Innovative education pathways in the South West with Eat That Frog

In recognition of alternative education routes, we thought we would shine a spotlight on one of our amazing centres in the South West of England and share their experience of what its like to work with an awarding organisation, along with the unique benefits of their working relationship with OCN London. Eat that Frog are an innovative alternative education centre based in Devon, founded in 2011 with their prime focus being on people, values and quality. Their culture aligns perfectly with us here at OCN London as they enable people to identify and overcome their barriers to live a more fulfilled life through learning. We recently sat down with Hannah Rendle, Senior Partnership Manager at Eat that Frog, to talk about their accreditation journey with OCN London.

How did you originally hear about OCN London and the services we provide?

It was through our original senior management team and members of the team had worked with them at prior employers and it was all incredibly positive. We were looking for an awarding organisation that shared our values and beliefs and who would work with us on our qualifications portfolio, as we didn’t want a ‘one size fits all’ approach to what we could offer to the individuals who we work with.

How does working with OCN London contribute to your organisation achieving its objectives and goals?

OCN London offer great flexibility in their qualifications portfolio, from entry-level, all the way up to Access to HE courses, we work closely with our Curriculum and Partnership Development Manager to make sure the delivery and resources will suit our learners. Eat That frog looks to remove barriers to support people to progress in their education and employment and OCN London really do share our ethos when it comes to creating opportunity through education. An important part of our work involves us supporting young people and adults with special educational needs and OCN London offer us flexibility in what we can offer to those individuals as well.

Could you tell us why you would suggest OCN London to another organisation?

One of the many reasons we work with OCN is that we have a designated External Verifier that visits us regularly, keeps us updated on any new courses available and is always on hand to support us with queries from our delivery team. This is key for us as a community organisation to be able to nurture external relationships to better support the learners that we help. If you are looking for an awarding organisation to work with, I would recommend them as they offer a fantastic all-round service with a constantly evolving set of qualifications and short courses to choose from.

Vickie Bishop, who is a Curriculum and Partnership Development Manager at OCN London and works closely with the team at Eat that Frog said, “Its always an adventure working with the team at Eat that Frog as they have some very innovative ideas that we are able to support them to realise through our accredited qualifications, benefitting some of the most disadvantaged learners in the South West.”

If you are interested in speaking with us about our accredited qualifications or any of our other services, please get in touch at enquiries@ocnlondon.org.uk.

To find out more about the support that Eat That Frog offer, please visit their website at eatthatfrog.ac.uk.