A threefold increase in the number of inspections by Sixth Form College Commissioner Peter Mucklow this academic year is likely to get worse, Sixth Form Colleges’ Association chief executive David Igoe has warned.
Mr Mucklow (pictured right) was sent to just one college in 2013/14 — his first year in the job. But with six months of the current academic year still to run he has already carried out three inspections.
Mr Igoe told FE Week: “We are aware of the increase in visits and expect this trend to continue. Most sixth form colleges are coping well with funding cuts, but it is inevitable that more and more will experience financial problems and trigger commissioner visits.”
Mr Mucklow inspected 995-learner Hartlepool Sixth Form College on January 22 following its inadequate Ofsted rating in November.
He visited 1,075-learner King George V College (KGV), in Merseyside, a month after its inadequate grade was published in November last year.
And he had inspected 4,602-learner Totton College, in Hampshire, in October, which was deemed by Ofsted to require improvement in March, after concerns were raised about a lack of improvement since being issued with a financial notice to improve.
Meanwhile, his 2013/14 inspection of 2,180-learner Prior Pursglove College, in Guisborough, in February was triggered by an inadequate-overall Ofsted report published the same month.
“Poor Ofsted results are also often related to funding. When a college is expending all its energy on balancing the books, it is easy to take your eye off the ball with quality of learning,” said Mr Igoe (pictured left).
The Department for Education (DfE) declined to comment on the increased number of inspections.
However, a spokesperson said a report on Hartlepool college would be “published in due course” by the commissioner.
She added: “A number of recommendations have been made to improve outcomes at KGV and the Education Funding Agency is working with the college on its implementation of them.”
The commissioner’s report on KGV raised concerns about teaching and learner progress and called for the recruitment of a senior vice principal from outside the college with proven experience in improving teaching and assessment for 16 to 19-year-olds.
A KGV spokesperson said: “KGV is acting on Ofsted’s recommendations to improve the college.
The senior leadership team has produced an action plan [submitted to DfE last month] on the steps needed to achieve this.”
A spokesperson for Hartlepool college said: “The visit was positive. Mr Mucklow and his team were very supportive and helpful.”
A Totton College spokesperson said: “More and more colleges are being given a financial notice to improve and this reflects the challenging times for the FE sector.”
Judy Burton, principal of Prior Pursglove College, said: “We have made significant progress since the commissioner’s visit.”
“A week is a long time in politics,” were famous words from Labour Prime Minister of the 1960s and 70s Harold Wilson. It stands to reason then, that a full five-year Parliament feels like a lifetime.
You might already be sick of the general election — the ‘costed spending commitments’, ‘the other lot have got their sums wrong’, and ‘yes but look, Ed Miliband lol.”
How much longer do we have to wait before UKip leader Nigel Farage gets a photo op at a college hair salon, or a college bar? Perhaps an English for Speakers of Other Languages class?
There’s never a dull moment in FE, goes the most overused sector cliché, and a lot has happened since our 2010 general election.
The parliament started with a re-emergence of mass student protests in London over education cuts and increases in university tuition fees (‘24+ Advanced Learning Loans’ was too hard to fit on to placards and has too many syllables to rhyme well).
We saw college students organise days of action opposing the abolition of Education Maintenance Allow-ance — even principals were getting involved.
Plans to devolve planning of 19+ FE to Regional Development Agencies were scrapped, and then Regional Development Agencies were scrapped. We had a ‘bonfire of the quangos’ in the public sector and the ‘big society’ to clear it up.
Some of what we do now is funded through a new loans system, which hasn’t had the desired impact, and is potentially about to
be expanded.
Then there was the higher education white paper that never happened, complete overhaul of the state school system and curriculum and an increase in 19+ apprenticeships to the tune of around 203,000.
We know already that no matter who makes up the next government, there’s even less money to go around
Even though we know that the next five years are going to be just as, if not more, difficult than the last five, there are some things I think we can learn and look out for.
Deciding to deal with university tuition fees so early in the parliament was a strategic move. It meant that an entire cohort of undergraduates could enrol and graduate under the new system and gave enough time to describe the fees increase as a success in terms of not negatively impacting on admissions of young people from disadvantaged backgrounds.
Fantastic as it is to sugarcoat participation in this way, the unfortunate core of this political Smartie is that part-time and mature students have taken the brunt as the number of adults in learning continues to fall sharply.
We know already that no matter who makes up the next government, there’s even less money to go around.
Both of our core government departments will have a tough time balancing the books; the Department for Education with its forecasted funding shortfall of £4.6bn to accommodate increasing pupil numbers and the Department for Business, Innovation and Skills’s expensive system of student loans coupled with its vulnerability as a government department without a ring fence.
Something pretty drastic needs to happen; redressing inequalities in schools, FE and higher education would be a good start, but could go even further by properly linking together pre and unemployment services too.
Now if all of that sounds like a lot, picture FE in the entirety of public policy and the massive changes we’ve seen across the board in just five years.
There’s no way the FE Week editor will give me the word count to go through all of it, so I’ll end with a relevant and necessary call to action.
Thursday (February 5) is National Voter Registration Day (NVRD). FE has access to people of all ages and stages, learners and staff, and the outcome of the next election matters to every single one of us.
Registering to vote has never been easier. It can now be done online and Bite The Ballot has some free downloadable resources which would look great on your VLE. #NVRD
The 70th anniversary of the liberation of Auschwitz was marked with a memorial event organised by learners who had visited the notorious concentration camp.
A plaque at Queen Alexandra Sixth Form College was unveiled as part of the event, overseen by North Tyneside mayor Norma Redfearn.
A-level learner Kaldyne Field, aged 17, said: “Going to Auschwitz is an experience I will never forget, it really hits home what went on there.
“The idea of the plaque came to us on the way home from Auschwitz, we wanted to do something that would be permanent, creating a place of remembrance for students and the wider community.”
Coun Redfearn said: “The students have done an excellent job in commemorating the 70th anniversary and taking it upon themselves to educate other young people and their community.”
Main pic: from left; Queen Alexandra Sixth Form College history teacher Steven Driver with 17-year-old A-level learners Harry Smith, Kyran Brady, Kaldyne Field and Connor Burgess
A Weston College student who trained in plastering after being made redundant has launched his own business and discovered an ability in 16th Century skills.
Dan Garner, aged 32, recently completed his level two plastering diploma at the college’s construction and engineering centre of excellence (CECE).
It was there that lecturers found his ability with the 500-year-old skill of pargetting, which uses plaster of Paris mixed with hemp to sculptural effect.
Father-of-three Dan, 32, said: “I was made redundant from a printing company and decided I wanted to work for myself.
“I found plastering easy and then discovered my niche with this creative work.
Plastering lecturer Barry Allford said: “I made a musical note on the wall and Dan then created a cherry blossom branch. I have not seen talent like this in all my
years here.”
Main pic: from left; Dan Garner and Weston College plastering lecturer Barry Allford at work
Colleges risk failing their Ofsted inspections if they are not engaging effectively with employers, Ofsted chief inspector Sir Michael Wilshaw has warned.
During questions from the House of Commons Education Select Committee this morning on the education watchdog’s annual report in December, Sir Michael warned inspectors were going to be “more critical” of poor employer engagement by colleges.
Responding to a question from Labour MP Alex Cunningham about incentives for colleges to engage with business, Sir Michael said they risked an inadequate rating.
He said: “That’s such an important question because apprenticeships aren’t going to work unless employers get heavily involved, and some of the classroom-based courses that these FE institutions are running don’t go well because employers are disengaged.
“When we go to a really successful college, they have really strong links with local employers, local chambers of commerce, Leps [local enterprise partnerships] and so on, they go out of their way for youngsters who are demotivated, lacking in confidence.
“We are going to be a lot more critical of the FE sector and colleges in particular if they’re not doing that. They will fail their inspection if they don’t do it.”
The annual report had painted a mixed picture for FE and skills, highlighting a rise in the proportion of good or outstanding providers while also pointing to one-in-six learners at less than good providers.
It said that in 2013/14, 3.2 million learners were at grade one or two providers because 81 per cent of providers were judged to be good or outstanding at their latest inspection — compared with 72 per cent the previous year and 64 per cent as at August 31, 2012.
And Ofsted director of FE and skills Lorna Fitzjohn told MPs today she wanted a new system to help colleges engage with smaller companies.
She said: “We see large employers, and even medium-size employers engaging, and colleges have had some success in that, but what there hasn’t been success in is engaging in small and medium employers within that. There has to be some kind of structure, some kind of brokerage to encourage them.”
See FE Week edition 126, dated Monday, February 2. for more coverage of the committee hearing — plus analysis of the sector’s 2014/15 Ofsted results so far.
Apprenticeship starts in the 16 to 18 age group were up by almost 9,000 in the first quarter of 2014/15 versus the same period last year, provisional figures released today have revealed.
But the apparent increase could be explained by problems with reporting learner data through the Skills Funding Agency’s Funding Information System (Fis) during the reporting period relating to the 2013/14 numbers. Final figures for the August to October 2013 period showed 54,400 starts for under 19s.
The provisional figures further show that all-age apprenticeship starts between August and October last year stood at 147,500, an increase of almost 40,000 from the provisional 108,800 reported the previous year. But again, the 2013/14 August to October figures ended up actually being 130,300 starts.
Traineeship data was also released today, showing 5,000 starts in the first quarter of 2014/15 (August to October), compared to 3,300 in the first two quarters of 2013/14.
A “lack of understanding” about salaries has been blamed on careers guidance failings after research released today showed teenagers under-estimated pay in skilled sectors by almost 40 per cent.
The research marked the launch of this year’s Vocational Qualification (VQ) Day awards, which celebrate the achievements of vocational learners and aim to raise awareness of non-academic options.
Image and figures supplied by Edge Foundation
However, the research, conducted by VQ Day organisers the Edge Foundation, revealed many young people did not know how much they could earn in technical or skilled roles.
In 2014, the sector with the highest annual earnings was electricity, gas, steam and air conditioning supply — but only one-in-six teenagers guessed it was even in the top three. What’s more, they thought average earnings would be around £23,000 — nearly £15,000 below the true median figure of £37,922.
Association of Colleges (AoC) president Richard Atkins said poor careers advice was responsible for young people’s inaccurate expectations.
“It is not surprising there is a lack of understanding around salaries. Careers guidance and advice is currently failing young people in this country,” he said.
“If, as a country, we are going to increase the number of young people opting for professional and technical education and choosing apprenticeships then we must improve careers education in schools.
Mr Atkins’s comments follow the creation of a “careers company” announced by Education Secretary Nicky Morgan last month with the aim of building links between schools and employers.
However, Mr Atkins called for advice to go one step further. “We would like to see the establishment of a careers hub in each local area, supported by schools, colleges, universities, local councils, employers and Jobcentre Plus to ensure that everyone has access to the high-quality impartial advice they deserve,” he said.
The Association for Employment and Learning Providers (AELP) agreed. “This illustrates why England should have an integrated all-age careers service with the Department for Education and Department for Business Innovation and Skills presiding over a single structure built around the services of the National Careers Service which parents and young people can access,” said a spokesperson.
Edge Foundation chief executive Jan Hodges OBE warned it was “essential” that young people were encouraged to take up vocational training.
“With the cost of education at an all-time high, future salaries are more important than ever to the majority of teens,” she said.
“But our research highlights a worrying gap in both theirs and their parents’ understanding around earnings. A skilled workforce is essential to the UK economy and high quality vocational routes need to be encouraged – not just for the personal fulfilment they bring but also the lucrative financial opportunities they offer.”
This year’s VQ Day on June 10 will be the eighth annual celebration of vocational qualifications, and nominations for the awards recognising outstanding vocational learners, employers and teachers open today. Visit www.vqday.org.uk/vq-awards by May 1 to nominate.
Approval of FE sector leadership and management has declined since last year, according to the results of an Education and Training Foundation (ETF) survey released today.
The survey revealed that 44 per cent of the 255 respondents thought the standard of leadership and management in the sector was good or very good, while 22 per cent rated it as bad or very bad.
In the previous survey, conducted in February, more than half (52 per cent) of respondents gave a positive response to leadership and management, while only 7 per cent had a negative response.
The survey report (pictured below right) said: “The difference between the two surveys may be due in part to the higher proportion of teachers and trainers in this year’s sample as there was considerable variation in the response depending on job role — 58 per cent of Principals or Chief Executives responded positively on the standard of “leadership and management” compared to just 28 per cent of Teachers and Trainers.”
Among teachers and trainers, 36 per cent rated leadership and management as bad or very bad as did 24 per cent of middle/functional managers, while 9 per cent of principals and chief executives and 7 per cent of senior managers did.
Almost 60 per cent of respondents thought professional standards within the sector were very good or good.
This is the same as last year’s survey, although this year, the percentage saying very good (10 per cent) was more than double that of the previous survey (4 per cent).
A third of respondents thought sector governance was very good or good although well over half did not know or gave a neutral response — this compares to 38 per cent giving a positive response in the previous survey. Of the 12 governors who responded, all but two gave a positive response.
More people are now aware of the ETF, launched in August 2013, the survey also revealed.
In February last year, 78 per cent of those who responded to the survey knew about the ETF — this went up to 90 per cent this year.
The survey also found three quarters of respondents were are ‘very likely’ or ‘likely’ to use the ETF’s services and 90 per cent of those who have previously engaged with the organisation would do so again, as would 63 per cent of those who have not.
Olivia Dorricott (pictured below), ETF director of leadership, management and governance, said: “It’s great to see that awareness of the ETF’s role and remit has risen significantly since we carried out our initial perception survey in the spring.
“Overall, the Perceptions Survey provides a positive and encouraging picture of our first year. Those of you who have engaged with us report consistently high satisfaction rates, often well in excess of 70 per cent.”
Eight out of ten respondents were ‘very aware’ or ‘quite aware’ of the ETF’s role and remit, compared to 63 per cent in February.
However, the survey also revealed low levels of awareness of the some of the ETF’s programmes, including governance and clerks support programmes, foundation online learning, the leadership register and FE advice.
Ms Dorricott said: “We clearly need to do more to achieve whole sector awareness of the range of programmes and support we offer, and will be striving to improve our communications reach in order to achieve that.
“Resources such as FE advice, foundation online learning and the leadership register are very popular with users, but the results indicated that awareness of these is still not high enough.
“We will be working hard to promote these more effectively, using all the communications channels at our disposal.”
Following feedback from the last survey, Ms Dorricott added, the ETF has made alterations to its website, such as changing fonts and colours which survey respondents said were hard to read.
Review of non-GCSE English and maths kicks off
The Education and Training Foundation (ETF) is tomorrow launching its review of teaching and accreditation of maths and English for learners unable to reach D grade GCSE.
The review, entitled Making maths and English work for all, is chaired by former Highlands College principal professor Ed Sallis and is expected to close on February 24 with the findings due out the following month.
It will look at how non-GCSE maths and English qualifications are understood by employers, how well they meet their needs, and how they might become validated qualifications with large scale recognition across the population.
It comes as learners who record a D in English and maths at GCSE will, from August, have to retake in pursuit of an improved grade, while those who get an E or below can try alternative qualifications in the hope of getting a C grade equivalent.
Professor Sallis said: “GCSE is a recognised brand among employers and the public. Government policy is to enable as many young people as possible to have the chance to achieve GCSE maths and English, at grade C or above, at 16 or shortly thereafter.
Professor Ed Sallis, OBE
“However for many groups of learners, GCSE retake is not the most appropriate route for acquiring the relevant skills.”
The ETF will not be reviewing GCSEs, rather, their alternatives, including Functional Skills — already the subject of an Ofqual review — and has called on employers, practitioners and learners to contribute to the consultation stage.
The review was announced by Skills Minister Nick Boles at the Association of Colleges (AoC) conference on November 18: “I have asked the ETF… to work with employers, colleges and awarding bodies to understand what kind of English and maths qualifications might give those who are not able to pass GCSEs a certificate of real value — something that is emphatically not a soft option, something practical and relevant but demanding.”
The review will include online surveys with employers, practitioners and stakeholders, in depth telephone interviews, workshops with a range of organisations and learners and webinars.
“With this review we are working to establish what kind of improvements might be needed to make sure non-GCSE English and maths qualifications have labour market respect,” said Professor Sallis.
“This means equipping people with relevant skills, being taught well, being accessible to learners at all starting points, and enabling steps to higher level learning.”
“I encourage anyone with an interest to contribute.”
Ofqual has issued a four-point improvement plan for awarding organisations (AOs) in a bid to make Functional Skills qualifications “more valid and more reliable”.
The qualifications watchdog today published the report on its review, launched last year, of level two English and maths Functional Skills, which concluded that they “need to be improved”.
The report said AOs had already responded “positively” to findings that action needed to be taken to improve the quality of assessment materials and reduce the risk of malpractice and maladministration. The report also said AOs needed to strengthen standard-setting procedures and evaluate better how far qualifications were meeting user needs.
“The majority of improvements will be in place by this summer,” it added. “We are also taking action to make sure standards are more consistent between different awarding organisations.”
Jeremy Benson (pictured), Ofqual executive director for vocational qualifications, said: “We take the quality of Functional Skills qualifications very seriously and have high expectations of the AOs that offer them.
“The changes awarding organisations are making should result in real and visible improvements to Functional Skills assessments — making them more relevant and more reliable.
“We will follow up on these changes and if we find that qualifications don’t meet our requirements, we will take further action.”
The Ofqual review included investigation of the Functional Skills offer in each of the 13 AOs that run the 28 level two English and maths qualifications.
The report, entitled Improving Functional Skills Qualifications, outlines how City & Guilds and Pearson “dominate” on Functional Skills, controlling almost 80 per cent of the market, and highlights how the total number of certificates issued has gone up from nearly 300,000 in 2010/11 to more than 1m in 2013/14.
Kirstie Donnelly MBE, UK managing director at City & Guilds, told FE Week: “We welcome Ofqual’s feedback which enables us to review and improve our qualifications to ensure our learners get the best possible outcomes.
“However, as we have noted in our recent Sense and Instability report we caution against change for change’s sake as learners and employers need stability to have confidence in measures of attainment.
“We have established a demand for the credible and valuable role of Functional Skills, reflected in the delivery figures the report highlights.
“We look forward to the ongoing and important contribution Functional Skills will make to improving the maths and English skills of learners and the overall functional literacy of the UK workforce.”
A spokesperson for Pearson said: “We have been working with Ofqual following their thematic review of Functional Skills, and welcome the opportunity to ensure that these qualifications continue to provide a valuable demonstration of a learner’s skills in literacy, numeracy and ICT.
“We will continue to work with Ofqual to make these changes to our qualifications and will be keeping our customers fully up-to-date as we progress.”
A spokesperson for the Education and Training Foundation, which today launched its review of teaching and accreditation — including Functional Skills — of non-GCSE maths and English for learners unable to reach D grade GCSE, said: “It is very helpful to have this Ofqual review of Functional Skills qualifications.
“It provides additional data for our Making maths and English work for all review [click here to take part]. We are working closely with Ofqual as partners in our review.”
The review marks a turnaround for Functional Skills, which were increasingly being seen as mere “stepping stones” toward GCSEs by some, including former Skills Minister Matthew Hancock. They were even due to be removed as a requirement for apprentices in favour of GCSEs from 2017.
But Skills Minister Nick Boles, describing Functional Skills as “important” as he appeared at an FE Week fringe event at Conservative Party Conference late last year, pledged to work with Ofqual on improving elements of the qualification, including the branding. He said he wanted to make the them “legitimate, valid, respected and admired”.
David Hughes, chief executive of the National Institute of Adult Continuing Education (Niace), said: “We welcome the work Ofqual is doing to improve the quality of these important qualifications. It is vital that they are understood and valued by learners and employers, the quality of the qualification itself and the way it is taught are both important parts of that.”
A further Ofqual review of Functional Skills was due in the autumn, it said in the report, following up on changes made by AOs and to check they were meeting regulatory requirements.
“We will not limit this to level two English and maths, but will look across all subjects and levels. Where there is evidence that our requirements are not being met, we will consider formal regulatory action,” it said.
“Poor Ofsted results are also often related to funding. When a college is expending all its energy on balancing the books, it is easy to take your eye off the ball with quality of learning,” said Mr Igoe (pictured left).
