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The proportion of colleges and independent learning providers (ILPs) ordered to improve by Ofsted is on the rise, FE Week research has found.

Sector bodies have raised concerns the trend in results so far this calender year versus the same period last year is evidence Ofsted has raised the benchmark for FE providers — or is failing to measure them appropriately.

Analysis by FE Week revealed of all 57 general FE colleges, sixth form colleges and ILPs inspected and reported on between January 1 and May 5, 33 per cent had their Ofsted rating changed to a grade three, or ‘requires improvement’. For the same period last year that figure stood at 17 per cent of 64 inspections.

The newly-awarded grade threes all represent a drop from a grade two, apart from the grade given to A4e last year, when it had worked its way back up to a grade three. The proportion of new grade one results fell 3 percentage points, with no new grade ones so far this year compared to two in the same period last year. And new grade two ratings as a proportion of inspection results fell from 50 per cent last year to 32 per cent, while the proportion of grade fours went from 2 per cent to 9 per cent.

For general FE colleges, 31 per cent of the 16 inspected and reported on so far this year dropped to a grade three, up from 22 per cent.

David Corke (pictured), director of education and skills policy for the Association of Colleges (AoC), said: “The current Ofsted framework doesn’t fully capture the scope of what colleges do and this is reflected in an increase in the number of ‘requires improvement’ grades given. Ofsted appears to have recognised this, which is why they’re introducing a new framework to inspect schools and colleges in the same way.”

Mr Corke said the new framework “should better assess the complexity of colleges”.

Of the 37 ILPs inspected and reported on this year, 30 per cent got a grade three — up from 17 per cent out of 29 the year before.

Association of Employment and Learning Providers chief executive Stewart Segal said: “Although the sample of recent inspections is quite small, it does seem that the Ofsted benchmark has been raised and a greater proportion of all providers are getting a grade three than last year. We have said for some time that the pressure on funding in terms of overall budgets and the fact that funding rates have not even kept pace with inflation means that it is really difficult for training providers to get grade one or two.

“Ofsted inspections have to reflect these external factors as well as being driven by success rates and elements such as safeguarding and ‘prevent’ requirements.”

He also called for Ofsted to place more emphasis on satisfaction survey results in its judgements. He added: “With providers under pressure from inspections, it will be important to manage the transition to the new common inspection framework later this year.”

Four sixth form colleges have been inspected and reported on since the beginning of the year and all but one (75 per cent) dropped to a grade three — while in 2014, this happened to just one out of the twelve (8 per cent) inspected. Sixth Form Colleges’ Association deputy chief executive James Kewin said it was “difficult to draw conclusions” from the four colleges and that he was “confident” the grade three colleges would “bounce back”. He added: “The picture for the whole academic year is likely to be less gloomy — we are aware of six colleges that have been inspected recently and their grades have not yet been published.”

An Ofsted spokesperson said: “We would caution against reading too much into inspection outcomes for such a short period.

“Since we aim to raise standards in the sector we prioritise those further education colleges and skills providers that are not yet good or better. We will inspect colleges and providers judged to require improvement within two years. In the meantime, inspectors offer challenge and support to help them provide a better service for learners.”

The figures show providers inspected between the same periods in both 2014 and 2015 where the report was also published within that period. They do not show providers inspected before January where the report was then released between January and May.

What does a grade three mean for providers?

Up until 2012, getting a grade three meant Ofsted saw you as satisfactory.

But since the last change to the Common Inspection Framework (CIF), a grade three means the provider “requires improvement”.

And if a provider gets too many grade threes in a row, Ofsted, under the current CIF has the power to brand them a grade four — inadequate.

Sliding from a grade one or two to a three also means the provider will no longer be eligible to take on new traineeships as a prime contractor — and also barred from the direct recruitment of 14 and 15-year-olds.

But a new, unified CIF, providing one framework for inspecting nurseries, schools and FE, is due to introduced from September.

And, as the unified CIF requires all grade two, or good, providers to be re-inspected at more frequent, three-year intervals, the opportunities to slip into grade three status will come around more often.

A merger between two failing and nearby South East London colleges could be on the table with the FE Commissioner considering both their futures, FE Week can reveal.

Dr David Collins has been sent into Greenwich Community College and Lewisham Southwark College in recent months after they both got disastrous grade four Ofsted results — the second in a row for Lewisham Southwark.

And while his recommendation of a structure and prospects assessment at Greenwich was made public in March, a Department for Business, Innovation and Skills spokesperson told FE Week he had recommended the same at Lewisham Southwark and that it was now under way.

The report of Dr Collins’ second Lewisham Southwark inspection has not been published, but the BIS spokesperson further revealed the two colleges, which have around 23,000 learners, had already entered into “discussions” with each other.

Greenwich principal Lindsey Noble, who took over after the inspection by Dr Collins, who placed the college into administered status amid concerns over provision and finances, said: “One option might be merger with a number of possible colleges, including Lewisham Southwark College, but a range of options will be considered.”

A spokesperson at Lewisham Southwark said information about its structure and prospects assessment had “been shared with staff”.

The assessments of the grade four colleges come amid calls for a review of FE provision in South East London in the same vein as the review underway in Nottingham, as revealed on feweek.co.uk this month [click here for more]. And the principals of two other South East London colleges also raised no objection to a review.

Shakira Martin, National Union of Students vice president-elect for FE and Lewisham Southwark students’ union president, said: “I would rather the commissioner focused on provision across the area rather than individual colleges. It could put issues faced by my college and Greenwich in better context.”

Further Education Trust for Leadership honorary president Dame Ruth Silver, a former Lewisham College principal, also backed an area-wide review. But she said: “I think any mergers would be wrong, as existing problems just get bigger with bigger colleges.

“The issues facing colleges in South East London stretch beyond FE, as our sector is missing out on funding to schools and universities for example. I would ultimately like Dr Collins to look at all education in that area and how it could work better overall.”

Danny Ridgeway, principal of grade two Ofsted-rated Bexley College, said: “There are clearly issues with quality in some South East London colleges. We do not object in principle to a review nor to the possibility of federations or mergers.”

Mark Silverman, principal of grade three Ofsted-rated Lambeth College, said: “If there was an area-wide review, then we would expect to contribute. We support anything that can contribute to improving FE.”

The BIS spokesperson said it would be for the new Government to decide whether to launch an area-wide review of South East London.

Keep grade four mess to a minimum

Between them, Lewisham Southwark College and Greenwich Community College have around 23,000 learners — or in Ofsted-esque parlance that many learners are in provision that is inadequate.

Their similarities in Ofsted grades, not to mention their close South East London proximity, might make the suggestion of merger appear logical.

But it’s a move that should not be taken lightly. As Dame Ruth says, we could just end up with one big grade four mess. Merger in itself is no solution — remember K College?

The situation, again as Dame Ruth puts forward, requires a wider view, and on this basis questions should be asked as to why such a review has taken place in Nottingham and not South East London.

The East Midlands city’s two colleges are both (relatively) mere grade three-rated providers and while finances are said to be an issue at one, exactly the same can be said of Greenwich.

It’s just over two years ago that, reporting in FE Week and armed with research on falling Ofsted grades, I asked if we had ‘a capital in crisis?’

So, with the new Government taking shape and potential new Skills Ministers being sounded out, we have an early request for the new post-holder. Give us a review.

 

News, updates and pictures from the eve of the election through to the formation of a new government.

The self-proclaimed ‘saviour of FE’ has been ousted in a disastrous General Election for the Liberal Democrats and Labour.

Former Business Secretary Dr Vince Cable became one of the most high-profile casualties of the General Election on Thursday (May 7) as he lost his Twickenham seat to the Conservatives.

The Liberal Democrat last October claimed to have fought off suggestions from civil servants in 2010 to cut budgets to a level that would have “killed off FE” — a claim later backed up by former Skills Funding Agency boss David Hughes, chief executive of the National Institute of Adult Continuing Education.

At the time of going to press, the Conservatives were widely being tipped to claim a majority with around 330 MPs.

Dr Cable, who had led the Department for Business, Innovation and Skills (BIS) for the past five years, was one of dozens of Liberal Democrats to lose their seats in Parliament.

The economist and former Lib Dem deputy leader was first elected to Parliament in 1997 and had increased his majority every year until 2010, when he won by more than 12,000 votes.

Another high-profile Lib Dem loss was education minister David Laws, who lost his seat in Yeovil. Liberal Democrat leader Nick Clegg was the only minister from his party to retain his seat, albeit narrowly.

Conceding defeat to Tania Mathias, who won 25,580 votes to Dr Cable’s 23,563, he said: “Thanks are due to a lot of other people, the people who organised this event, above all to my army of volunteers.”

He said the result was “no reflection” on the work of his team, adding: “The fact is we were hit by a very well-organised national campaign based on people’s fear of a Labour government and the Scottish nationalists.”

The result contrasted with a good night for the Conservatives who saw comfortable wins for Skills Minister Nick Boles and Education Secretary Nicky Morgan, who retained their seats in Grantham and Stamford, and Loughborough, respectively. Education Select Committee chair Graham Stuart was also returned to the House of Commons as an MP, reclaiming his Beverley and Holderness seat.

The FE and skills sector’s Labour contingent will also be back at the Commons. Shadow Business Secretary Chuka Umunna won Streatham and Shadow Education Secretary Tristram Hunt retook Stoke on Trent Central. Shadow Skills Minister Liam Byrne reclaimed the seat in Birmingham Hodge Hill, as did Shadow Junior Education Minister Yvonne Fovargue in Makerfield constituency.

And the party’s BIS Select Committee chair Adrian Bailey won West Bromwich West.

The University and College Union (UCU) has said it hopes FE Commissioner Dr David Collins’ city-wide review of vocational education under way in Nottingham could end “wasteful and unnecessary” competition between local providers.

The review, revealed exclusively by feweek.co.uk this month, could lead to the merger of two of the city’s biggest colleges, New College Nottingham (NCN) and Central College Nottingham.

The Nottingham branch of the UCU said the review was an “opportunity” — and one that “should not be wasted” — but said alternatives to a merger should be explored.

The review follows grade three Ofsted inspection results for both NCN and Central over the last year and the revelation, reported in FE Week on April 20, that New College Nottingham (NCN) plans for a multimillion pound campus revamp had to be saved by £12m funding from the local authority and Skills Funding Agency (SFA).

The first of four planned meetings, chaired by Dr Collins and involving governors from both colleges and both principals, is believed to have taken place on Monday, April 27.

A Nottingham UCU spokesperson called on the commissioner to ensure the review “enables meaningful participation in the review process by all stakeholders.”

He said: “UCU has long argued that the FE structures in the city need rethinking.”

He branded competition between providers in the city “unnecessary and wasteful”.

However, he said UCU was “neutral on the issue of merger”, but added combining NCN and Central was “only one option” and said “alternative propositions should be explored”.

“Research shows mergers do not necessarily result in better run, more stable colleges or better quality provision,” he said.

“This is particularly the case when mergers are undertaken for reasons of financial expediency.”

He added jobs should be protected in any possible merger. He also called for the review to put in place “a collaborative strategic structure”, which he said, “would be in a better position to pool resources and expertise”.

“The review is an opportunity for a broad collaborative effort that restores the democratic dimension of FE,” he said. “It is an opportunity that should not be wasted.”

Dawn Whitemore (pictured above left), principal of NCN, and Malcolm Cowgill (picture above right), principal of Central, issued a joint statement to their staff on April 28 confirming that Dr Collins had launched the review.

It said that both colleges had agreed to “participate actively” in the review and “share information and data openly”.

A spokesperson for NCN also told FE Week: “The review has been on the cards for some time and has been championed by Nottingham City Council.”

She added: “Both colleges welcome this review and will continue to work in partnership with all key stakeholders throughout the process.”

A Nottingham City Council spokesperson confirmed the council was involved with the city-wide review.

 

Stockport College has hit back at questions over its role as sponsor of Stockport Technical School after the announcement it would close a year earlier than planned.

More than 20 learners will have to be found schools elsewhere at which to complete GCSEs and other qualifications after the 14 to 19 free school announced it would close at the end of this academic year.

It was previously reported by FE Week that the school, which opened in the Wellington House office block in September 2013, announced in March it would close its doors in 2016, citing disappointing recruitment levels caused by the lack of a permanent building.

But principal Philippa Ollerhead this month confirmed the school would in fact close at the end of 2014/15 instead — forcing 22 Year 10 pupils to transfer to secondary schools in the area to complete their GCSEs and other qualifications, with an option to complete vocational courses at Stockport College on a day release basis.

And although Ms Ollerhead claimed the Education Funding Agency (EFA) had failed to find the school a home for its final year of operation, triggering the decision to close earlier than planned, she said ongoing problems at Stockport College, which was branded inadequate in October 2013, “didn’t help”.

“Stockport College is our sponsor and they have had a myriad of problems themselves and that hasn’t helped, but they have done the best they can,” she told FE Week.

But Simon Andrews (pictured), Stockport College’s third principal since January 2014, said the 7,000-learner institution, which has a current Skills Funding Agency allocation of £7.5m, was making “big strides”, having raised its grade to “requires improvement” following an inspection in December.

He said: “Our focus is on the wellbeing and progression of every student. We are working proactively with the Stockport Technical School to ensure all students have been placed in local schools.

“Stockport College has not failed in its duty as a sponsor. Issues outside the scope of the college, such as the failure to secure a permanent home for Stockport Technical School and the politics of local secondary schools have contributed to the situation.”

An EFA spokesperson said it had agreed to the school trust’s request to close as it was “no longer viable in the long-term”, but claimed it had found a permanent location for the school in 2014 with which its ruling trust decided not to proceed.

She added: “We and the trust are working with the local council to ensure alternative school places are found for pupils, ensuring a smooth transition.”

Ms Ollerhead said that although the former Hillcrest Grammar School site in Stockport was originally identified as a potential future base for the school, low pupil numbers meant the large building was “not a financially viable option”.

 

Awarding organisations have spelled out their “rigorous” anti-fraud measures for private security industry training after it emerged that 129 security guard licenses were set to be revoked after malpractice.

An undercover BBC investigation aired in March alleged staff at Ashley Commerce College (ACC), in Ilford, were prepared to sit exams for students training to work as security guards. It sparked a wider investigation into “fraudulent practices” at ACC by awarding organisation (AO) Industry Qualifications (IQ), which led this month to it revoking 251 level two and three door supervision and CCTV surveillance qualifications it had certificated for the provider.

And sector regulating body the Security Industry Authority (SIA) has now told FE Week that it had “started” revoking 129 licenses given out to security guards who passed the IQ courses at ACC.

Raymond Clarke, chief executive of IQ, said: “We carry out rigorous checks on providers. We actually visited ACC three times in the year leading up to these revelations, because of the high volume of qualifications they were giving out and they seemed to be a very good provider giving high quality training. Unfortunately, there was a back office there which we did not know about that was feeding a lesser number of fraudulent exams alongside the genuine ones. We passed on information about all 251 qualifications that were given out fraudulently to the SIA and police.”

A Metropolitan Police spokesperson said it was “working closely with the SIA” to investigate alleged fraudulent activity and the Home Office said it “will be informed of the outcome”.

ACC was unavailable for comment.

Other AOs that run door supervision and public space surveillance qualifications, provided by hundreds of independent learning providers and a number of colleges across the UK, said they had strict security measures in place. A spokesperson for Pearson said it carried out “unannounced spot checks on test days on providers offering our BTec security qualifications”.

Terry Bloor, Highfield Awarding Bodyfor Compliance quality assurance manager, said it placed “undercover mystery shoppers on full courses” and held “regular, unannounced audits”.

A City and Guilds spokesperson said: “We work closely with the SIA and Ofqual to make sure all centres use best-practice training methods.”

Dr David Hutchinson, deputy managing director of NOCN (previously the National Open College Network), said: “You have to be careful who you use as a training centre and we are very particular about checking them out.”

A Scottish Qualifications Authority spokesperson said it enforced “robust quality assurance processes”.

And IQ published proposals for regulatory reforms on its website following the ACC investigation. Its paper called on the SIA to issue licenses to trainers and directors/owners of private security industry training providers.

It added the SIA and exams regulator Ofqual should keep a record of centres and staff found guilty of malpractice for reference.

An SIA spokesperson said: “Any extension to the regulatory powers of the SIA would require primary legislation by parliament.”

An Ofqual spokesperson declined to comment on the proposals, but said: “We have been notified of this incident [involving ACC] and are keeping it under review.”

 

A long-forgotten collection of key documents hidden away in the dimly-lit basement of a Somerset lodge for nearly half a century before their chance discovery led to pride of place at a London institute — it’s certainly not your average FE and skills storyline, writes Paul Offord (pictured above).

But it’s one that stars New College Telford governor and Association of Colleges Governors’ Council member Graham Briscoe and a huge collection of records at the Institute of Education (IoE) that charts the history of FE dating back to the early 20th Century.

Almost 900 boxes stuffed with document upon document charting the development of FE over the last century would have been lost forever if it wasn’t for Mr Briscoe’s quick-thinking.

The collection of books, official reports and other archives had been part of the library at the former FE Staff College in Coombe Lodge, Somerset, which was a national training centre for sector leaders for more than 40 years from the 1950s.

The documents were stored in the basement and largely forgotten about after Coombe Lodge, which was built in 1932 by the Bristol-based cigarette-manufacturing Wills family, closed as a training centre in 2002 and was turned into a privately-run conference and wedding venue.

Graham Briscoe, who was a governor at that time for Coleg Gwent, in South Wales, and City of Bath College, came across them in 2008, during a lunch break while working there as a Saturday conference porter.

He recalled how his quick thinking, after the building changed hands in 2009, saved what is now known as The Coombe Lodge Collection from being dumped.

“I had been developing a portfolio of housing association non-executive directorships and governorships at colleges after retiring (as operations support leader for insurance company the Royal Sun Alliance Group), but had nothing to do on a Saturday, so took on the conference porter job and was fascinated to find the archive in the basement,” said Mr Briscoe.

“I used to spend my lunchtimes opening up boxes and reading through the papers, as I’m a bit of a heritage nerd like that.”

But he said: “I heard that the new company that took on Coombe Lodge was going to have a clear-out and throw all the boxes in a skip. I thought ‘No you’re not’ and got to work on a rescue plan.”

Mr Briscoe asked his friend Mick Fletcher, who was head of training at Coombe Lodge from 1989 until 1995, to accompany him to the basement to check through the boxes and make sure they were worth saving.

“The library at Coombe Lodge basically went when it closed as a training centre and I wasn’t aware of how many of the records had been retained,” said Mr Fletcher.

“It was really fortunate that Graham knew they were there. I saw straight away what an important historical record they were for our sector and wanted to help.”

Mr Fletcher, a regular FE Week expert and member of the Policy Consortium, put Mr Briscoe in touch with the IoE, in London, which agreed to take on the archive that includes many FE-related local authority and government documents and reports published by the now defunct Association of Technical Institutions (ATI) and Association of Colleges for Further and Higher Education (ACFHE) dating back to the turn of the 20th Century.

Mr Briscoe also secured around £500 funding from the Learning and Skills Improvement Service (LSIS) to fund the hire of a white Ford Transit van and petrol to transport the boxes to the IoE.

“After getting the funding, I decided to do the move myself as quickly as possible,” said Mr Briscoe.

“I had to carry each box up a winding turret-style staircase from the basement and across a corridor to a door where the van was parked.”

He added: “There were far too many boxes to fit in the van, which I then drove to London, so I had to do it in two journeys over two weekends. I was really happy to save what’s a very important archive of the history of the sector.”

Paul Grainger, co-director of the centre for post-14 research and innovation at IoE, took charge of the collection after it was dropped-off by Mr Briscoe.

He said: “It took Dr Norman Lucas [IoE senior lecturer in post-compulsory education] and I a month to sift through the material and discard duplicate documents and books that we already had at the IoE.

“It was just the two of us, shirt sleeves rolled-up and late evenings, with books stacked in our offices, on the stairs, along the corridor. The health and safety people had the heeby jeebies.

“When we had whittled it down to a room full, we got it transferred to a small room at the library to await cataloguing.”

The IoE then secured another £12,000 funding from LSIS to pay professional librarian Stephen Pickles to catalogue all the items, before the collection was finally unveiled to the public in March 2013.

Main pic: Reporter Paul Offord in the Institute of Education vaults checking out a book from the Coombe Lodge Collection

Archives show how history repeats itself for the sector

Reporter Paul Offord delved into the Coombe Lodge collection to see what had changed in the sector over the last century and, in many, cases what had not.

They say history repeats itself and I was struck by a sense of déjà vu as I read through FE-related pamphlets and books dating back 100 years.

So many of the documents I discovered in the IoE library vaults, which were mostly published by Association of Colleges predecessor bodies the ACFHE and ATI, dealt with issues that I have become familiar with at FE Week.

A pamphlet documenting an ACFHE summer conference in June 1977, for example, indicated that problems with poor careers advice for school students about FE are nothing new. The historical report said that “there would be advantages in colleges establishing closer ties with schools, so that the content of college courses reflecting employers’ needs could be better understood”.

Sector leaders who think recent FE-related government reform proposals, for example aimed at encourage more employer-involvement with apprenticeships, have come too thick and fast for financially-constrained providers could also take solace from an ACFE booklet published in 1979.

The document, called Education and Training of 16 to 18s, warned that “government must be resistant to temptations to make changes where none are needed. There can be a high price to be paid for disruption of established systems”. It also noted a reluctance on the part of employers to support FE training schemes and concluded that “breakthroughs to achieve a positive employer attitude… may not be achieved without promotion by central government”.

Further Education Trust for Leadership president Dame Ruth Silver, who trained at Coombe Lodge in the 1980s and signed-off around £13,000 of funding for the Coombe Lodge Collection while LSIS chair, said the lesson for policy-makers was to take note of the cyclical nature of FE. “I was delighted that the collection was saved because it charts our sector’s history. People don’t realise how much of what we are talking about now has been done or discussed in the past, “she said.

Another example of a recurring issue faced by the sector is the question of what balance should be struck between teacher-based and technology-enhanced learning. Skills Minister Nick Boles provoked controversy by announcing in January that he would not be enforcing the FE Learning Technology Action Group’s recommendation that 10 per cent of all course content should be delivered online. James B Thomas had an earlier stab at addressing the thorny ‘teacher versus tech’ debate in a 1967 ATI pamphlet called Learning Packages for Technical Education.

He proposed incorporating film slides, education TV, audio tapes and “teaching machines” into lessons and said it was “not a plan to replace lectures but a scheme to improve their effectiveness”.

And sector staff of today who feel frustrated by breakdowns in the government’s online data collection systems might take solace in how much more labour-intensive the process used to be.

A 1967 ATI booklet, called The Administration of Technical Colleges, said: “At certain times of the year, the 650 colleges have to ask small armies of young women to extract data from the records… count them and then to make marks on pieces of paper either by hand or typewriter. Once sent through, the authority has to use a small army of women to take the marks from the returns and make other marks to process them.”

It added that “if means could be found whereby the data in the college records could be extracted from them automatically, then indeed we should be getting somewhere”.

And a sobering picture of the sector, it staff and learners, emerges from the 1917 ATI yearbook. It said that many people associated with colleges had been “called up to join His Majesty’s Forces” to fight in First World War. “All the institutions in the Association have been affected more or less,” it said.

“The principals and governing bodies have done all that in them lay to answer the call of the country [by] providing the best men and as many of them as possible for the defeat of the common enemy.”

The ATI and Association of Principals of Technical Institutions also produced a pamphlet in 1938, in preparation for the Second World War, entitled Air Raid Precautions in Technical Institutions.

It said: “A blackout may be imposed at certain times. The memorandum is issued without prejudice to the question of whether or not ordinary evening classes should be kept up in the event of the outbreak of war.”