Nick Linford | FE Week

Government announces vocational measure

Plans for a new Tech Bacc were announced by the government today. It will be introduced for courses beginning in September 2014 and be reported for the first time in the college and school sixth-form performance tables in January 2017. The Tech Bacc will be a performance measure marking achievement by young people aged 16 […]

Traineeships are ‘go’

Skills Minister chooses Manchester meeting to ‘launch’ programme The 11-month wait for an outline of the government’s plans for traineeships appears to be almost over, just as youth unemployment figures nudge the one million mark. Skills Minister Matthew Hancock is due to speak this week at an event hosted by the Greater Manchester Chamber of […]

FE Guild go-ahead

Government funds of £18.8m a year to get a new FE body off the ground have been welcomed, although the total is around £10m less than what was asked for. The Department for Business, Innovation and Skills (BIS) confirmed funding, excluding VAT, of £18.8m for August to April next year, and the same figure again […]

Apprentice wage cheats crackdown

Business Secretary Vince Cable has promised “tough new measures” to tackle employers who pay apprentices below the legal minimum, up 3p to £2.68 an hour from October. Dr Cable’s announcement came after a Low Pay Commission report indicated 27 per cent of all apprentices, and more than 40 per cent of apprentices aged 16 and […]

Agency backtracks on awards cull

Plans to stop government funding for qualifications aimed at helping the unemployed have been shelved. The Skills Funding Agency had said it would stop paying for around 1,600 ‘awards’, prompting criticism that struggling learners could be among the hardest hit. Graham Hasting-Evans, managing director of the National Open College Network (NOCN) awarding body, told FE […]

FE commissioner’s powers need ‘consideration’

Further education leaders have told of concerns about the proposed FE Commissioner’s two-week timescale for deciding the fate of struggling colleges. The Association of Colleges (AoC) and the University and College Union (UCU) have both said that the government’s plans for a powerful FE Commissioner needed further consideration. Skills Minister Matthew Hancock announced the plans […]

The statistics tell the story

The government wants an FE commissioner to step in when a college is deemed to be failing. Most colleges improve by themselves . . . so what role would he or she have, asks Joy Mercer In its ‘Rigour and Responsiveness’ paper, the government suggests a new tough line on college failure, proposing the appointment […]

Plea for equality on sixth-forms

The head of the Association of Colleges (AoC) has called on Education Secretary Michael Gove to ensure schools opening a new sixth form have good or outstanding Ofsted grades. Martin Doel, the association’s chief executive, wrote to Mr Gove saying that as colleges needed either of Ofsted’s two top gradings to take on 14 to […]

Let’s have balance at the top, says FE

The lack of female politicians responsible for FE has been criticised following a mini-reshuffle. The departure of Karen Buck, junior Shadow Minister for education, will leave no women in senior posts affecting the FE sector in either the Government or Opposition. Ms Buck, who spoke at the Assocation of Colleges annual conference in November, is becoming […]