Two social care experts are in the running for a major award after developing a pioneering staff training scheme designed to enrich the lives of care home residents in Wrexham.

Michele May and Sarah Longhurst have also helped establish a clear career path for the workforce at the Pendine Park Care Organisation at their homes in Wrexham and Caernarfon through a successful training and development programme.

They were working with the organisation’s in-house training company, the Pendine Academy of Social Care.

The academy was established by owners Mario and Gill Kreft who felt externally trained staff did not have sufficient ‘hands-on’ experience or a clear understanding of the organisation’s ethos.

Michele and Sarah set up focus groups to get the views of staff on what training they felt they’d missed out on and also the families to find out what their expectations are.

“We basically put the structure in place and they put the content in,” said Michele. “It’s written by care practitioners for care practitioners.”

The introduction and ongoing success of the programme has resulted in Michele and Sarah being shortlisted as finalist for the Commitment to Training and Workforce Development award at the Wales Care Awards 2017, which takes place at City Hall in Cardiff on November 17.

The awards, run by Care Forum Wales and dubbed the ‘Oscars’ of the care industry, acknowledge the hard work and exceptional performances of those in the sector.

Michele, 48, said: “I was really shocked but thrilled when I found out. It’s such a team effort though. I absolutely love working with Sarah.”

Sarah, 46, added: “We were really shocked to be nominated. When it’s your colleagues nominating you it makes you feel very proud and humbled.”

Michele said: “The issue was that although people had the care sector qualifications, they actually didn’t have the care skills that Mario and Gill needed.

“What students were doing wasn’t real and hands-on enough. Mario and Gill wanted to make the training real, for them to emulate role model behaviour and learn how they deliver the skills.

“They also wanted them to learn about teamwork and how to supervise and lead a team. It’s all about personal development.

“We’ve made the training easy to read, fun and engaging so doesn’t feel too academic.

“We call it the Pendine Diploma Plus. When people come in they have an induction for the first six months where they learn about the job and then they sign up to do their care sector diploma.

“What they’ve learned with us and continue to learn supports them with their diploma. It also means they’re trained with person centred care.”

The mum-of-two added: “The training builds up over five years and takes them on a journey from new starter, a student care practitioner, and teaches them great care practice skills, how to be part of a team and supervise.

“It creates a clear career pathway. There are great career prospects – you can go from a student care practitioner to a registered manager. We take you on that journey.

“That is something we have been working on the last seven years but over the last couple we’ve really focused on a clinical care practitioner role.

“It provides great clinical support for nurses and they work on very important stuff like taking obs, checking blood pressure, wounds and dressing, and medication.

“This could eventually lead to nurse training. It shows to people who may not have worked before that there is a really good career path in the care sector.”

In nominating the pair for the award, centre manager Ann Farr said: “Michele and Sarah deserve recognition for passion and persistence – they haven’t always had a smooth ride, they often had to cope with resistance as they tried to change things that we may not have thought needed changing.

“But we have the core of an integrated workforce development programme that threads through the whole of the organisation and is really having a marked impact on the richness of the daily living experiences of the people who live here and making the job far more interesting for engaged staff who now know they all have an important role within their specialist area.

“Staff who understand about the ethos of the organisation and feel able to contribute to improving the way we work.”

The awards ceremony will be hosted by tenor and radio presenter Wynne Evans, better known as Gio Compario from the Go Compare TV ads.