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K College rescuer East Kent College in merger talks with neighbour

A college that leapt to the rescue during one of the most disastrous mergers of recent years now plans to join forces with its neighbour.

East Kent College, which took on two of K College’s campuses following the latter’s meltdown in 2014, has announced plans “in principle” to join forces with Canterbury College (pictured above), having combined their leadership teams on August 1.

This is the latest merger to be announced after Sir David Collins, the outgoing FE commissioner, told MPs on the education select committee last month that there were 88 colleges engaged in merger discussions, following the first three waves of the area reviews of post-16 education and training.

Both East Kent and Canterbury are involved in the Kent review, which is due to start December 8.

No date has yet been set for when the merger will go ahead, although both said in a statement it was “unlikely” to be before next summer.

Beverley Aitken, East Kent’s chair, said: “We have seen a wide range of benefits since forming the partnership with Canterbury College, and our governors were minded to recommend we examine a full merger.”

Colin Carmichael, Canterbury’s chair, said that the college had already seen “significant efficiencies” through the shared leadership team.

“At this stage, it feels like the time is right to move forward with our planning, and look to bring the two together,” he added.

K College, which was formed through a merger between South Kent College and West Kent College in 2010, fell apart in 2014 after racking up huge debts.

It split into two, with East Kent taking over campuses in Dover and Folkestone.

East Kent, which has around 6,000 learners, was rated ‘good’ during its latest Ofsted inspection in March 2013, while Canterbury, which has around 9,000 learners, was given a ‘requires improvement’ grade following its last inspection in May 2015.

In a separate move, four colleges in Devon have come together to form the Devon Colleges Group – but they’re not merging.

The link-up between Petroc, Exeter College, City College Plymouth and South Devon College will see them working in collaboration rather than merging.

In a joint statement, the four said the group was a “partnership with a shared vision focussed on enhancing skills, raising aspirations and driving regional economic growth and productivity”.

All four were rated either ‘outstanding’ or ‘good’ at their most recent Ofsted inspections.

John Laramy, Exeter’s principal, said he welcomed the opportunity to “work together in collaboration with our neighbouring colleges”.

City College Plymouth’s principal Phil Davies said the college was “fully committed to the collective and strong collaborative working that the Devon Colleges Group will provide”.

Diane Dimond, principal at Petroc, said “effective collaboration is key to delivering the skills our regional economy needs, both now and for the future”.

Stephen Criddle, South Devon College’s principal, added the group would “provide a coordinated approach and greater focus on identifying good-practice areas of strength and specialism”.

The announcement came ahead of the Somerset, Devon, Cornwall and Isles of Scilly area review, in which all four colleges are involved and which held its first steering group meeting on November 9.

Last month the College of Haringey, Enfield and North East London pulled out of a planned three-way merger with Barnet and Southgate College and Waltham Forest College, citing different approaches to governance and management as a sticking point.

Meanwhile, the remaining two colleges announced that they would soon be consulting on proposals for a two-way merger, with a planned merge date of August 1, 2017.

Consultation on a proposed link-up between City College Brighton and Hove and Northbrook College Sussex also opened last month.

Mining apprenticeship standards delay leaves ‘recruitment time bomb’

The mining and processing sector has been left without the means to deliver apprenticeships even though it faces a “recruitment time bomb”, sector representatives told FE Week.

A trailblazer group has been working on new apprenticeship standards for over two years, but faced repeated rejections from the government – including having one plan turned down seven times.

The old framework for the industry, meanwhile, which is commonly referred to as ‘extractives and mineral processing’, has been inoperative since 2014. And with less than five months before the apprenticeship levy kicks in, employers are concerned.

Karen Wright, learning and development manager at British-based international building materials company Hanson, is chair of the Mineral Products Qualifications Council and the trailblazer group that has worked to get new apprenticeship standards passed.

She said employers initially saw the levy as “a big opportunity” to “attract new blood into the industry” with an aging workforce.

Employers initially saw the levy as a big opportunity to attract new blood into the industry

Her team has been working for “at least two years” on a range of new apprenticeship standards, and now has five in development.

However, she added: “We have had hurdles at every single stage.”

None of the new standards have been approved for delivery yet, and Ms Wright said “constant changing of requirements” had been a barrier.

“The government hasn’t made this easy at all,” she said, explaining that when their first standard was submitted for approval it was “returned seven times”.

“Even rewriting it in the exact wording we had been given by the Department for Business, Innovation and Skills, it was rejected.”

Anthony Elgey, general manager at standard setting organisation MP-Futures, warned employers faced a “recruitment time bomb”, adding just 14 per cent of the workforce was aged below 35.

Mr Elgey explained that while the trailblazers had been fighting to get standards approved, employers had “no useable framework to offer”. An application had been made by employers to update the ‘Extractives and Mineral Processing Occupations’ framework, but this was rejected.

Then in January this year, Mr Elgey said he was informed by issuing authority Proskills that the framework would be taken down altogether by April or August.

This was delayed until December, but, he said, the extension was irrelevant because only three of the 33 qualifications embedded in the framework are still operational.

The DfE declined to explain why there had been so many problems with the new standards, or the old framework had not been renewed in the meantime.

A spokesperson said:“We are working constructively with the mineral processing industry – and currently developing five apprenticeship standards with them – to ensure they have high quality apprenticeships in place.”

Government is overseeing the managed decline of further education

Rather than creating a regime that makes it easier for colleges to become insolvent, government should be investing more in further education, says Angela Rayner.

More than four million people in Britain are learning in the further education sector every year.

The sector plays a crucial role in supporting our young people. Those who are seeking qualifications to move on to university. Those learners who, later in life, are retraining and gaining new skills to get better jobs.

Also, as I know from my own personal experience, it’s helping those people who didn’t get what they needed from the education system the first time around to go further in life.

Going into further education after leaving school at 16 was life-changing for me. It enabled me to gain new skills and qualifications so that I could get work and start to fend for myself and my baby son.

Going into further education after leaving school at 16 was life-changing for me

Most of all, perhaps, further education helped me to understand that I was far more suited to a vocational approach than an academic one.

The vocational skills I gained are invaluable to me even more today when I try to help my constituents as a member of parliament.

That’s why I am passionate about further education and the route it can offer for people from every walk of life to go further and reach their full potential.

So I was hugely disappointed when the government missed a great opportunity to get behind the sector when it recently announced, to as little fanfare as seems possible, a new Technical and Further Education Bill.

Because it is clear to anyone who has read the bill that this Conservative government has no plans to develop a system of technical and further education fit for the 21st century.

Over 20 clauses in the government’s bill are committed to developing an insolvency regime for further education providers. Only under a government that has continually starved the further education sector of the investment it needs would this be necessary.

Last year, a report by the National Audit Office said that the FE college sector was in deficit for the first time in 2013/14; 110 colleges had an operating deficit, more than double the number from 2010/11.

In the same period, the number of colleges assessed by the Skills Funding Agency to have ‘inadequate’ financial health rose from five per cent to 12 per cent. All of this from the party of so-called fiscal responsibility!

Education is the best investment we can make in Britain

Everyone who works in the further education sector will have witnessed the dangerous levels of deficit denial coming from the Tories.

Anyone truly committed to an education system that works for everyone could see the dire warnings in that report and take immediate action to invest in our colleges.

Education is the best investment we can make in Britain, to support young people at every stage of their lives to get the skills which they need to live well and to contribute to Britain’s economic prosperity.

So when I see a government that, looking at the millions of people who rely on the FE sector and how it can change lives, decides that the priority is not investment but to create a regime that makes it easier for colleges to become insolvent, I see a government that is failing in its duty.

As shadow secretary of state for education, I have been urging the government to invest in our young people, to help them get the skills they need to go further. It’s an investment that we know will pay off down the line.

That’s why Labour has pledged to bring back the Education Maintenance Allowance, which would support hundreds of thousands of young people from low- and middle-income backgrounds.

I want to make it clear that Labour will never accept second best for our young people. Everyone deserves the opportunity to succeed. And instead of turning their backs on a generation, government has a moral, economic and social duty to help make their dreams come true.

This is a government that, instead of investing to build a better future for all, has instead chosen the path of managed decline.

And I for one, will not rest until we see every young person go further.

Angela Rayner is shadow secretary of state for education

Institute for Apprenticeships questions dodged, says Gordon Marsden

The government’s handling of the new Institute for Apprenticeships has been “shambolic” according to shadow skills minister Gordon Marsden, after it evaded a series of parliamentary enquiries about its capacity.

He says that questions he asked about staffing, resources and appointments in a letter posted on November 1 were dodged.

His queries were prompted by the government’s plans to expand the remit of the Institute, which is set to launch next April, to cover technical education as well as apprenticeships, which were first set out in the Technical and Further Education Bill announced October 27.

But despite the tight timeframe and its new responsibility, he was told only that the “detailed structure” of the IfA was still in development and that the government was “therefore not yet able to set out initial staff numbers”.

It is now “absolutely pressing” that the plans are finalised, Mr Marsden (pictured) told FE Week.

Peter Lauener cannot be expected to be carrying this job until the middle of next year, as if it was another bauble on his Christmas tree

“The questions I put down were based on a very real concern about the fairly shambolic history of the government’s handling of the IfA – and as important, what they’re going to do about it imminently,” he said.

He also urged the government to speed up the recruitment process for a permanent IfA boss.

“Peter Lauener, for all his skills and experience as a senior civil servant, cannot be expected to be carrying this job until the middle of next year, as if it was another bauble on his Christmas tree,” he said.

Mr Lauener, who is also the boss of the Skills Funding Agency and the Education Funding Agency, was named in September as shadow chief executive for two days a week.

So far, only shadow appointments have been made for senior IfA posts, and official information about its scope and capacity is not widely available.

At a recent select committee grilling, the apprenticeships and skills minister Robert Halfon and Department for Education mandarin David Hill were asked whether the role should be full time “given the importance of making sure the institute is up to speed as quickly as possible”.

Mr Halfon assured MPs that the chief executive, chair and board would in post by next April, while Mr Hill said recruitment was underway for many of the key roles, with the board expected to be in place before Christmas.

The latest questions about capacity at the IfA come after former skills minister Nick Boles told senior FE figures at a Policy Exchange event in January that he had “no idea — or if I had an idea I’m not going to share it” about how big the IfA should be.

FE Week later discovered in May that the apprenticeship body was only planning to have 40 members of staff until 2019/20.

A leaked document called ‘BIS2020 — Finance and Headcount outline’, seen by FE Week, indicated that the IfA would take on 40 employees in 2016/17 — and the number would not increase over the next three years.

And a job advert for the permanent chair, posted by the Cabinet Office in early October, said the institute would have an estimated annual budget of £8 million until 2020.

The role itself would be part-time for two days a week, and would pay £56,000 a year.

The government advertised for eight board members during the summer, with a salary of up to £15,000 available for each position.

The Skills Show is back and it’s bigger than ever

Strictly Come Dancing stars and the apprenticeships minister will be among more than 90,000 people heading to NEC Birmingham for the fifth annual Skills Show next week.

Visitors will be taking part in over 50 hands-on activities, taking careers advice, and watching the country’s most talented apprentices and learners compete in finals of the national skills competitions, from November 17 to 19.

Employers including Jaguar Land Rover, NHS Careers, IBM and the BBC will be there throughout offering careers advice.

The BBC stand will feature professional dancers from this year’s Strictly Come Dancing, who will talk to young visitors about how they made it to the big time, and will perform on the main stage before lunchtime on Thursday.

skills-show-strictly — Strictly Come Dancing professionals at launch of 2016 show

This year’s Skills Show will also for the first time offer “accelerated learning” – a continuing professional development offer for colleges to learn how competition activities can be used in their curriculum.

Neil Bentley, chief executive of WorldSkills UK – the organisation that runs the Skills Show – explained: “There will be three 45-minute taster sessions available throughout the show to demonstrate how competition activity can be used both to increase or improve teaching practice and to raise standards through teaching and learning.”

Visitors can also take advantage of the show’s new “sign-up Saturday”, where people can sign up to college courses, training, apprenticeships and even apply for live job vacancies.

Also new to 2016 will be the Skills Show “pre-show”. Young people have been encouraged to take part in a Careers Cloud before attending the show – a test where visitors answer questions and it comes up with their “perfect career choice”.

Mr Bentley said: “It is all about getting visitors prepared and thinking about what specific events they want to take part in and see during their time at the Skills Show.”

The finals of the national skills competitions will as ever be at the heart of the show.

Daryl Head competing in automotive engineering at the 2015 show

They will run across the three days and will involve 530 apprentices and learners taking part in 61 different skill areas ranging from floristry to forensic science.

Each category will have its own hub, with have-a-gos, spotlight stages, featured exhibitors and careers advice.

Top-scoring competitors will be recognised during a glitzy awards ceremony on the Saturday evening, hoping their efforts get them talent-spotted as a potential competitor at WorldSkills 2019 in Kazan, Russia.

With an estimated 90,000 visitors expected over the three days, competitors will “certainly feel the pressure”

With an estimated 90,000 visitors expected over the three days, Mr Bentley said the competitors will “certainly feel the pressure”.

“The audience size is part of the learning from the competition cycle,” Mr Bentley told FE Week. “It is not just about being technically excellent, it is about being able to work under pressure, being able to work in a team, in a specific environment where you are observed.

“Those are the key employability skills that will stand any competitor in great stead with any employer.”

There are also five inclusive skill competitions for students with physical and learning difficulties.

These will include a total of 33 competitors taking part in carpentry, catering, ICT, health and social care, and media competitions on the Saturday.

Robert Halfon will also attend the show for the first time on Thusday, as part of his new role as the UK’s apprenticeships and skills minister.

He might be tempted to have a go at one of the more than 50 hands-on activities available to try, including furniture design, electric installation, car bodywork, nail art,and media make-up among others.

With the NEC Birmingham scaled to the size of 10 football pitches, Mr Bentley recommends visitors “bring some comfortable shoes”.

Bolton college principal appeals to SFA over new apprenticeship rules

A desperate principal has pleaded with the Skills Funding Agency to relax rules that would prevent Bolton College from recruiting new apprentices from May next year.

On October 25 the SFA launched an application process for the new register of apprenticeship training providers, but those with the lowest Ofsted rating for the apprenticeships are barred from applying.

Ofsted rated the college as grade three overall, but declared it ‘inadequate’ (grade four) for its apprenticeships in March last year.

Bolton College’s principal Marie Gilluley (pictured) has now sent a six-page letter setting out her case to Kirsty Evans, deputy director of funding and policy for the Skills Funding Agency.

FE Week understands that the agency has subsequently engaged in “positive dialogue” with Bolton College – although neither body officially confirmed this – relating to her request to be allowed to carry on running the training.

Ms Gilluley warned in her letter that “the use of the Ofsted grade alone, rather than more recent available data as an indicator of quality” of providers allowed to run the training will have “serious consequences” preventing Bolton from running apprenticeships.

The use of the Ofsted grade alone as an indicator of quality of providers allowed to run the training will have “serious consequences”

“In our case the historic grade does not reflect the considerable improvement which has recently taken place,” she claimed.

“For some providers, there may be the opposite effect. For new providers there will be no Oftsed grade.”

This approach was “unfair and inconsistent”, she added, with other measures “encouraged by SFA to be used by providers, such as success rates, and employer and learner satisfaction scores, all of which show us to be performing very highly”.

She elaborated, explaining: “Our most recent data shows the college three per cent above the national average for overall outcomes and seven per cent above for timely outcomes.”

The government wants the new register to work alongside the existing register of training organisations.

Its rules state that providers are ineligible if they were rated ‘inadequate’ for apprenticeships within the last three years.

They can still apply if they were ranked ‘inadequate’ overall, but grade (‘requires improvement’) three or better for apprenticeships.

Ms Gilluley said: “The three-year window that has been specified can result in provision from as far back as 2013/14 being used to form the judgement – this is the case for Bolton.”

This year Bolton College has been allocated just under £2 million for apprenticeship provision.

“Between 2014/15 and 2015/16 academic years, we have increased our apprenticeship starts by 40 per cent and had an in-year request of over £100,000 granted for our 16-to-18 learners,” she said.

She pointed out that the college is due for an Ofsted reinspection, which it understands could happen within the next four months, and expects a better apprenticeships grade.

“We are confident that all the improvement points in the previous inspection have been addressed,” she added.

“Our outcomes for learners on both apprenticeships and class-based provision have increased significantly.”

An SFA spokesperson told FE Week that “we do not comment on individual cases”, adding: “The SFA will be responding directly to Bolton College in due course.”

We have a once-in-a generation chance to reform FE

Reforms will inevitably cause upheaval, but the problems with our current system are too pressing to ignore, says Lord Sainsbury.

No area of public life has suffered so much from poor government policy-making, constant change and under-funding as technical education.

The first report which said that our technical education was not as good as that of Germany was in 1870 and since that time, there have been endless attempts to improve it.

Having started my business career in the personnel department of the family firm, I have followed this unhappy saga over the last 50 years, starting with industrial training boards. To illustrate the rate of ill-thought-out change, in the last 35 years alone, there have been 28 major acts of parliament relating to vocational education and skills training.

If one looks at other countries, it quickly becomes clear that if we are going to have good technical education provision, we need three things: a national system of qualifications that is well understood and works in the marketplace; an effective system of funding students while they are learning; and finally, well-funded facilities and teachers to provide the education and training.

So how do we make this happen? I am not going to go through all the recommendations of the independent panel report on technical education. I encourage you to read it if you have not already done so. But I will describe a few key points.

We recommend that a new set of 15 technical education routes should be introduced. For 16-18 year olds studying full-time, each route will typically begin with a two-year study programme. Each programme will start with a common core of knowledge and skills, after which individuals will specialise towards an occupation or cluster of aligned occupations.

So, for example, in the ‘construction’ route, after a common core, an individual might choose to specialise as an electrician or a carpenter.

Technical education is not a catch-all term for everything that isn’t GCSEs, A-levels and degrees

For each of these specialisations there will be just one publicly-funded ‘tech level’ qualification available. The content of these tech levels will cover the knowledge and skills that industry experts have identified as being essential for the relevant occupations.

The clear organising framework we are proposing will cover all occupations where there is a substantial requirement for technical knowledge and practical skills. Technical education is not a catch-all term for everything that isn’t GCSEs, A-levels and degrees. So, falling outside of technical education are many skilled occupations, such as retail assistant, which do not require a significant amount of technical knowledge.

This is not for one moment to suggest that these jobs are not important in the labour market – they offer large numbers of demanding jobs – simply that to perform well in these occupations does not require a substantial technical training. Instead, shorter, job-specific training while in employment is more appropriate.

By focusing technical education in this way, there will inevitably be some young people who are not ready to access either the 15 routes or the academic option at the age of 16.

Those with low prior attainment, including some with special educational needs and/or disabilities, will need additional support. This group of young people should be offered an additional, fully-funded ‘transition year’ to help them prepare for further study or employment, and this transition year should be flexible and tailored to a student’s prior attainment and aspirations.

Any reforms to the technical education system, especially those as significant as the ones we are proposing, will inevitably cause upheaval for colleges. Some people will say that the last thing the sector needs is more reform, and I do understand this view. But the problems with our current system are simply too pressing for us not to act. I know it is all too easy for me to say that this is about ‘opportunities’ rather than ‘challenges’, but I genuinely think these reforms present a once-in-a-generation opportunity for the FE sector.

Further education is the only sector with the expertise to deliver world-class technical education and there is no more vital area of public endeavour. This country faces huge challenges to meet the skills needs of a modern advanced industrial economy, and it is only a strong, appropriately-resourced FE sector that can deliver the technical education we desperately need.

Lord Sainsbury is chair of the independent panel on improving technical education

New destination data for unemployed learners

The colleges that are most successful at helping unemployed learners move into work have been named, in the latest learner destination data.

The new experimental data on outcome based success measures for adult FE learners from 2012 to 2014, published by the Department for Education, details the proportion of sector learners that have moved onto further learning or employment.

The report, covering outcomes for learners across 221 private training providers and 218 FE colleges, comes ahead of the planned introduction of minimum standards based on outcome measures from 2017.

A key measure, for example, looks specifically at the outcomes for learners who were on unemployment benefits before starting their studies.

The most successful college by this measure was Selby College, with 71 per cent of unemployed learners finding sustained employment following their courses.

Liz Ridley, Selby College’s vice principal, said she was “delighted” by the college’s learner destination data results.

Liz Ridley, Selby College vice principal

She said the college had developed a “tripartite approach” which involved working closely with Jobcentre Plus and local employers, and training learners to “undertake specific roles or work with specific companies”, as well as tailoring courses to meet learner and employer needs.

At the other end of the table, South and City College Birmingham was the least successful at enabling its previously unemployed learners to find work – with just 34 per cent moving onto sustained employment.

Mike Hopkins, South and City College’s principal, told FE Week that the college had “one of the highest levels of disadvantage of any college in the country, and a very significant level of our completions are either in ESOL or entry or level one provision, especially for students with learning difficulties and disabilities.”

He added: “These adult students progress into other higher level training and take considerably longer to gain employment hence the apparent low employment rate.”

Across all providers, independent training providers had a slight edge over colleges at getting their unemployed learners into sustained employment.

In total, 48 per cent of the 170,740 out-of-work learners at training providers found work – compared with 46 cent of the 276,490 unemployed learners who studied at colleges.

This new report is the second set of experimental data on outcomes for FE learners to have been published.

The first, released in September 2015, covered outcomes for adult FE learners from 2010 to 2013.

At the same time, the government ran a consultation, which closed December 2015, on introducing outcome-based success measures for providers based on learners’ destination data.

The intention was that these new performance measures would have “bite” and would “provoke transformational improvement”, according to the consultation document.

The latest report is “intended as a step towards understanding the long term trends of learners into all types of employment and moves towards routine publication of outcome-based success measures designed to help inform learners, employers, providers and anyone with an interest in the further education sector”.

For the first time, the statistics include self-assessment employment returns, alongside PAYE data for 2013/14 – meaning that it is the most complete set of outcome measures so far.

In its response to the 2015 consultation, the government said it would start to use the measures “for accountability purposes” from autumn 2017 “with a period of shadow running from autumn 2016”.

Gazelle’s underpants partner hits the skids

The company that the Gazelle Colleges Group employed to run a competition to help teach young people entrepreneurial skills has been dissolved.

Pants to Poverty, a fair trade underwear brand, ran the contest, initially named the ‘Pantrepreneur Challenge’ and then the ‘PantrepreneurSHIP Challenge’, in partnership with Gazelle.

The challenge encouraged college students across the country to work on business projects that involved designing, marketing and selling custom-made underwear between 2012 and 2015.

In its first year, the challenge involved 15 colleges, and over 250 students designed Olympics-themed pants.

It is claimed that more than 100,000 students engaged with the competition over the three years it ran, but according to Companies House, Pants to Poverty was dissolved on October 11 this year.

Pants to Poverty Ltd was launched in the Make Poverty History youth movement in 2005

Pants to Poverty Ltd was launched in the Make Poverty History youth movement in 2005, as an ethical fashion company selling underwear made of Fair Trade cotton.

It claimed to support 5,000 farmers in India, and students that won the company’s entrepreneurial challenge were given the opportunity to visit the country to live and work with the farmers and factory workers who made the underwear they had sold.

FE Week called the phone number on the Pants to Poverty website to ask about its closure, but found it was no longer in use, while messages to Pants to Poverty founder Ben

Ramsden via LinkedIn had received no response at the time of going to press.

However, in describing the ‘Pantrepreneur Challenge’ on his LinkedIn page, Mr Ramsden wrote: “With crushing government cuts in the FE sector, the programme was put on hold after three fabulous years.”

There are also questions surrounding the current membership of the Gazelle College Group.

Of the 11 members currently listed on its website, only five would confirm that they are still members and have no intention of ending their membership.

Two colleges said they have left the group, one is in the process of leaving, one refused to say either way – and the final two didn’t respond.