News

Agency strips provider of £2.5m contract

A Lancashire-based training provider has been stripped of its £2.5m Skills Funding Agency contract following a damning Ofsted grading…

Nick Linford
Nick Linford
News

Apprenticeships make up just half a per cent of FE loan applications

Figures released this morning show just 239 loans for apprenticeships have been applied for  since the scheme began — 162 in September. The figures…

Nick Linford
Nick Linford
News

Funding software delay ‘getting serious,’ 157 group tells SFA

The Skills Funding Agency (SFA) has been hit with further criticism over “serious difficulties” faced by colleges because of…

Nick Linford
Nick Linford
News

Foundation appoints permanent chief executive

A policy director at the Department for Education (DfE) will become the Education and Training Foundation’s (ETF) first permanent…

Nick Linford
Nick Linford
News

Government publishes its ‘radical and far-reaching’ apprenticeship plan

The government has this morning confirmed in a newly-published implementation plan that it would put apprenticeship design in England in the hands…

Nick Linford
Nick Linford
News

Fresh concerns raised over Barnfield College

Teaching unions have raised further concerns about the governance and management of a troubled college which is being investigated by the…

FE Week Reporter
FE Week Reporter


News

Association of Colleges calls for action on funding software

The Association of Colleges’ boss has written to the Skills Funding Agency expressing concerns over software funding delays and…

FE Week Reporter
FE Week Reporter
News

New course will prepare FE lecturers to teach GCSE English

A new training course is set to be launched to prepare FE lecturers for a massive expansion in students…

FE Week Reporter
FE Week Reporter
News

Elmfield to ‘take steps to put the company into administration’

Elmfield Training has confirmed that its “directors have taken steps to protect the company through an administration process”. In…

FE Week Reporter
FE Week Reporter
News

Fury at SFA funding software delays

Funding software delays at the Skills Funding Agency (SFA) sparked fury in the FE sector. A delay in supplying…

FE Week Reporter
FE Week Reporter
News

Shadow Skills Minister quizzes government on apprenticeship drop

Newly appointed Shadow Skills Minister Liam Bryne quizzed his opposite number Matthew Hancock over the drop in 16 to…

FE Week Reporter
FE Week Reporter
News

SFA funding software delay as provider data deadline looms

Providers will have just eight working days to check and correct their 2013/14 academic year data as the Skills…

Nick Linford
Nick Linford

Must read

Colleges, Long read

Colleges on the frontline of a divided nation

As social media algorithms fuel intolerance and binary thinking, college staff increasingly find themselves dealing with the fallout. Jessica…

Jessica Hill
Jessica Hill
Colleges, Long read

Alun Francis, chair of the Social Mobility Commission

Deprived areas need vision – not victimhood – to level up, and Social Mobility Commission chair Alun Francis is…

Jessica Hill
Jessica Hill
Long read, Prison education

The prison that’s offering hope for a new life upon release

‘We’re saving people’s lives as well as turning them around’

Jessica Hill
Jessica Hill
Apprenticeships, Politics

Phillipson to exempt young people from level 7 apprenticeships funding axe

Education secretary makes ‘important concession’ amid backlash from other government departments

Billy Camden
Billy Camden
Colleges, FE Commissioner

Weston chair felt powerless over £2.5m payments to former principal

Ex-Weston college chair gives tell-all interview following FE Commissioner probe

Anviksha Patel
Anviksha Patel
Colleges

Weston College governance failure allowed ‘concealment’ of £2.5m payments to former principal

Paul Phillips was paid £1.8m in 2023, including a ‘significant’ six-figure retention payment which his COO son ‘resisted’ paying…

Anviksha Patel
Anviksha Patel