Welcome to the July edition of Innovate's updates. Here you will find everything you need to know this month across our Qualifications and Apprenticeship services.
We are finalists!
Innovate are thrilled to have been shortlisted for two awards at the 2026 Qualifications and Assessment Excellence Awards.
Firstly, our Product and Assessment Services Team have been shortlisted for Team of the Year. This team is made up of our Client Relationship Team and Development Team, two teams, now working as one, to ensure our valuable customer insights and development activity are working synchronously. This is essential now more than ever as we work through the transition to Apprenticeship Assessment.
Secondly, we are proud that our new product, launched in 2026, Vantage, has been shortlisted for the Innovation Excellence Award. Invigilation has, for too long, been an unneccesary barrier in the assessment process. We are so pleased that Vantage is successfully changing that for our customers and apprentices. The feedback we continue to receive is phenomenal, and we are delighted to have this achievement recognised by being shortlisted for this award.
These awards demonstrate our commitment to improving the skills system for everyone, and we are looking forward to celebrating with our fellow nominees later in the year.
Apprenticeship Reform FAQs - Version 2
We have updated the document 'Apprenticeship Reform FAQs' to Version 2 this month to now contain even more helpful information on the topics we are speaking to you about most frequently. If there is anything you would like to speak to us about in more detail please get in touch at hello@innovateawarding.org or talk to your usual point of contact.
Assessment Key Verbs
Please can we bring our support document ‘Assessment Key Verbs’ to your attention, if you are not already using this document as part of your apprentice preparation.
We hope that using this document helps you to prepare apprentices to respond to questions in line with the verb included in the question and have the best chance of success. We would also recommend using this when conducting mocks.
New and Updated Standards
Level Catering and Hospitality Foundation Apprenticeship v1.0
We are preparing the knowledge tests, specification and support materials at the moment and hope to have some draft materials available from August 2026.
Level 6 Production Manager v2.0
This is in development at the moment and will be available in September 2026. This replaces the Level 7 Creative Industries Production Manager standard.
New and Updated Support Materials
Level 4 Hospitality Manager
Mock MCQ Tests for this Standard have been reviewed and updated versions are now available.
Level 2 Food and Beverage Team Member v1.0
Mock EPA Records have been updated to new Innovate branding and format.
Level 2 Hospitality Accommodation Team Member v1.0
Mock EPA Records have been updated to new Innovate branding and format.
Level 2 Production Chef v1.2
Mock EPA Records have been updated to new Innovate branding and format.
Level 2 Commis Chef v1.4
Mock EPA Records have been updated to new Innovate branding and format.
Level 3 Production Assistant v1.3
Two new Scenario Test Briefs for Audio and two new for Screen available on Proficient now.
Previous Standard Versions
The standard versions currently approaching the gateway deadline within the next 6 months are:
Senior Healthcare Support Worker 1.4
Proficient
Released
Drag and drop functionality for apprentice file uploads. Applicable to gateway.
Testing
Multi select files - The File Browser now displays files in a table format, allowing users to see key file information at a glance, including the file name, upload date, uploaded by user, file type, file size. Applicable to gateway.
Your thoughts?
We work closely with Skilltech, the company behind Proficient, so if you have any feedback please do let us know so that we can help to shape future improvements to the platform.
Qualifications Pricing Review
We are pleased to announce that we have now completed our review and our updated fees and pricing can be found in the "Documentation" area of QuartzWeb. These will be in place from the 1st August 2026.
New Qualifications System
We are pleased to announce that we have been working with the team at Skilltech to launch a new system for our Qualifications Clients called Accolade. This is currently in the pilot stages and due to launch later this year. If you are an exisiting qualifications client and would like to be involved with the testing of the pilot please feel free to reach out to us.
This will be in replacement of the current QuartzWeb system and we will share more updates when we have a confirmed launch date.
If you have any questions about anything included in this update, please get in touch with your usual point of contact or contact epa@innovateawarding.org for anything Apprenticeship Assessment related, or coordinators@innovateawarding.org for anything Qualification related.
