Concurrent Job: LSIP Executive Director, Essex Chamber of Commerce and Industry
Interesting fact: Following a 27 year career in further and higher education, Andy moved to the Chamber to develop and maintain the Essex, Southend-on-Sea and Thurrock Local Skills Improvement Plan (LSIP)
David Gallagher
Vice Chair, Federation of Awarding Bodies
Start date: March 2024
Concurrent Job: Chief Executive, NCFE
Interesting fact: Growing up, David wanted to be either an architect or an archaeologist (somewhat Indiana Jones inspired). He think an architect is still in there somewhere as he’s very interested and involved in how our skills system is designed
Interesting fact: Joanna is a great traveller and has been to all seven continents. She once got overtaken by a giant tortoise on a trek up the side of a volcano in the Galapagos but in mitigation explains that it was very hot and rather steep!
David Marsh
Chief Executive Officer, TTC Group
Start date: April 2024
Previous Job: Chief Executive, Babington and Co-Chair, St Martin’s Group
Interesting fact: David played for the 1st team in both Rugby Union and Rugby league for Oxford University and was also once invited to compete in the world’s toughest mudder in New York
Cyberbullying, vaping, revenge porn, smartphone addiction… College staff are now having to deal with types of anti-social behaviour that were practically unheard of just a decade ago.
Across England, colleges are reporting a rise in challenging behaviour, particularly among their first-year 16-19 students.
While the immediate impact of Covid has gone away, it has left behind a trail of disaffected young people, who had stopped attending school regularly by the time they took their GCSEs. School absence and exclusion rates for year 11s last year rocketed to record levels, DfE data shows.
More than three-quarters (77 per cent) of college student support staff believe that their students felt more dissatisfaction with wider society in 2023 than in previous years, a survey conducted exclusively for FE Week of The National Association for Managers of Student Services’ members reveals. Almost the same share (71 per cent) believe that this disaffection has contributed to a rise in challenging behaviour.
DfE’s newly-appointed FE student support champion, Polly Harrow, said that “without question, post-pandemic colleges are facing more behaviour that we find challenging.”
The challenge now for colleges is to win back those young people, who have previously rejected, or been pushed out of, mainstream education.
Polly Harrow, FE student support champion
Inclusive FE culture
While many schools are responding to increased behavioural disruption with punitive measures such as isolation booths, suspensions or permanent exclusion, colleges generally take a more inclusive approach.
Only 26 per cent of NAMSS respondents believed that their college permanently excluded more students in 2023 than in 2022.
Harrow believes that “colleges do everything they can to keep exclusions to a minimum”.
But they do appear to be resorting to fixed-term exclusions more frequently, some of which are being imposed for an entire academic year.
Almost half (48 per cent) of NAMSS respondents said their college had temporarily excluded more students in 2023, while only 26 per cent were sure they had not – with the rest being unsure.
One NAMSS member reported a doubling of exclusions and suspensions in the first term of this academic year compared to the same period the previous year, noting that those students were coming onto campus regardless.
Getting an accurate picture of how many students are being excluded from colleges – and where they end up afterwards – is impossible, because DfE does not collect the data.
Harrow questions why the department gathers such data for schools and not colleges. “Where’s the curiosity for what the levels of exclusion are in FE?”
The data for sixth forms shows that although they did not permanently exclude any students in the 2022-23 Autumn term, their suspension rate was the highest since these records became available in 2019-20 (0.4 per cent).
The real picture is also difficult to ascertain because while some colleges might ‘exclude’ a student for disruptive behaviour, another college might simply withdraw them, without labelling this as an ‘exclusion’.
The Association of Colleges’ policy manager Eddie Playfair believes that exclusions are used “very sparingly” in colleges, but it is hard to gain an accurate picture because “in some cases, exclusions are just called withdrawals”.
NAMSS chair Lisa Humphries echoes this point.
“Unlike schools, there’s no standard practice. There’s no consistency across the sector because it’s everyone’s individual interpretation.”
While exclusions data remains elusive, our FOI of colleges last year indicated there had been a rise in withdrawals. 7 per cent of students in the 2022-23 academic year had withdrawn from their courses by January 2023, while in the entire 2021-22 academic year, 9 per cent withdrew.
This could help explain the recent increase in 16- to 18-year-olds not in education, employment or training (NEETs), which in 2022 rose to 8.4 per cent – the highest rate since 2012.
Lisa Humphries, NAMSS chair
Permanent exclusion last resorts
Colleges only resort to permanent exclusions in exceptional circumstances. For example, last year Plumpton College permanently excluded two students who were arrested after a sheep was attacked and killed on the South Downs. Two others treated as significant witnesses were “withdrawn from their course”.
Blackburn College has excluded 15 students since September, but not all permanently. Its student support director, Matthew Robinson, said around 36 others have been “right at the top of the disciplinary process” but “at some point, interventions worked and they’ve integrated back into college. At the end of the day, it shouldn’t be game over for these young people”.
Kirklees College, where Harrow is assistant principal, only permanently excludes students “at risk of harm to themselves or others”, and therefore has only permanently excluded one person in the last five years, Harrow explained.
Harrow sees permanent exclusions as “painful decisions” because authorities often then lose sight of these young people.
Although legally local authorities are responsible for young people until they are 18, there’s no legal obligation on colleges (as there is on schools) to report to councils when someone is missing from education.
“There’s an expectation that if you were concerned about someone missing, you adopt the school practice in college…you follow it up to make sure that they’re safe,” said Harrow. “But it’s a grey area, 16 to 18. If they can’t be in college and don’t get a position in another college… it gets very tricky.”
Attendance woes
Attendance and punctuality were the most common types of challenging student behaviour reported by NAMSS members to have increased in 2023 (cited by 84 per cent). One member noted a “general lack of concern if they’re not in class”, with “more hanging around socially”.
In school sixth forms, DfE data shows how severe absence (50 per cent or more days missed) has risen consecutively each year since 2017-18 from 1.1 to 3.3 per cent in 2022-23, while the overall absence rate increased from 7.4 per cent to 10.1 per cent.
Cat Marin, group director at Activate Learning, which runs seven colleges across Oxfordshire, Berkshire and Surrey, said that Activate’s dropout rates have increased most commonly for mental health reasons.
Robinson said while the “golden number” that colleges aim for is 90 per cent attendance, he believes it is more important for them to consider “the distance travelled”. “If a young person’s attendance at school was 50 per cent, and then they’re at 60% at college, actually, that’s progress.”
Similarly, the City of Liverpool College’s recent inspection, which rated it ‘good’, noted that attendance rates were “not consistently high” but praised leaders for setting “realistic individual targets” in the “context of very high persistent and severe absence rates across schools in the city”.
“Low-level disruption” was noted by 82 per cent of NAMMS respondents, while three-quarters (74 per cent) reported a “general lack of engagement”.
Humphries says her members are “not seeing more students who are violent”, but “more disengaged students – low-level behaviour stuff. Where we could quickly sort it in the past, it’s becoming harder to do that.”
Over half of respondents said drug and alcohol use (55 per cent) had risen, with one member stating that the “cost of living crisis now makes drug dealing an appealing career option”.
Robinson notes a particular challenge with THC vapes, not just at Blackburn College but among young people across Lancashire.
Ben Beer, director of The Safeguarding Group
Social media stress
Inappropriate use of social media was also cited by most respondents (53 per cent) as causing a rise in behavioural issues and was the most common source of student disaffection (cited by 84 per cent).
One NAMSS member cited a “big increase in the amount of online bullying and harassment caused by students being set up and filmed for public social media sharing and shaming”.
Ben Beer, director of The Safeguarding Group, which regularly audits colleges’ safeguarding data, believes there has been a shift in the type of college behavioural incidents, which is being driven by the impact of social media.
“The feeling of behaviour getting worse is a manifestation of colleges not necessarily being prepared for the rapid increase in social media, and how that’s used to facilitate some crime, abuse and harassment.
“What’s emerging is outside the current skill set or training available to many colleges. There’s loads of bespoke training available on county lines or drugs and alcohol, but not a lot around how we build cultures that respond to some current adolescent issues.”
Beer notes that some colleges have updated their behaviour policies to reflect the changing student culture.
Weston College’s new student behaviour policy, published in November 2023, includes the rule to ‘behave respectfully towards others online and all platforms of social media.’
Robinson believes that in maths and English GCSE classes in particular, teachers are having to “mitigate” the compulsion that students have to be “connected all the time” through their mobiles, because “sometimes the interest [in those subjects] isn’t there”.
Beer believes that these classes have “unique behavioural pressures” because colleges have “very little buy-in” from students, and the provision is “often under-resourced, with quite transient staff… it’s a really tough gig”.
The impact of the schools’ crisis
The record numbers of young people dropping out of mainstream schools, either through absenteeism, exclusions or elective home education, is having a profound impact on those young people’s readiness for college.
The absence rate for year 11s – the final GCSE year before young people start college – jumped to 26.1 per cent in 2022-23, its highest level since records began in 2017-2018. The year 11 suspension rate also reached a record level that term of 6.81 per cent, while the permanent exclusion rate was 0.08 per cent, the highest level since 2019-20.
Over three-quarters (76 per cent) of NAMSS respondents noted a rise in behavioural problems among students who missed a large amount of time in school, due to anxiety, exclusions or poor engagement. Similarly, 69 per cent of respondents to a recent survey of attendees at an AoC safeguarding conference said their college had been impacted by the rising number of school exclusions.
Zoe Lewis, principal of Middlesbrough College
Zoe Lewis, chief executive of Middlesbrough College, cannot recall another time in her 20-year FE career where “attendance at schools is lower than at college”. She describes this as “quite remarkable”.
Middlesborough’s secondaries had an absence rate in summer 2022-23 of 14 per cent, while its suspension rate for year 11s in 2021-22 was a record 90 per cent, compared to 12 per cent nationally.
Many young people leaving mainstream school early end up in alternative provision, which is often unregulated and provided in small, niche settings. Harrow believes the quality of this provision “should be of interest to colleges”.
College can then come as a culture shock to those young people.
“They find it much more difficult to find a sense of belonging,” said Harrow. “We have to do lots more pastoral care around them to really build trust in an education system that they’ve lost confidence in.”
Similarly, Robinson finds that often, “it’s not until a behaviour incident happens that you realise their previous education setting was very different. When they enter this big, noisy college environment with lots of freedom, they struggle.”
Harrow is calling for “something to bridge the gap” in the sector for the growing cohort of 16- to 17-year-olds “not yet ready to learn”.
Blackburn College is hoping to provide such a service. Robinson said he is exploring expanding the college’s team, which supports the transition of high-needs students into college, to support other students with that transition too.
How colleges are stepping up
Last academic year Middlesbrough College was witnessing “the worst behaviour we’d ever seen”, said Lewis. She witnessed more “vandalism, vaping, backchat…you name it. There was a lack of respect which we’d never had before”.
The turning point came after she observed some particularly rowdy behaviour on one of her regular walks about campus, and decided enough was enough. The college needed to chart a new course, “to support our staff as much as our students”.
Workshops and focus groups with students and staff were conducted to find out “where the pinch points were – what they didn’t like, where they felt we needed to be tougher, where we’d been too tough and just lots of listening”.
Senior leaders came up with a new behaviour action plan, investing in new roles to pilot new initiatives.
Vaping detector
Lewis found that installing vaping detectors “really improved behaviour in toilets and changing rooms”, while installing more CCTV and security in other spaces, offset with “more rewards and celebrations” also made a difference.
The language of the college’s discipline policy was changed to have a more “positive spin”, to “reduce the friction points, celebrate more and focus on the trouble areas, rather than assuming that all students are problematic”.
By the start of this year, things “felt completely different”. Attendance rates rose by 2 per cent, and a survey found that student satisfaction with other students’ behaviour, and how the college deals with it, had risen from 88 to 93 per cent.
Middlesbrough’s last Ofsted inspection report, published last month, rated its behaviour and attitudes as ‘outstanding’.
Middlesbrough is not the only college to embark on new behaviour strategies.
Among the tactics being deployed to tackle disruptive behaviour, NAMSS members reported “employing a team of youth workers”, “strengthening links with parents and carers”, “providing more one-to-one support and reduced timetables” and taking “trauma-informed” approaches.
Kidderminster College’s principal Cat Lewis explained how just before Covid, the college adopted a more “positive, restorative rather than punitive” behaviour policy. “When we’re talking about poor behaviour, we do it privately and calmly. We don’t do public humiliation.”
Kidderminster, which is part of the NCG Group, realised it had to be “fleet of foot” in responding to “young people coming in via different routes, not just the traditional school pathway, who might not respond to authority in a positive way”.
In partnership with Activate Learning, Kidderminster has also stepped-up mental health training and is embarking on a new gamified approach to tackling mental health.
Marin explained how students will play a game through their mobiles to help them build “resilience and soft skills”, while also being part of a “randomised control trial of epic proportions”. The colleges are aiming for 8,000 students to take part.
Middlesbrough College
What’s causing behaviour issues?
As well as social media, NAMSS members put the sources of disaffection being felt by college students down to the cost-of-living crisis (73 per cent), family breakdown (68 per cent), the Covid legacy (55 per cent), global issues (32 per cent) and political disillusionment (13 per cent).
The spread of Andrew Tate-style online misogyny is thought to be influencing some poor behaviour. Three-quarters of respondents to AoC’s safeguarding conference survey said their students’ conduct was being “affected by misogyny”. One NAMSS member explained how they were tackling poor behaviour by introducing a “consent week” and “staff awareness session on sexual harassment/violence”.
And mental health problems, which have become particularly acute among college-aged students, are driving challenging behaviour on campuses.
Robinson believes that “a lot of the young people coming into colleges now don’t have the resilience, communication and tolerance skills sets they might have picked up from school”.
Almost a quarter (23.3 per cent) of 17 to 19 year olds surveyed by the NHS in 2023 had a probable mental health disorder, compared to 21.7 per cent of 20 to 25 year olds and 20.3 per cent of eight to 16 year olds.
And 95 per cent of colleges reported an increase of disclosed mental health difficulties among 16 to 18-year-olds, AoC research found last year. 82 per cent of colleges were encountering a significant number of students experiencing mental health difficulties without a formal disclosure.
Reflecting the increase in pressure on college mental health services, last month the AoC launched a new mental health charter, updating a previous version published five years ago.
Meanwhile, Humphries concludes that disruptive behaviour is mainly down to “a generation of young people who aren’t sure where they belong”.
“We need to talk about what we’ve done to our young people that makes them operate in this way. We all need to take collective responsibility here. And how do we fix it?”
A north Yorkshire college has been downgraded by Ofsted following “significant turbulence” in its leadership.
The previously ‘good’ Craven College was handed a ‘requires improvement’ judgment this week. Inspectors said “too many” study programme learners do not attend lessons and teacher workloads “may not be sustainable.”
While the college was judged ‘good’ for the quality of education, personal development, adult learning and apprenticeships, the watchdog found its leadership and management to ‘require improvement’.
“Over the last five years, there has been significant turbulence in the leadership of the college. The current senior leadership team, appointed within the last 18 months, has established stability and identified a clear path to make necessary improvements,” according to the inspection report.
However, “strategic and cultural changes have not fully permeated throughout the organisation”.
The college is currently led by interim principal Anita Lall, who took over following the sudden and mysterious absence of its previous leader, Lindsey Johnson, last year.
Johnson was last seen at the college in January, reportedly being escorted into the college to collect their belongings. According to LinkedIn, Johnson left their role at the college in January 2023, but had not been at college since the preceding October. They had been principal at Craven for three years and have since moved into a role as head of education, skills and work at the Ministry of Justice.
The college told local reporters at the time: “We are confident that Lindsey’s absence has not impacted negatively on the college’s ability to meet its obligation to its students and the communities it serves.”
As well as an interim principal, Craven College is also led by an interim assistant principal for quality and two interim assistant principals for curriculum. Just one of the five senior managers, the vice principal for finance, is not an interim.
FE Week understands interviews for a permanent principal of the college have been taking place this week.
A college spokesperson said: “Whilst the overall grades are not what we wanted or hoped for, the report acknowledges the journey the college has been on recently and highlights the steps we are already taking to address the challenges identified.”
Student attendance “doesn’t reach the high standards we have” the college admitted, adding, “our attendance is in line with the national average, but we will continue to focus on implementing specific actions” to improve.
Students that do attend learn in high-quality facilities, often in “environments in which they aspire to be employed”, Ofsted reported.
The college added: “We would like to take this opportunity to thank our wonderful staff and students for all their hard work and commitment and to extend our thanks to our community partners and stakeholders, who supported the college during the inspection and continue to do so.”
The government’s prison service has pulled out of apprenticeships after forcing thousands of custody officers onto the programme before realising there wasn’t the capacity to train them and run prisons safely.
His Majesty’s Prison and Probation Service (HMPPS) experienced a rapid rise in apprenticeship delivery after deciding, in 2021, to make it mandatory for all new prison officers to take the level 3 custody and detention officer apprenticeship.
Starts shot up from just 20 in its first year of delivery in 2018/19 to 2,387 in 2021/22 and then 3,320 in 2022/23 – making it the 14th largest apprenticeship provider in England last year.
But HMPPS, part of the Ministry of Justice, recently found that releasing apprentices from operational duties for around 200 hours over the period of the apprenticeship to complete off-the-job training was “putting strain on staffing levels and the safe running of prison regimes”, according to its recent annual report.
More than 1,200 prison officers, who were put onto the apprenticeship dropped out of their training last year, leaving HMPPS with a retention and apprenticeship achievement rate of just 21 per cent in 2022/23.
The prison service has now stopped enrolling new apprentices and chosen to focus on other training schemes. It has also just been judged as ‘requires improvement’ by Ofsted.
The case echoes a situation at HMRC two years ago, when the government’s tax office put thousands of employees onto apprenticeships before realising it did not have capacity to train them – leading to the majority withdrawing from their programme.
A prison service spokesperson said: “We launched this scheme [mandatory apprenticeships] prior to our surge in prison officer recruitment and have since changed the way we train our hardworking staff.”
Despite HMPPS’ rapid rise in apprenticeship delivery, Ofsted waited almost seven years before conducting a full inspection of the government agency.
The prison service received an early monitoring visit from Ofsted in May 2021 when the employer provider had just 182 apprentices, in which it was judged to be making ‘reasonable progress’.
Ofsted rules state new apprenticeship providers will normally receive their first full inspection within 24 months of their early monitoring visit – a timeline that was recently reduced to 18 months. But the watchdog didn’t fully inspect HMPPS until March 2024 – 34 months after its early monitoring visit.
FE Week understands Ofsted had planned to fully inspect HMPPS in November 2023, but deferred the inspection due to a staffing incident. A November inspection would have still been six months later than the window for fully inspecting new providers after a monitoring visit.
HMPPS’ learning centre is based in Rugby, Warwickshire, but trains apprentices working in prisons across the country. The employer provider only offers the level 3 custody and detention officer apprenticeship and had 2,284 apprentices in learning at the time of Ofsted’s full inspection last month.
Ofsted published HMPPS’ grade three report this week, in which the watchdog praised HMMPS’s “highly experienced” coaches for creating a “positive and calm learning environment” with high standards.
But the inspectorate called out the service’s low completion rates and its lack of capacity to teach functional skills English and maths, which most of its apprentices are required to complete.
The report said: “Leaders have developed a curriculum in response to the significant skills needs of the prison service. The service recruits large numbers of new staff every year and has a constant need for initial officer training.
“Following a detailed review, leaders identified that they did not have the capacity to support the high number of prison officers entering the service to complete an apprenticeship.
“Leaders have changed their training offer to stop the high numbers of apprentices withdrawing from their apprenticeship early. Leaders have removed the mandatory requirement for all new prison officers to study the apprenticeship. As a result, the number of officers completing their apprenticeship is beginning to increase.”
HMPPS is still on the government’s apprenticeship provider and assessment register, but it has not yet decided whether to put any prison officers through apprenticeships in the future.
Adult education body Holex has appointed Caroline McDonald as its first chief executive officer.
Birmingham-born McDonald arrives from Birkbeck, University of London, where she has worked as director of access and engagement for the past six years.
Up until now, Holex has been run by policy director Sue Pember and a board of governors. But Pember announced in February the organisation had created the CEO position amid an “increased demand” for its services.
Holex was looking for a “dynamic and experienced” person with a “deep understanding” of the adult community education landscape, according to the job description.
McDonald was hired by the membership organisation after building up more than two decades of expertise in adult education and community engagement, according to Holex chair Dipa Ganguli.
Pember will remain in her role as policy director under McDonald’s leadership which begins in August. She told FE Week that the appointment will allow her more time to advocate and lobby on behalf of members.
In her previous role at Birkbeck, McDonald worked closely with several adult education providers and served as head of access and engagement and head of outreach.
The position will pay between £70,000 to £90,000 and McDonald will report to the board, chaired by Ganguli.
She will now be responsible for advocating for positive change and influencing policy discussions, possibly in time for a general election.
“I am delighted to announce the appointment of our new chief executive officer, Caroline McDonald. With over two decades of expertise in adult education and community engagement, Caroline brings a wealth of experience and a commitment to our mission,” said Ganguli.
Holex is now 31 years old and has more than 140 members, including local authorities, adult education institutes and further education colleges, that provide adult and community education in England.
Along with the Association of Colleges and the Association of Employment and Learning Providers, Holex is also a founding member of the Education and Training Foundation.
The government has said it will retract a new policy document after mistakenly giving the FE commissioner powers to intervene in universities.
A fresh “post-16 intervention and accountability” guide was released by the Department for Education today to show the ways officials tackle poor performance in different types of education providers.
For higher education institutions, the guidance made clear that the department does not undertake financial assessments of those that also provide further education provision, like apprenticeships, as this is a job for HE regulator the Office for Students.
But in a surprising addition, the document said that if a higher education provider receives an ‘inadequate’ judgment from Ofsted for any further education provision it delivers, then the “FE Commissioner may undertake an assessment of the capacity and capability of current leadership and management”.
The FE Commissioner “would then make recommendations to the minister about appropriate intervention action”.
DfE guidance published April 18, 2024
This would mark a remarkable expansion of the FE Commissioner’s remit, which has to date only included further education colleges and local authorities.
The FE Commissioner, an independent adviser post currently held by Shelagh Legrave, leads the DfE’s oversight of struggling colleges and publishes reports on leadership capacity and capability for those in formal intervention.
However, the DfE has since backtracked on the guidance and claimed it was published in error when approached for further information by FE Week.
The department said the FE Commissioner does not have a role in higher education institutions and the page concerned is being withdrawn.
The page was still live at the time of going to press.
A large college in Birmingham has been hit with a first ‘requires improvement’ Ofsted judgment, as it reveals plans to close a troubled academy for 14- to 16-year-olds.
The inspectorate downgraded South and City College Birmingham (SCCB) from a long-held ‘good’ rating in a report published today which revealed low qualification achievement rates, particularly in English and maths, and attendance concerns.
Ofsted also flagged poor teaching and bad behaviour in the college’s 14 to 16 provision, including homophobic name-calling which made a minority of students “feel vulnerable”.
The academy, which offers pathways in engineering and technical crafts, health sciences, physical education, animal care and art and design, opened in 2019 and currently teaches 123 young people.
Ofsted said teachers in the 14 to 16 academy “do not check learning and challenge misconceptions effectively”, and it lacks a “clearly designed curriculum for English or maths that supports the needs of learners”. The students also use “some poor language” which undermines a “considerate culture” found in the wider college.
SCCB told FE Week the viability of the academy has been under consideration for “some time” due to staffing resource challenges. It has now decided to shut the academy for new applicants as of September 2024.
SCCB has eight campuses across Birmingham, with the majority of its 10,000 students being adults.
The college was judged to be ‘good’ by Ofsted for its delivery of adult education and apprenticeships but was downgraded overall due to the quality of education for young people and leadership and management.
Ofsted reported that most learners and apprentices “greatly value the relationships they have with their teachers” and become “respectful and active citizens”.
But inspectors found that “many” learners do not routinely attend lessons and therefore miss “valuable learning opportunities”.
Leaders were criticised for being “too slow to resolve the significant underperformance in the quality of education”.
SCCB leaders told inspectors that in the previous few years, they have been “greatly affected” by Covid-19, the cost-of-living crisis, a cyber-attack and a failure in their data systems.
Ofsted reported that there are poor levels of retention and pass rates across all age groups and provision types. The watchdog’s report said: “Consequently, too few learners and apprentices achieved the qualifications they had trained for.”
Inspectors noted that leaders have recently taken action to improve the quality of education by restructuring management posts and invested in new management data systems.
They also refocused staff on attendance, assessments and improving teaching.
Principal Mike Hopkins said: “Whilst the outcome of the recent inspection wasn’t as we’d hoped it would be, we’re confident that the improvements we’d started to implement in advance of Ofsted’s recent visit, are already paying dividends.
“The past three years have been amongst the most challenging that the college has experienced and the impact that Covid had on our learners cannot be underestimated, but we must learn from this and look to the future.
“I have every confidence that we will deliver a tangible turnaround by the time we’re monitored and then fully re-inspected.”
Staff at a Lancashire college have won an pay rise of up to 12.8 per cent – the highest awarded to an FE college this year.
Myerscough College reached the deal following strike action and talks with the Advisory, Conciliation and Arbitration Service (ACAS).
It marks the highest pay deal reached by any college in England this year, and higher than the University and College Union’s (UCU) pay demand of 10 per cent for FE staff in 2024/25.
Union members at the college took to the picket line for three days in November and called off four days of strikes in February to enter negotiations with college bosses.
The full pay deal is as follows:
A 6.5 per cent pay rise, backdated from January 1, 2024
An additional 1 per cent pay rise, from July 1, 2024
A commitment to award all eligible staff with an incremental pay rise worth £1,277 on average from August 1, 2024
An uplift of over £3,750 to the college lecturer starting salary
UCU regional support official Daniel Maguire said: “This incredible win is the best pay award at Myerscough in years. It is down to the incredible solidarity of our members and shows what can be achieved when workers unionise and stand together. College employers in the North West and across England now need to look to Myerscough and see what can be achieved when you engage meaningfully with your workforce.”
A Myerscough college spokesperson said: “This collaborative agreement brings an end to our on-going pay dispute and paves the way for the implementation of the proposed pay adjustments for all affected colleagues.
“We recognise that this resolution has taken longer than we all hoped but wish to reassure you that resolving the dispute with UCU has always remained a priority.
“We believe that these proposals demonstrate the college’s long-term commitment to enhancing our pay framework as much as possible within a sustainable model.”
A total of 64 colleges have now reached a pay agreement since September.
The remaining three colleges involved in disputes yet to reach a pay deal are Craven College, Croydon College and Farnborough College of Technology.
The last deal agreed was by staff at Loughborough College, who last month agreed on a pay rise of 8.5 per cent for salaries under £26,000 and 7.5 per cent for those earning above.
Staff at Capital City College Group also settled, after recently undertaking three days of striking in January. They called off four further days of picketing after a deal was reached on staff workload.
