Author: FE Week Reporter

A struggling sixth form college in Hampshire has announced plans to become part of a national crime prevention charity after being branded as “inadequate” by Ofsted. The governing board at Totton College has this morning announced that from November it will “join with” Nacro, a charity which uses skills and training to reduce crime and […]

Government plans to create 3m apprenticeship starts by 2020 are “largely unfunded,” post-16 policy adviser Professor Lady Alison Wolf claimed today in a hard-hitting report that warns FE could “vanish into history” to foot the bill. The King’s College academic, who penned a 2011 government review of vocational education, said the push for apprenticeship numbers risked […]

The government is making a “dog’s breakfast” of apprenticeships by making providers wait until after next month’s Budget before learning if they’ll get paid for provision already carried out, Shadow Minister for Young People John Woodcock has said. In an exclusive interview with FE Week, he said the block on the Skills Funding Agency (SFA) […]

The government should take some of the “buckets of cash” given to higher education and use it to prop up FE, a leading policy adviser has said. Jonathan Simons (pictured front), head of education at the right-leaning Policy Exchange think-tank, which counts Skills Minister Nick Boles as founder, said the Department for Business, Innovation and […]

Apprenticeship funding could be “more effectively spent” with independent learning providers which can provide evidence of additional demand from employers, the Association of Employment and Learning Providers (AELP) will say today. The AELP will renew calls for a review of apprenticeship reforms and a simpler contracting system as it launches its annual conference in London. […]

The Conservatives have been accused of making an “apparent U-turn” over enforced apprentice recruitment. Department for Business, Innovation and Skills (BIS) plans to make public bodies such as schools, hospitals and prisons take on apprentices were announced on Sunday, June 14. But it comes after Conservative MPs opposed previous Labour proposals for enforced targets on […]

Newly-elected Business, Innovation and Skills (BIS) Select Committee chair Iain Wright has outlined his plans for greater collaboration with education’s fellow newly-elected committee chair Neil Carmichael. Labour MP Mr Wright (pictured above left), who beat former BIS committee chair Adrian Bailey in the MPs’ vote on Wednesday (June 17), said he was “determined to hit […]

An “area-based assessment” is being carried out by FE Commissioner Dr David Collins (pictured) into provision in South London’s Lewisham, Southwark and neighbouring boroughs. Skills Funding Agency (SFA) chief executive Peter Lauener revealed details of the review in a letter to corporation chair of Lewisham Southwark College Christopher Bilsland, sent in April but made public Wednesday […]

New regional scrutiny committees will consider complaints about Ofsted from September as the education watchdog acts to address transparency criticisms. The eight bodies, each made up of an Ofsted official not involved in inspections along with an “external” provider leader put forward by “appropriate national representative bodies”, will rule on internal reviews of complaints about […]