Functional Skills

Key Information about Functional Skills & Useful Forms

When a centre wishes to join NOCN to deliver Functional Skills, they must agree to certain conditions and complete the NQ1 form, which may be requested from your OCN.

It is intended that learners will take assessments for the qualifications when they are ready.

Assessment Information Entry Level

Entry Level Functional Skills Registration Form

Registration for Entry Level must be completed within 25 days for courses of less than 12 weeks and within 40 working days if the course is 12 weeks or more.

Assessments at all Levels are ‘on demand’ and can be taken when the learner is ready. At Entry level, centres may access the live assessments through a secure login to the NOCN website. Please contact functionalskills@nocn.org.uk for more information. Entry level assessments are internally marked and externally verified. Centres may contextualise the assessments based on the information provided in the assessment mark scheme.

Assessment Information Level 1 and 2

Functional Skills Level 1 and 2

This registration form should be used to register the learners and to book the required assessment time and date. It must be submitted to the centre's regional OCN a minimum of 10 working days before the planned assessment date.

Please contact your regional OCN for further details.

From September 2010, all assessments will be written to the November 2009 Functional Skills standards which may be downloaded from the Ofqual website.

Level 1 and 2, with the exception of Speaking and Listening, is externally marked. Assessments may be booked on demand. Assessment papers are booked no less than 10 working days before the planned assessment date. Assessments are then sent to the regional office within 24 hours of completion. They will be then marked within the next marking period.

The cut off dates for the receipt of completed assessments at the regional office for 11/12 marking periods are shown below and the results will be with centres by the date indicated.

Dates for 2011/12:

Cut off date for Assessments to Arrive at Regional Office by:	Results released to centres
22^nd August	19^th September
12^th September	10^th October
10^th October	7^th November
7^th November	5^th December
5^th December	9^th January
9^th January	6^th February
6^th February	5^th March
5^th March	2^nd April
2^nd April	30^th April
30^th April	28^th May
28^th May	25^th June
25^th June	23^rd July * last date for Year 2 Diploma students (unless Diploma Aggregation Dates change)
23^rd July	20^th August
20^th August	17^th September

NQ12 form

If a learner requires a reasonable adjustment to enable them to access the assessment please complete the NQ12 form. At Entry level this is held in the centre and at Level 1 and 2 should be sent to the regional office.

NQ13 Form

In cases where special consideration is required please complete form NQ13 and send to regional office with the assessment papers.

Application for Transfer of Credit

Where a learner has already completed one or two English components with a different awarding organisation, the Transfer of Credit form should be completed so that the learner's achievement may be used against the NOCN Functional English assessment. The form should be completed for one learner only. It should be sent to NOCN as soon as possible after the learner has joined the centre.

Reports

On Tuesday 16 November 2010 NOCN held a National Standardisation of the Entry Level 3 Functional Skills Assessment across all three skills; English, Mathematics and ICT. The focus of the event was the standardisation of assessments from the pilot for Entry Level 3 across papers of the same skill, as well as ensuring that standards were consistent across skills. The outcome of the meeting is available in the report below:

2010-11 Entry Level Functional Skills National Standardisation - Public Report (PDF, 90KB)

Events

Key Information about Functional Skills & Useful Forms

Useful Links