Kent small and medium-sized businesses are being encouraged to take advantage of fully funded AI training through the Kent AI Skills Accelerator (KASA), following the success of its first round.
Funded by KCC through the Helping Hands programme, the scheme is delivered by Social Enterprise Kent in partnership with R People.
The over 40 learners have already successfully completed their training, with participants reporting significant improvements in their confidence and understanding of AI. Average confidence in using AI more than doubled over the course of the programme, alongside positive feedback around productivity, time savings, marketing, decision-making and responsible AI use.
Participants also gain access to a toolkit of resources, prompts, to enable smooth adoption of AI in their business, enabling the adoption to happen without significant investment in resource and instead benefit from improved capacity benefits of AI.
The training has been funded for micros and small businesses in Kent Marmot Coastal Districts (Ashford, Folkestone & Hythe, Canterbury, Thanet and Swale) to benefit from funded places. To enable them to maximise the productivity and growth benefits of using AI in small businesses.
The courses allow participants to gain a City & Guilds Assured qualification in AI Prompt Engineering – covering the skills needed to help people use generative AI more effectively or AI Governance & Ethics – helping organisations understand how to introduce and use AI safely.
“Following this success, further fully funded places are now available for eligible Kent small and medium sized businesses and micro businesses.”
KCC’s Cabinet Member for Economic Development and Special Projects, David Wimble, said: “It is brilliant to see such fantastic results from the work we are doing.
“Following this success, further fully funded places are now available for eligible Kent small and medium sized businesses and micro businesses.
“The feedback we have had from learners has been really encouraging and I look forward to hearing how future cohorts use the skills learnt through these fantastic courses.”
SEK Group Director of Skills and Employability, Kirsty Hawkins, said: "We're delighted to be working with Kent County Council to deliver the Kent AI Skills Accelerator. AI is developing incredibly quickly, and for many small businesses it can be difficult to know where to start or how to use it safely and effectively.
"KASA is about making those skills accessible and practical, giving Kent businesses the confidence to use AI to improve the way they work while also understanding the importance of responsible and ethical use.
"We've already seen how learners are taking their new skills back into the workplace, and we're excited to build on that success and support even more businesses across Kent through the next phase of the programme."
Rebecca Bradley of R People Ltd said: "It has been a pleasure to work with Social Enterprise Kent (SEK) to deliver KASA. Their reach across Kent's business Kent's business community has been a real strength of the project and has helped us work with such a varied group of businesses and learners.
"The stars of the project are the learners who have embraced the programme and shown a real commitment to understanding not just what AI can do, but how to use it well and responsibly.
"Our favourite part has been seeing learners grow in confidence and put what they have learned into practice. To us, that is the best measure of the project's success, and it has been made possible through the support of Kent County Council's Helping Hands fund."
To find out more and apply, visit AI Training Courses Kent | Kent AI Skills Accelerator
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