Currently there are 2 Electrical Apprentices and 3 Mechanical Apprentices in their 3rd year of an ONC at Neath College. They are following a syllabus that has been agreed by MOB and which will be accredited by the Institute of Mining and Minerals.

They complete certain ONC units with other engineering apprentices and then carry out additional units in order to cover the mining aspects of the course.

The mining legislation aspects of the course are provided by Tower's Training department.

Completion of the ONC at the end of their 4th year
and a successfull pass in legislation should enable
the apprentices to gain a Class 1 qualification. They
are currently in the 3rd year of the former British
Coal Engineering Craft Apprenticeship Scheme and
completion of the scheme should provide the necessary
experience to satisfy MQB. Completion of the ECAS
scheme is only possible with the support of RJB Mining
Ltd. in order for our apprentices to have an appreciation
of equipment that is not used at Tower Colliery. We
are very grateful for the support that RJB Mining Ltd.
have already showm us.

It is planned that suitable apprentices will complete a
HNC, which again may require bolt-on units to satisfy
MQB. If they pass the MQB legislation examination, they
would have suitable qualifications to become Engineers.

Officials

There is a current requirement to train officials at Tower Colliery. Potential officials would currently have to attend a course at Doncaster College. If there were sufficient interest, Doncaster College would possibly run a course based in South Wales.

NVQ's

Unless the industry (including MQB and HSE) adopts NVQ's as the desired training medium throughout all tiers of the industry then the industry will find it difficult due to cost and experience to place apprentices on suitable courses. The government has decreed that ONC's and HNC's are to be phased out and are to be replaced with NVQ's and GNVQ's. All potential funding is channelled through vocational qualifications.

However, the industry is already too small to set up its own NVQ training organisation and the largest employer inherited the former British Coal training facilities to satisfy its own training requirements.

Tower Colliery have tailored mining courses at Levels 1 and 2 which could be adopted as NVQ's to cover introductory training, outbye training and face training. It would not be too difficult a task though time consuming and costly to formulate a suitable course for officials. The Federation of Independent Mines has met EPIC (Extractive Products Industry Consortium) in order to gain EPIC's support for coalmining NVQ's.

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