Aspire is working in partnership with Oxford City Council to deliver a Work Based Customer Service English for Speakers of Other Languages [ESOL], for Syrian Refugees who have settled in the City. 

There are 8 participants who have enrolled for the 10 week course, which began in September. All of our participants have already learned a level of English, and are ready to move onto the next stage towards obtaining employment.

For the first 5 weeks, the learners have spent the majority of time in the classroom, learning specific vocabulary related to customer service roles, and also learnt about the world of work here in the UK. Employers are also taking part in this pilot. They have  visited to talk about what it is like to work for their particular organisation. We are now into the second phase of the project- where the classroom based element, diminishes, and the learners are now spending up to 3 hours, work shadowing an Employee at one of the designated Employers.