FE Week Reporter | FE Week

Work with colleges on learners’ ‘technical expertise’, Cable tells Hefce

The body responsible for funding higher education has been instructed by the government to work with FE colleges to improve the “technical expertise” of learners. In its annual grant letter to the Higher Education Funding Council for England (Hefce), which confirms overall funding for universities and FE colleges with higher education provision will rise from […]

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Labour loses vote on apprenticeship two-year minimum duration and level three start

Labour this afternoon lost a House of Commons vote on plans to scrap apprenticeships of less than two years’ duration and below level three. Following a heated opposition day debate in Parliament, a vote on a motion calling for the new standards was defeated 294 votes to 218. The motion, submitted in Labour leader Ed Miliband’s name […]

WorldSkills UK Brazil job for sector funding boss Peter

The boss of the Skills Funding Agency (SFA) and the Education Funding Agency has been handed the enviable task of representing the UK at WorldSkills in Brazil this summer. Peter Lauener, chief executive of both funding agencies, will be taking over the role of official UK delegate to the WorldSkills 2015 competition in Brazil. He replaces former SFA interim chief executive Keith […]

Law change ‘could lead to HE in FE complaints rise’

Student complaints about FE colleges offering degrees could rise with a proposed new law putting them under the universities ombudsman, principals have been warned. Complaints about FE colleges’ higher education courses will be scrutinised by the Office for Independent Adjudication in Higher Education (OIAHE) if the government’s Consumer Rights Bill passes later this year. Currently […]

FE leaders criticise ‘disappointing’ and ‘disgraceful’ decision to deny FE funding ringfence

A decision by the Conservative Party not to pledge the same funding protection for FE as is afforded to schools has been labelled “disappointing” and “disgraceful” by sector leaders. The Prime Minister this morning used a speech at a school in Enfield, North London, to confirm that the ringfence, which has been in place around the education […]

Learner needs top in functional skills revamp

Learner needs for “frequent retakes” need to be taken into account amid Ofqual-recommended improvements to Functional Skills, Federation of Awarding Bodies (FAB) chief executive Stephen Wright (pictured left) has warned. He welcomed the qualification watchdog’s plan to make Functional Skills “more relevant and more reliable” and said “FAB is supportive of the drive to increase […]

Don’t leave it more than two years between inspections

Having been handed a disastrous ‘inadequate’ Ofsted grading nearly six years after the last visit resulted in ‘outstanding’ plaudits [see feweek.co.uk], Barry Lord-Gambles explains why he thinks all providers should be inspected every two years. I have been involved in publicly-funded learning since 1984. I have been through a number of inspections for several companies […]

A sector in freefall? English and maths take their toll

The FE and skills sector is performing worse in Ofsted inspections this academic year than last year, FE Week research has uncovered. The research shows the proportion of general FE and tertiary colleges inspected so far in 2014/15 and graded inadequate or told to improve is up 27 percentage points on last year, […]