A day in the Life of an End-Point Assessment Delivery Officer: Gabi Brown
3 February 2021
Hi, and welcome to my day.
I’m 29 and have worked at AIM Qualifications and Assessment Group for two years. Some would call me the organisation’s Disney expert, others would disagree… those people are wrong. So when I’m not singing ‘Let it go’ I’m talking to employers and training providers about apprenticeship end-point assessments. It’s a diverse and fulfilling role which I really enjoy, and I’d like to share my typical day with you.
8am: To start my day I wake up and mentally persuade myself to get out of bed and get ready. I love musicals so you're always sure to hear me singing along to the musicals that fill my Spotify playlist. Singing in the morning, Disney songs in particular, always gives me hope that today will be the day birds help me get dressed like I’m Snow White… but today, that’s not the case.
8.30am: Time to start work and put on my end-point assessment hat, or tiara. First, I check my email inbox and the general assessment inbox. It’s a morning task all office workers will be familiar with, giving me time to remember yesterday and see anything that needs my urgent attention. I make sure to mark anything that I know I will need to look at today, then I use these tasks to create my to-do list, with all of this written down in my big red diary. The thought that all of these tasks will be ticked off in orange highlighter by the end of the day gets me excited to dive into my work. During my time working from home, I have also been working on implementing tech into my work life. So, using reminders for daily tasks has saved me bundles of time.
9am: Where the real work begins. Today's first task is a workshop for apprentices on the Junior Content Producer standard. This is followed by another workshop for employers of Event Assistant apprentices. The focus of these sessions is to speak with both apprentices and employers who are studying, or supporting those studying, apprenticeships with an AIM end-point assessment. I give support and advice and answer questions about their standard/apprenticeship or assessment. I love the workshops; they give me the opportunity to speak to the people that I am responsible for helping. These events are held on a regular basis to ensure that we provide support to those who need it.
11am: A few hours free before my next big task so I can focus on the main part of my role as an EDO; communicating with training providers, and apprentices to answer questions or concerns they may have. The job of an end-point assessment delivery officer is to be there for our EPA customers so that they always feel confident offering/studying the standard, and that the learner will be ready for the end-point assessment. As a quick 5-min break my partner and I set a movie quiz question and ‘true or false’ question each day, some of these are rather hard and give me a much-needed break. Today's quiz question was who said “We are high priests, Vatican assassin warlocks. Boom!” and the true/false was ‘Originally the term movies did not mean films but the people who made them?
12pm: It's lunchtime! Whilst we have all been working from home, we have seen many different and interesting lunches, you can cook something amazing in 15 minutes. My lunch choice is always sporadic and unknown, is it a salad, a bagel or maybe a sandwich? I won’t know until it is ready to be eaten. But today I went for a pizza, because why not? Then back to the day job.
2pm: And my final big task for today, an end-point assessment invigilation. This is one of the most important tasks for EDOs. An end-point assessment is the final part in apprenticeship, and it is where an apprentice demonstrates the knowledge, skills and behaviours they have learnt within their apprenticeship and their job role. However, an end-point assessment has the benefits of allowing me to continue working whilst invigilating the apprentice. This means I can send confirmation emails to apprentices, employers and training providers to let them know the date and time of their assessment, allowing them to book in a test call to make sure they can use the system.
4.30pm: As the day draws to a close the end-point assessment has finished early. In the 30-minutes to close off the day, we are encouraged to reflect and ensure we are happy with everything we have done. Looking back, I had a productive day and even managed to schedule new assessments into the calendar, ensuring I included the assessor, apprentice, meeting link and assessor bio so they can be accessed on the assessment day, making the end-point assessment a smooth process for everyone. I also had the pleasure of sending out a statement of results to apprentices, employers and training providers.
I measure my success by looking at how many tasks I start the day with and how many I end the day with. This is where I can go back through my diary and cross off everything I have completed on my to-do list, which is the highlight of every day, if you’ll pardon the pun.
5pm: The workday is done and it’s time to relax. Due to the current world, a lot of people have said their after-work routine has taken a huge change. Mine, not so much. If it’s going for a walk or singing lessons, I keep my after-work schedule interesting unless I have nothing to do and can switch on the TV and read a book from my ever-growing “to-read” list. All of this topped off with some sort of chocolate.
So that’s a day in the life with me, Gabi Brown, one of your end-point assessment delivery officers at AIM Qualifications and Assessment Group. I hope this gives you a better insight into how I spend my day and what I do behind the scenes as part of the AIM Assessment team.
So, if you have any questions related to end-point assessment, contact us on 01332 224654 or email assessment@aim-group.org.uk and it might just be me you speak to.
