For FE, the first six months of the new government were soured by our almost-immediate deprioritisation. With late confirmation of which qualifications would be defunded, the weak positioning of Skills England and ongoing VAT injustice, the snubs have come thick and fast. Leaving FE staff out of an above-inflation deal for school teachers prompted 11,000 to sign a petition just weeks after the election. Our sector’s influence on government is clearly lacking. So I suggest these five steps to fix FE pay:
1 Know our audience
Sadly, making an issue purely about public-sector pay right now is unlikely to move decision-makers. And, theoretically, colleges can pay what they want. The reason they can’t match schools is because pre-16s are funded on the assumption of 39 weeks of 32.5 supervised hours, while 16- to 19-year-olds are funded for just 33 weeks of 19.5 hours.
Students in school sixth forms benefit from cross-subsidisation from the funding of 11- to 16-year-olds, while the disproportionately economically-disadvantaged learners in FE colleges are short changed twice; first by their secondary schools using their funding to prop up uneconomic sixth forms they don’t get into, then by the government’s inadequate funding of 16- to 19-year-olds’ education.
In my experience, the education teams at the Treasury and at 10 Downing Street are keenly motivated by social justice (far more so than the listless DfE), so swapping out the ‘teacher pay gap’ language for ‘disadvantaged-student funding gap’ will find a more sympathetic ear.
2 Know the detail
Talking about a ‘pay gap’ is simplistic and allows an easy dodge. Most school-teacher contracts are for 1,265 hours a year, reflecting the pre-academisation standard conditions. Some academies have 1,500-hour contracts. FE contracts are often less than 900 hours a year, because of that gap in funded hours.
Crudely raising annual salaries would mean college hourly rates exceeding schools, which isn’t politically realistic. We need more funded hours in the 16- to 19-year-old sector. We’re an international outlier in how meagre they currently are, so let’s appeal to Whitehall’s international competitivity.
3 Make a business case
It’s a cliché that our academic year is structured around an outdated agrarian calendar. It’s more accurate to say it’s structured around the convenience of moneybags awarding organisations. We know the damage that learning loss does, and I haven’t met anyone who doesn’t think post-16 transition needs attention. But for the convenience of awarding organisations we insist that every summer from age 16 onwards is counted in months rather than weeks.
We need to put students first and insist that assessment deadlines and exam dates come in July, not May. The additional teaching hours would support transition, reduce learning loss, and would provide the funding to increase FE pay, with Treasury seeing a tangible return.
4 Remove easy excuses
Imagine the conversations that might be had between ministers and civil servants behind closed doors when the issue of equal pay between FE and schools arises.
“Do they have the same level of qualification?”
“Some.”
“Well can we just give a pay rise to those?”
“That would be a headache.”
“Ah well. We tried.”
I got my Qualified Teacher Status through an on-the-job route. With the availability of such routes and teaching apprenticeships, there’s no reason we can’t aim for FE teaching to become a level six profession and kick away another excuse on pay.
5 Be honest about choices
As a former Education and Skills Funding Agency man, I would confidently match former Academies Minister Lord Agnew and offer a bottle of champagne to any college where I couldn’t find an efficiency. I am also a former college manager and very familiar with the perennial requests for smaller class sizes. Wouldn’t it be refreshing if we could just be honest and say that the cost of smaller class sizes is teacher pay? The cost of inefficient timetabling, for example offering both Functional Skills and GCSE for study-programme resitters, instead of just GCSE, is teacher pay. The cost of excessive representative-body membership fees is teacher pay.
Even with these steps, there’s no quick win. Fundamentally, 16-19 education needs billions invested in significantly more funded hours. But I am confident that these steps would start addressing the real barriers behind closed doors. So let’s rebrand our placards and remind this Labour government that FE serves the working-class students they should be putting first.
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