An Association of Teachers and Lecturers survey last week showed how many FE professionals felt unprepared for their new duties to help prevent learners become attracted to terrorism. Selina Stewart explains the help at hand from the ETF.

The new FE Prevent Duty guidance document became statutory on September 21, so the duty is now law.

All FE providers — college, private or adult education — now have a clear legal obligation to prevent extremism in their organisations and to protect their students from exploitation by extremists. The Prevent Duty applies to all providers and to all areas, not just the big cities.

Colleges, independent learning providers (ILPs) and adult and community learning (ACL) providers will all be aware of the high profile of the Prevent Duty. This may be because in the North East of England Liam Lyburd was recently convicted of planning mass murder at his local college or because families and young men and women are travelling abroad to join extremist  organisations.

The ETF recognises what a challenge the duty is for providers. To comply with it, one requirement is that board members, staff and volunteers are Prevent Duty-trained. The ETF has developed a suite of four free online training modules, tailored to the needs of leaders and managers, practitioners, support staff and governors or board members. These present the Prevent Duty in various FE contexts with case studies. They cover different groups of staff including facilities staff, librarians and practitioners.

The Prevent Duty applies to all providers and to all areas,not just the big cities

The materials are flexible, accessible, and derived from work with the sector. They deal with the broad scope of the Prevent Duty, including who needs to comply, policies and procedures. The modules provide an insight into how to implement British values into practice and how to exemplify British values which include compliance with the Equality Act 2010. They give examples of how British values can be integrated into curriculum areas and what is expected in terms of staff, governor, board member and volunteer behaviour.

It is often difficult to get staff, governors or board members together for training sessions, which is why the training is provided free and online.

Staff, governors and board members can use the materials wherever they have access to the internet and at a time which is appropriate for them. This gives a flexibility which many providers appreciate.

The feedback on the modules has been very positive. Angie O’Neil, head of Wirral adult education service, said it was a “great resource – really straightforward, informative and easy to navigate”.

“The modules and the resources available are really helpful for all staff to understand what is meant by Prevent and how this understanding can be applied and integrated into wider service practice – in particular teaching, learning and assessment,” she told us.

The ETF is aware that it is very time-consuming for colleges, ILPs and ACL providers to collect the certificates for everyone who has completed the modules. Therefore in addition we offer a paid-for service, the Provider Access System (PAS), which allows provider to upload the details of all those who need to take the modules and to monitor their progress.

The cost of the licences varies between £250 and £850 depending on the number of licences organisations need to buy. If you are interested in finding out more about the provider access system then go to
www.preventforfeandtraining.org.uk.

We are confident that free online training modules and the PAS will make it much easier for colleges, ILPs and ACL providers to Prevent Duty train their staff, volunteers and governors or board members.

We plan to continue to develop Prevent Duty support for the sector in the form of face to face training sessions for Safeguarding officers and a consultancy offer to provider face to face support for providers.

Further education’s struggle for survival may not be quite on a par with Tom Cruise battling the Syndicate — that network of dastardly operatives out to establish a new world order following the demise of the IMF.

Nevertheless, it looks increasingly like a Mission Impossible to many people in the sector. Well, they do seem to be bearing the brunt of austerity after the near collapse of the  world’s banks. And the network of — maybe not quite as sinister — ministers and civil servants certainly wants to see a radically different world order for colleges and other providers.

“Mission impossible” sums up the views of teachers, managers, leaders, directors and governors interviewed in-depth six months on from the Policy Consortium/FE Week annual survey. This representative group of 32 from the 700-plus original respondents was asked whether they were more optimistic than around Easter time and prior to the General Election. Had minsters set out a fair and effective reform programme and what impact was envisaged?

The results published this week are disheartening. As one might expect, cash concerns and low staff morale feature prominently — this is austerity after all and it is symptomatic of the wider public sector. That said, there is equally a remarkable sense of determination to make reforms succeed provided they have the wherewithal, freedom from central constraints and flexibility to respond to local and national need rapidly. And there’s the rub.

What emerges from interviews at every level is concern over inconsistency, the rise in bureaucracy despite repeated ministerial pledges to the contrary and a restrictive target-driven culture focusing almost exclusively on an ill-defined notion of apprenticeships. Such initiatives are being developed piecemeal, on the hoof (and in some cases cutting across each other). There is irritation over the way the latest consultation document specifically equates commitment to training with involvement in apprenticeships, even though this is patently inappropriate for many learners.

There is incoherence and contradiction from government around pressing issues such as the wind down of adult education and the end of mandated English for Speakers of Other Languages (Esol), negating wider social cohesion policy. A lack of consultation over apprenticeships means employers, especially small to medium-sized enterprises, will have little real ownership. Nor are reforms likely to increase employer confidence in the sector. Many people in the interviews reported a lack of sufficient and adequately qualified teachers to fulfil maths and English policy. And, most of all, there can be no coherence in conducting area reviews while schools can stand outside.

Were this just about FE then that would be bad enough. But the key threats are to economic revival through lack of skills for work and social cohesion through reducing services to people who are most in need. So, the FE practitioners say, they are teaching maths without maths teachers, selling loans to a public that rejects them and trying to integrate communities while ESOL is cut, etc.

To paraphrase the majority of people interviewed, what they are saying is ‘give us the right vehicle or change the destination because we can’t get where you want like this’.