FE Week Reporter | FE Week

Please, don’t get me started on Colleges Week. Oh, go on then

I hate Colleges Week. Colleges hate Colleges Week. Journalists hate Colleges Week. Colleges Week (26 September to 2 October) interrupts the genuinely good stuff that colleges do. It’s a constipated, false celebration, where some group of individuals as well as the AoC and 157 Group and goodness knows who else decides to tell colleges what […]

FE Week visits entrepreneurial City College Norwich

FE Week could not travel to the east of England without visiting City College Norwich (CCN), and taking a look at the their innovative work around enterprise and entrepreneurship. The Principal, Dick Palmer, has an innovative approach when it comes to teaching and learning, and recent developments at the college look set to transform students’ […]

Lambeth College use partnerships to crack the employability challenge

As young people struggle to enter the labour market, colleges and other providers are doing all they can to help their students become more employable. But what if the employers won’t play ball? Furious debate continues around what triggered the summer riots and how to prevent further unrest – too often generating more heat than […]

Managing the college reputation

The one major problem with burying your head in the sand … it raises your backside in the air. This provides a perfect target for people to start kicking it – and you don’t get to see them coming. PR is always going to be a balancing act between selling your successes and dealing with […]

August riots ~ more fall out for further education colleges?

As half of the 1,700 people arrested after the August riots were under 21, colleges may find that some of their students or applicants were involved. Can colleges take action regarding misconduct occurring outside their premises? Should they do so? Can you take action? Colleges can “police their own gates” and take action under their […]

DfE denies FoI from AoC

The Department for Education (DfE) has declined a Freedom of Information request submitted by the Association of Colleges (AoC). The AoC asked to see the list of applications to set up free schools for 16-19 year-olds next September, but the DfE has refused to disclose details.

Let’s talk about sex

Young people are full of contradictions. Confident, yet uncertain. Outgoing, but easily embarrassed . Streetwise, yet naïve. Talk to them about S E X and all their contradictions all roll into one. At a time when UK teenage pregnancy rates are the highest in Europe – in England alone 90,000 girls and young women under […]

Not a happy holiday

Employees at Darlington College are being asked to take eight days of unpaid leave in a bid to save money. As reported in The Northern Echo, the college has published a consultation that would force over 500 workers to take holiday without pay. The proposal is in reaction to a contract which the college lost […]

Dan Taubman, senior national education official, University and Colleges Union

The best career decision Dan Taubman ever made, was “not becoming a principal.” When the Inner London Education Authority (ILEA) was abolished, where he had worked in adult education for more than 15 years, going into college management seemed like a natural progression. But he was “lucky,” landing the job of union official for further […]