification follows.
Candidates who have already achieved units that can be transferred from other awards will be advised how to use these units for their RMA. The cost of the unit route varies, depending upon the number of units undertaken. However, as a guide, the cost for a candidate undertaking 2-4 units would be in the region of half to two-thirds of the cost of the full qualification.
If the peripatetic assessor route is chosen the costs cover registration, telephone or email support, learning support manual, learning set programme, assessment, verification and certification. If the candidate(s) are assessed by a WBA the cost is reduced and covers registration, independent assessment of one unit, verification and certification; though there will be the cost of induction and standardisation activities for the WBA.
Please contact Jenny Grey, at the ARC Training Consortium, for more details about this qualification by email or call 07834 727304.
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