Latest news from FE Week

There are now more than 50 apprenticeship training agencies (ATAs) — but confusion surrounds how many apprentices each one is working with.

A dozen organisations were awarded a share of £7m by the National Apprenticeship Service to establish the first ATAs through a pilot scheme in 2009, as part of a drive to encourage more small employers to engage with the apprenticeship programme.

That figure has increased dramatically, climbing to 50 in January, and it now stands at 52.

ATAs, which are based on an Australian model, act as an apprentice’s employer and is able to place them at a number of smaller firms over the course of a single training programme.

They are seen as a key means of helping the government hit its target of three million apprenticeships by 2020, as it will need far more small- and medium-sized enterprises to get involved to drive up starts.

But a Freedom of Information request sent by FE Week to the Skills Funding Agency appears to have poured cold water on the government’s ambitions — as it indicated that there were just 1,370 apprenticeships starts involving ATAs in 2014/15.

Even worse, apprenticeship starts with ATAs have remained effectively stagnant for two years, with 1,340 starts in 2013/14 and 1,360 in 2012/13.

However, Jeremy Hempstead (pictured), chief executive of the Confederation of Apprenticeship Training Agencies (CoATA), disputed the figures, telling FE Week that he believes “the numbers are not accurate”.

This is “a problem that has been brought to the SFA’s attention and they have said they are investigating”, he added.

He said: “The London Apprenticeship Company alone in the year to July 2015 had 528 starts. It is CoATA’s opinion that if replicated over 40 ATAs, at an average of 400 starts per ATA, this would represent 16,000 ATA employed apprentice starts — a significant discrepancy from the SFA’s 1,370.”

FE Week went back to the SFA to ask them if it was investigating the figures, as suggested by Mr Hempstead, but the response failed to clear up the confusion.

A spokesperson for the SFA insisted that the figures were accurate, and declined to comment on whether there would be any further investigation.

He said: “The recent response to your FoI request is an accurate report of the data that we collect. It is submitted by our colleges and training providers via their ILR returns about the training delivered to ATA organisations’ apprentices.”

The spokesperson said it was the responsibility of “our colleges and training providers to ensure that the ILR learner record code is completed correctly”.

But she conceded that the SFA was “aware of some discrepancies between the data submitted on ATA apprentices via the ILR and the data held by ATAs”.

She said: “This would not affect SFA funding claims so would not constitute a breach in our contract. We will continue to work with the SFA’s provider network to ensure the ILR learner record is coded correctly to identify apprentices that are employed by an ATA.”

There is also uncertainty over the future of ATAs from April 2017, with the introduction of the apprenticeship levy.

Government guidance published in April said: “We know that some employers will want to use the funds in their digital account to pay for training of apprentices employed by an ATA.

“We will make an assessment of the pros and cons of any approach before providing further information in June.”

Governors at prisons will get direct power to hire providers for offender learning — as the Justice Secretary Michael Gove looks to replicate the decentralisation agenda he once pushed as Education Secretary.

Offender Learning and Skills Service (OLASS) contracts are currently held by three colleges and one independent learning provider, and appointed by the Skills Funding Agency (SFA).

But under Mr Gove’s new plans, prison governors will be handed responsibility for contracting from July next year, through the upcoming Prison and Courts Reform Bill.

It is not certain, however, that future contracts would only be given to FE providers, a Ministry of Justice spokesperson admitted to FE Week.

The reforms were mentioned in the Queen’s Speech on Wednesday, when she said: “Prison governors will be given unprecedented freedom and they will be able to ensure prisoners receive better education.”

The plan reflects recommendations made in an inquiry by Dame Sally Coates, which was published on Wednesday (May 18).

The transition will be overseen by Mr Gove, whose plans to hand additional powers to prison governors reflect his past efforts to shift decision-making power from local authorities to head teachers, via a massive expansion of academy schools which happened during his time at the Department for Education between 2010 and 2014.

From August 2017, Dame Coates said she would expect that “in line with the wider implementation of prison reform, we will move to all governors having full freedoms over the choice of education providers for their prisons”.

Peter Dawson, the deputy director of the Prison Reform Trust, has said he is looking forward to what he called the “academy solution” for prison learning, in an expert piece for our sister paper FE Week.

He stressed that “the willingness to place more trust in the leader of an institution opens up potential which tight central control does not”.

Dame Coates, a former head teacher, also recommended that current OLASS contracts, which are due to end in July, should be extended for another year to allow time for a phased introduction of the reforms.

The OLASS system was first rolled out across the country in 2006, and the fourth round of contracts were agreed in August 2012.

Manchester College holds them for London, the north-east, north-west, Kent and Sussex, and Yorkshire and Humber.

Barbara McDonough, chief operating officer for Novus, the college’s offender learning service, said:

“Overall we believe this report accurately reflects the challenges the sector is facing, and we welcome the recommendations.”

Milton Keynes College holds contracts in the east Midlands, west Midlands and for south central.

Jason Mansell, the college’s director of offender learning, said: “We believe that governor autonomy for the provision of education, and governor accountability for educational progress of all prisoners within their establishments, is key to driving the prioritisation and improvement of all learning consistently across the prison estate.”

No one was available to comment from Weston College, which holds the OLASS contract for the south-west of England.

People Plus, formerly known as A4E, which holds the contract for the east of England, declined to comment.

The government is privately worried about the ongoing delays with the Greater Manchester area review – despite skills minister Nick Boles publicly claiming in January that he was more concerned about the quality of area review outcomes than timing.

According to leaked documents seen exclusively by FE Week, the review – which involves 21 colleges and sixth forms and was one of the first to be announced – is still barely two thirds of the way through, likely due to an extended four-month gap between steering group meetings.

Minutes from the most recent steering group meeting, on April 21, reveal the government’s concern over the ongoing delays.

Mike Keoghan, director of vocational education at the Department for Business Innovation and Skills (BIS), warned the group that “the pace of the review in Greater Manchester was a cause for concern within BIS and the Department for Education (DfE)”.

He said it was “critical” that the steering group agreed a final set of recommendations at the next meeting, due to be held on May 25.

Theresa Grant, the chief executive of Trafford Council, who chairs the steering group, warned in her concluding remarks of the risk that the process “would lead to a fragmentation of the colleges in Greater Manchester”.

FE Week has repeatedly highlighted ongoing delays to the review process.

Initial BIS guidance in September said a “typical timescale” for a review would be three to four months, but updated guidance from March extended this to four to six months.

Earlier this year, Mr Boles told the commons education and skills subcommittee that he was “more concerned about the quality of the outcome than whether it hits the month in the year that I initially signed off on as the plan”.

However, to date just two areas have completed – Birmingham and Solihull, in early March, and Tees Valley, on May 13.

Eight months have passed since the first Greater Manchester steering group meeting on September 21, and the April meeting was only the fourth of six planned sessions.

The previous meeting was held in December – a gap of four months.

What’s more, just two mergers have so far been proposed, according to the minutes.

One involves a link-up between Oldham, Stockport and Tameside Colleges, which could potentially also include Hopwood Hall College.

Bury College has already announced plans to merge with neighbouring University of Bolton, but the leaked minutes showed that Bolton College could also be joining them.

Ms Grant told FE Week that “we are very near the completion of the review and I and the colleges are hopeful of a positive outcome”.

Wigan and Leigh College principal Michael Sheehan announced he was stepping down for unknown reasons on April 22, the day after the meeting. The minutes now prove he was not present at the meeting.

A spokesperson for the college declined to comment on his departure.

Oldham, Stockport and Tameside Colleges have said in a joint statement that there were “immense advantages” to a merged organisation, but noted that “we are in the middle of a process” which “needs to be allowed to take its course”.

Bolton College principal Marie Gilluley said the college had “engaged fully” in the area review, and that governors were “unanimous” that the proposed merger was

“the best option to safeguard the college and its future”.

A BIS spokesperson said the timescales for the Greater Manchester area review had been “rightly adjusted” to allow the steering group to carry out all its work.

The final steering group meeting is now scheduled for June.

A sixth form college (SFC) in West Yorkshire has become the first of its kind to be rated ‘outstanding’ by Ofsted since the introduction of the common inspection framework (CIF) in September.

Huddersfield New College received grade ones across the board from the education watchdog, in a report published today which also found the 2,400-learner SFC had “no significant weaknesses”.

It comes after Truro and Penwith College became the first general FE college to be rated outstanding under the new CIF, as reported by FE Week in April.

Inspectors found that Huddersfield New College’s principal, Angela Williams (pictured below), had an “unrelenting focus on a high-quality learning experience for young people” and “established a culture in which staff and learners flourish”.

It continued: “Consequently, the principal, college leaders and governors make a genuine investment in transforming the lives of the young people who attend.”

Success rates at the SFC were “well above those nationally and those for similar providers,” the report said.

Inspectors found that a “highly successful feature of the college ethos is that all learners, irrespective of background or barriers to learning, should have the very best opportunities to achieve and develop into confident young adults”.

As a result learners “make excellent progress from below average starting points” and “achieve better grades than might be expected from their prior achievements”.

It continued: “Improved outcomes are particularly notable for learners who are known to have been eligible for free school meals: a group who make up almost one fifth of the college cohort.”

The “rich and varied curriculum” meant that learners were well prepared for future study or employment, the report said.

Inspectors found that teachers at the SFC were “skilled and enthusiastic” and “consistently set high expectations” for students.

Teachers “take a forensic approach to the monitoring of learners’ progress and achievement” to “pinpoint priorities for future development”, the report said.

Learners in AS and A-level classes “work diligently and collaboratively” and were empowered by teachers to “take responsibility for their own learning”, it said.

Commenting on the Ofsted report, Ms Williams said: “It has taken years of hard work to remain highly inclusive and to become one of the best SFCs in the country and we fully intend to continue to work hard to stay top of the class and to transform even more lives.”

James Kewin, deputy chief executive of the Sixth Form Colleges’ Association, said: “This is a huge achievement and reflects the exceptionally high standard of education offered by the college, and the outstanding results achieved by students.”

Linda Summers, Huddersfield New College chair, said the Ofsted grade reflected “a team effort by students, staff and managers, and the governors are immensely proud of them all”.

 

The Skills Funding Agency (SFA) has pulled the delayed national achievement rate tables (NART) for providers from its website, after FE Week alerted it to a series of errors in the data.

The long-awaited tables were uploaded this morning, but a number of mistakes led the agency to take the information down again until they had been rectified.

A notice on the site said the 2014 to 2015 education and training NART overall institution spreadsheet was “temporarily removed for revision” and a spokesperson from the SFA subsequently thanked FE Week for highlighting the problems and confirmed they were the result of “human error”.

Mistakes in the data included the achievement rate percentage totalling over 100 per cent for the ’ethnicity’ column and the achievement rate and retention rate being the wrong way around in the ‘delivery LEP’ column.

It comes after the SFA twice delayed publication of the 2014/15 nationwide qualification achievement rates (QAR).

FE Week described in December 2015 how the publication of the QAR for 2014/15 had been pushed back, with promises it would be published “towards the end of March”.

The data would normally have been published in January and the rates were also missing from the Statistical First Release publication at the end of March, owing to “changes to the collection and storage of the data”.

The twice-delayed QARs were finally made available on April 5, via new interactive dashboards on the SFA’s online hub.

However, the dashboards did not include the facility to view national averages for individual qualifications – information that has been available in previous years, before the introduction of the interactive dashboards.

This led a number of providers to complain about the missing information through the SFA’s FE Connect forums in the days following the QAR publication.

In an answer to an FE Week Freedom of Information request over development costs, the SFA said that the new ‘Birst’ QAR data dashboard cost a one-off sum of £153,000 to develop in 2014/15, but would subsequently require only £58,000 per year to run.

It claimed that this should result in annual savings of 65 per cent, when compared with the £164,000 the old system cost in 2013/14, using multiple PDF annual reports that were sent out to providers.

However, sector representatives told FE Week that they were worried the new dashboard could shift the burdens of time and expense onto them.

Ofqual has announced Julie Swan as its new executive director for general qualifications.

She will take up the position permanently after a spell as the acting executive director when her predecessor, Ian Stockford, left the exams regulator to join AQA in December.

Ms Swan (pictured) has worked for Ofqual for seven years and was most recently associate director for regulatory policy.

She said that she appreciated “there are significant challenges ahead” as the organisation continues with reform of GCSEs and A-levels.

Major changes to the qualifications include the first awarding of new AS levels this summer, and the introduction of a new GCSE grading system from next year.

The late accreditation of new exam specifications is also causing concern among teachers who have been unable to plan lessons and could delay subject textbooks — leaving teachers without crucial resources when students return in September.

FE Week’s sister paper FE Week reported in March that more than half of the new GCSEs and A-levels had not yet been accredited.

To date, 129 of 147 of the new GCSEs and A-levels have been approved.

Ms Swan is the second high-profile appointment at Ofqual this year after Sally Collier was chosen as chief regulator in March following the departure of Glenys Stacey.

Ms Collier, a former civil servant, admitted in a parliamentary committee that she will need several months before she is up to speed with all the changes.

Ms Collier said she was “very pleased” about the new appointment and that Swan had “provided strong leadership over the past six months.”

FE has drawn the spotlight of the national press, after the government refused to rule out a hike in the levy after its launch next April.

City A.M.’s front page today raised concern that the chancellor could look to raise extra income from businesses – through new revenue raising measures, including a potential increase of the levy.

It came after Greg Hands (pictured above), chief secretary to the Treasury, was asked in a parliamentary question from Labour what the rate and threshold of the levy would be in in 2017-18, 2018-19 and 2019-20.

Mr Hands declined to give a clear answer, saying: “The government has confirmed that the apprenticeship levy will be set at a rate of 0.5 per cent of company paybill and every employer will have a £15,000 allowance to offset against their levy liability.

“In practice, this means only employers with paybills greater than £3m will pay the levy.”

But he added: “As with all policies, the government will keep the apprenticeship levy under review.”

Calls have been made for greater clarity, following complaints that the prospect of the levy being hiked adds yet another concern about the scheme.

Skills minister, Gordon Marsden, said it seemed “inevitable” the government would end up raising the levy.

He commented: “Having tried to duck answering our parliamentary question first time round, the minister has had to admit that the Treasury could now increase the levy rate on a yearly basis.

“The more we hear from various sources about how the levy will now need to fund the top up, the devolved administrations, English and maths at level two and disadvantaged learners, incentive payments and non-levy payers, the more it seems inevitable that the government will end up raising the levy.”

He added: “This just adds further to the mounting chorus of concerns from employers and providers about the government’s handling of the levy’s implementation from 2017.”

The Confederation of British Industry, which suggested on April 28 that the start date for the levy should be delayed unless a “radical review” took place, said that it would be “unjustified to raise [levy] rates”.

Scott Corfe, director at the Centre for Economics and Business Research think tank, added:  “As weaker economic growth is likely to leave the chancellor missing his deficit reduction targets by a wider margin, revenue-raising measures could take the form of new types of business taxes, such as the apprenticeship levy.”

 

The government has been criticised for largely ignoring the role of FE colleges play with delivering degree level provision in its new white paper on higher education.

There were only three mentions of FE colleges throughout the 83-page document, called Success as a knowledge economy: Teaching Excellence, Social Mobility and Student Choice, which was unveiled by the Department for Business, Innovation and Skills this morning.

This provoked criticism from Shadow Skills Minister Gordon Marsden that it “consistently talks simply about universities and possible new universities — yet it ignores the role of FE colleges and providers which currently deliver at least 10 per cent of all HE participation”.

The white paper did acknowledge that “the growth in FE colleges and alternative providers offering higher education has significantly changed the marketplace and how students study”.

It added that the government would introduce a range of reforms to the way in which providers can award their own higher education qualifications through degree awarding powers (DAPs).

It said: “DAPs in the current system are all or nothing — designed around traditional large, established, multifaculty providers.

“This system is both outdated and insufficiently flexible, so we will create a suite of options for those wishing to award their own degrees in the future.

“We will allow providers who meet our demanding quality standards to secure full degree awarding powers more quickly, after three years of operation.

“High quality providers will also be able to award foundation or taught degrees on a probationary basis when they first start operating, subject to some restrictions on scope.”

Martin Doel, chief executive of the Association of Colleges (AoC) said: “This step change away from the country’s traditional university system will empower more people than ever before to access HE in their local area through a college.”

It comes after colleges were granted foundation degree awarding powers in 2011 — although there was limited uptake from the sector.

The document published today added: “In our green paper, we proposed that only providers with 50 per cent of their students on higher education courses would be eligible for teaching excellence framework (TEF).

“Many stakeholders made a compelling case against what they saw as an arbitrary ban on other providers operating in the higher education sector.

“FE colleges, for example, may individually only have a minority of their learners on higher education courses, but collectively deliver a significant amount of higher education provision.”

It added that having considered such responses, “we have decided to expand eligibility for TEF year one to all providers that deliver undergraduate provision, including at levels four”.

It also said that part-time courses would also be incorporated from year one as a result of the responses to the consultation.

The white paper also stated that a single market regulator, the Office for Students (OfS) would combine the existing regulatory functions of the Higher Education Funding Council for England (HEFCE) and Office for Fair Access (OFFA).

“It [OfS] will have clearer and consistent powers to regulate the sector, by attaching regulatory conditions to providers that enter the system,” it added.

“The conditions will be consistent between all types of providers – higher education institutions, alternative providers, FE colleges and new entrants.”

The BIS white paper comes two weeks after FE Week exclusively revealed details of the postponed skills white paper, which will be the first of its kind in a decade.

Now expected before the government goes into purdah on May 27, ahead of the EU referendum, the skills white paper is due to outline how16-year-olds will have to choose between academic courses leading to university or a new technical professional education (TPE) route into work.

The plans are expected to reflect findings of an independent panel, led by Lord Sainsbury, to look into technical and professional education (TPE) plans.