FE Week Reporter | FE Week

Employer pilot should have a better structure

The days of a job-for-life are no more and workplace training initiatives need to be suited to today’s more fluid employment trends, says City and Guilds chief executive and director general Chris Jones. I watched with interest last month as the first successful employer bids were announced as part of the Department for Business, Innovation […]

Learners ‘miss out on £630m’ as Skills Funding Agency discover under-delivery

Providers failed to deliver on nearly 17 per cent of the Skills Funding Agency’s £3.8bn allocation for the past academic year, FE Week understands. An industry source said around £630m of agency funding had not been delivered by providers. And changes announced last week mean colleges will keep the cash without having delivered training. The […]

Labour plans for a Tech Bacc welcomed

Further education leaders have backed Ed Miliband’s proposals for a new Technical Baccalaureate. The Association of Employment and Learning Providers (AELP), the Confederation of British Industry (CBI) and education charity The Edge Foundation all welcomed the Labour leader’s plans for a new vocational qualification. Mr Miliband told his party’s annual conference that the qualification would […]

EuroSkills 2012 gets underway in true Olympian style

A glitzy opening ceremony, complete with an Olympics-style countdown clock, welcomed the UK’s 22-strong team to the EuroSkills competition in Belgium. The squad featured among more than 400 competitors, 316 experts and 39 team leaders from 23 European countries at last Wednesday night’s event. They were welcomed to the opening ceremony by members of Skills […]

Jaine Bolton, chief operating officer, National Apprenticeship Service

Growing up in England’s industrial heartland of the Midlands, Jaine Bolton’s childhood dream was a simple one — to become an engineer. But, having left school aged 16 with hopes of winning an apprenticeship, her world came crashing down as one potential employer told her bluntly: “We don’t recruit women.” The rejection, and growing up […]

First notice of concern issued over ‘significant deficit’

A Kent college has become the first provider to get a government warning that could lead to the withdrawal of Skills Funding Agency cash, FE Week can reveal. Financial worries were said to be behind an agency official notice of concern, issued to K College in August. The college was allocated £11.7m for the 2012/13 […]

FE comparison website leaves users ‘confused’

An independent review has branded the government’s £30m FE Choices website “bland” and “ambiguous”. The site, which compares the performance of providers, was criticised by unions in June when it was discovered that only 6,230 people had looked at it since its launch six months earlier. The Taxpayer’s Alliance said the site was “pointless”. The […]

Next Step fails to hit the mark in London

A survey on a countrywide government careers advice service uncovered varying levels of satisfaction and methods of delivery. The Department for Business, Innovation and Skills (BIS) ordered the study into the Next Step service — the National Careers Service since April — to see how it was performing on telephone advice. It also looked at […]

Empowering learners through new legislation

The Education Act 2011 has been widely heralded as a positive move for the FE sector, providing colleges with significant new freedoms to develop and deliver more learner-focused services. But, like any new legislation, the Act has brought with it a range of new challenges. Elizabeth Delaney, associate at business law firm DWF, looks at […]