FE Week Reporter | FE Week

Edition 125: Lindsey Noble, Gary Chin, Carole Kitching, Ioan Morgan, Jo Lomax and Frances Wadsworth

Having taken on the challenge of a round-the-world sailing event, Lindsey Noble has dropped anchor for the challenge of turning around the fortunes of Greenwich Community College. Ms Noble, who left City College Southampton in August 2013 after 12 years as principal to take part in the Clipper Yacht Race, has been taken on at […]

Digital skills duo told to drop Code College title

The founders of the new National College for Digital Skills have dropped plans to be called Code College after a small business with the same name launched legal action. Company records show that Tom Fogden and Mark Smith, who last December received Prime Minister David Cameron’s backing for their new college, had incorporated their new […]

Robin Hood meets Babes in the Wood in panto crossover

Performing arts learners from East Durham College got all mixed up with their annual pantomime. Foundation degree students organised the cross of classic tales Robin Hood and the Babes in the Wood and performed seven shows over three days from Wednesday, January 21. Cast member Craig Nunn, aged 19, from Sunderland, said: “We worked really […]

Jessica slides back into college life with winter Olympics festival

Fourteen years of alpine skiing hard work have paid off for a Northamptonshire college sports science student with a call-up to Team GB for the European Youth Winter Olympic Festival (EYOF), writes Billy Camden. While most 16-year-olds were settling back into the routine of college, 2015 started with the announcement of a lifetime for Jessica […]

Jonathan goes from elephant study to Derby dogs course

A former Chester Zoo worker who has also travelled to Sri Lanka to study elephants is behind a new course for dogs and their owners at Derby College. The four-week course, launching on February 16, is run by animal behaviour specialist Jonathan Taylor. Jonathan has worked at Chester Zoo and in Sri Lanka looking at […]

Marina Gaze, deputy director for FE and skills, Ofsted

One of the most frequent complaints levelled at Ofsted is that it lacks transparency. For example the system for dealing with complaints against inspection results, it has been claimed, is not open to scrutiny. However Marina Gaze, deputy director for FE and skills at the education watchdog, sees things differently. “I’m really sorry people think […]

Edition 125

The principal of a large and well-established FE college writes about life at the top — the worries, the hopes, the people and the issues they have to deal with every day. Congratulations to colleagues up and down the land who received well-deserved recognition in the New Year Honours list. One person in particular that […]

Build around a traineeship and apprenticeship ‘core’ for young people

Stewart Segal considers the 16 to 18 education and training landscape in light of the Public Accounts Committee (PAC) participation inquiry. The PAC was right to identify in its latest report that more needs to be done to support young people aged between 16 and 18. There have been some positive developments in recent years […]

Putting the college key to success under the MAT

Kevin Hamblin outlines the journey his Ofsted grade two-rated college made in order to take over sponsorship of a nearby academy. South Gloucestershire and Stroud College (SGS College) has announced that we will sponsor an under-performing secondary school though our newly-formed SGS Academy Trust. If anyone had asked me four months ago if we would […]