Latest news from FE Week

FE has its power structure completely upside down

There are lessons like cleaning your teeth, washing, and cooking that everyone has to learn in life. But a lesson that comes only to some can reveal the secret of the true nature of power. Many worship power. Many more strive for it and spend much of their lives chasing after it. But power always resides elsewhere, however much responsibility your job gives you. This truth applies to every head of FE department, curriculum manager, middle and senior manager in education. It applies even to the most powerful person you can imagine on earth – even the American President, or the Pharoah of Egypt himself was at the mercy of untamed external forces; the markets, the electorate, the climate or even their own partner. Every one of us is just riding the tiger.

The only real power any of us really has is the power to influence another person.

This realisation can shift the way one sees educational institutions. The whole purpose and focus of what we do throughout education is about maximising the influence we have on those in our classrooms. Everything is supposed to focus on that. That’s why the teacher stands where the rubber hits the road, where the needle hits the groove. It is not done in consultants’ apparently revolutionary programmes, nor in long management meetings or inspectors’ curt briefings. Not even in dubious ministerial appointments. Education happens where a teacher influences a student.

The manager’s only real power is exercised through how far they can influence the teacher, who in turn influences the student. And so on throughout the whole system, the government minister influences the inspector, who influences the principal, who influences the manager, who influences the teacher, who influences the student. Therefore the further you get from the classroom, the more remote you become from the centre of real educational power. This turns everything upside down.

Thinking that promotion means moving ever closer to the centre of power is a fallacy. Those ambitious enough to be promoted learn this quickly if they have eyes to see. The further you get from the actual classroom, the further you also find yourself from real educational influence so the more theoretical and abstract your contribution to the whole thing becomes. That can come as a surprise. Education is not a pyramid which people ascend up to power but a vast inverted pyramid, with students at the top and each layer increasingly removed from them beneath.

Properly seen, colleges should not be conceived of according to the usual style of organisation shaped by ambition and status. Management theories can deceive us here. Education is not really a power or business transaction, even if it is sadly now often reduced to a cost equation in which the money that’s required to oil the whole process becomes king.

In fact, every educational professional who is not a teacher is merely at the service of the teacher, who is at the service of the student. Every initiative should be there to aid the teacher. The student is king, the teacher chamberlain. This may sound counterintuitive., but one of the Pope’s titles is ‘servant of the servants’. That seems an appropriate way for managers in education to view themselves too.

At several points in my career, I’ve taken on management responsibilities which have reduced my contact time. I well remember the feeling of relief that has accompanied such reductions. Spreadsheets sometimes seemed preferable to whiteboards. Less hassle. More predictable. More, dare I say, controllable. But every time I’ve laid those responsibilities down and happily returned to the classroom. While I was a manager of various sorts, I often felt like a fraud. It wasn’t simply imposter syndrome but the fact I was aware that I was trained, experienced and skilled to do one thing but then had to leave that behind to progress professionally within the same career by doing something else. But when I left the classroom, I was now supposed to know more about it than those who spent all their time there. That seemed a ridiculous situation to be in. It still does. Why do people who are removed from the classroom thereby gain supposed expert status in what happens there? Of course, the practitioners are the true experts. Everyone else is in the support team.

I wish it were seen this way more often. Instead of consultants, managers, advisors, inspectors and ministers being viewed as the true experts with voices that needs to be heard, they should be seen as the servants instead. They, after all, are supporting those who do the real work of education; the teachers. I think most of those in ‘power’ positions know this deep down. It causes the strange imposter feeling that they hide.

The worst managers sometimes seem to resent teachers, sometimes seeing them as the problem. Perhaps this is because of the limitation on power they come to represent. Teachers can come to be seen as awkward, a hindrance, just not doing what the manager wants them to. However, the best managers I’ve known have had profound respect for classroom practitioners, seeing their own role as helping teachers to better do their job.

The very best senior managers I know have sometimes tried not to leave the classroom and kept a foot in the door. I’ve known principals who have continued to teach and have regularly sat in on lessons, not to formally observe but just to see where the real work is being done. That has given them enormous credibility. Because the classroom is the only place in education where students are really influenced, whatever those with supposed power might say.

Help us to save Britain’s lost boys

Andy Burnham has entered Downing Street with a commitment to create ‘parity of esteem’ between academic and technical education. Admittedly this has been the goal of many politicians over the years.

But I know from his work in Greater Manchester that he is determined that all young people have a line of sight to a fulfilling career and that means creating opportunities and pathways for every young person.

When I spoke to young people across the country, as part of the report I co-authored: Inside the Mind of a Young NEET, I heard too many stories of a horrible school experience. Young people told me that college was the first time in many cases that they had been treated like an adult and found a sense of purpose.

Too many young men struggle with school or feel trapped in an educational environment that they say is too regimented and fixated with exams at all costs.

The numbers do not lie. Boys remain behind girls at every stage of the education system. When they enter the school gates for the first time, only 60 per cent of them will be school ready compared to 75 per cent of girls. By age 11, 66 per cent of girls met the expected standard compared to 59 per cent of boys.

At the end of key stage 4, 44 per cent of boys (47 per cent girls) in England are achieving grades 5 or above in English and maths, while 68 per cent of GCSEs (2024-25) taken by boys achieved a grade 4 and above compared with 73 per cent girls. Two years later boys take fewer A Levels.

In FE there is also a big gap, with 58 per cent of T Levels (2024-25) taken by 18-year-old men receiving a merit pass or above compared with 75 per cent of women who achieved those grades.

This data can no longer be ignored. That is why I have agreed to chair the Boys’ Education Commission, hosted by the Centre for Policy Research on Men and Boys (CPRMB).

The commission will examine how we bring up boys to flourish: how we show them that they are valued, how we give them a rich and varied education, how we ensure they have role models to look up to and how we prepare them to take their place as valued and successful members of society. We will look at ‘education’ in its widest sense. Not just narrow exam success, though that matters, but how boys grow up with the confidence and tools to flourish.

That is why this week we have put out a call for evidence. We want to hear from you whether you are a college CEO, a member of frontline teaching staff, a student, a parent, an apprentice, or a governor. What change do you want to see to ensure that boys thrive as well as girls?

What needs to be kept and nurtured and what changed or even discarded?

This cannot just be about more money, although that is important. It has to be about a fundamental vision for an education sector that can truly deliver the skilled workforce the country needs.

The survey that is at the heart of the Commission’s call for evidence can be accessed through this link: https://www.surveymonkey.com/r/68BZT7R or email your views to boysedcomm@menandboys.org.uk

Please share the survey with any colleagues who may also have important insights.

The closing date for survey responses is Monday 21st September 2026.

As well as this call for evidence, we will be conducting visits, convening a youth panel, showcasing conversations with a range of people, and asking the wider community for their views. If you want to be involved or host a visit, we would be delighted to hear from you.

So please get involved. The issue of Boys’ Education is too urgent to ignore. And this time we want to get it right.

Conversations about skills happen in echo chambers

There is no shortage of people willing to talk about the UK’s skills challenge. Barely a week passes without a conference, a roundtable, a consultation or a fresh report, and often the same familiar faces debating apprenticeships, technical education and productivity.

The passion is real and the intentions are good. Yet after years of this, many of the underlying problems sit stubbornly where they were. That raises an uncomfortable question: have parts of the skills sector started talking mainly to themselves?

An echo chamber is not just a room where everyone agrees. It is a place where the same ideas are reinforced by people who share the same assumptions, while outside views and inconvenient realities get too little airtime.

Inside it, proposals sound ever more convincing because everyone wants the same result, and a tidy consensus forms. But beyond that room, employers are deciding for entirely different reasons: customer demand, technological disruption, labour shortages, inflation and rising employment costs. They are investing in automation and AI because, frankly, they have little choice. None of those pressures pauses while another consultation runs its course.

We tend to assume that if government changes the funding rules, employers will recruit more apprentices; that if qualifications are redesigned, employers will engage; that if another campaign promotes vocational learning, young people will choose it. Our own research suggests it is rarely that simple. In the latest 5% Club skills gauge, only around a quarter of employers said the government’s recent reforms would make them more confident to invest in skills, and almost two-thirds said the new incentives to recruit young people would make no difference to what they actually do.

Employers do not take on apprentices because someone tells them they should. They do it because it makes commercial sense, and that distinction matters more than any single policy lever.

The economics have shifted too. Digital tools, AI and automation are reshaping jobs faster than education systems can keep up; while rising national insurance, wage inflation and tighter regulation have changed the cost of taking someone on. More than three-quarters of the employers we surveyed this spring feel business confidence, and the wider economy have worsened over the past year. Design skills policy without those forces in view, and we end up with answers that look elegant on paper and disappoint in practice.

This is why employer voice matters, not only the large, already-engaged organisations who turn up to everything. We need to hear from employers of every size and sector, including those who have looked at the skills system and chosen to stay out of it. Some of the most useful insight comes not from celebrating the firm that has just hired its tenth apprentice, but from understanding why the business next door has never hired one at all.

Even so, the appetite to invest is real when the case is right. Despite the caution, three-fifths of those same employers expect to grow their workforce in the year ahead, and three-quarters are confident they can recruit, develop and retain the people they need.

Our members, who between them employ well over two million people and support around 130,000 in earn-and-learn roles, keep showing that commitment. Yet even within that group, the decisions come back to commercial reality. The conversation is rarely about ideology. It is about capability, productivity, retention and return on investment, and that should shape the national debate.

We also need to widen the circle beyond the usual skills crowd. The workforce of the next decade will be shaped as much by economists, technologists, business leaders and investors as by educators and policymakers. AI will move occupational demand around, demographic change will alter who is available to work, and global competition will decide where businesses invest. If those voices are missing, we risk getting incredibly good at solving yesterday’s problem.

None of this is an argument against collaboration. If anything, it is the opposite: an argument for collaborating more widely, because the best ideas seldom come from a table where everyone already agrees. Government needs employers, employers need educators, large firms need SMEs, and all of it needs evidence on which you can rely.

Perhaps that is where the next chapter starts: with a little less certainty and a little more curiosity, and a willingness to test ideas against the real world before declaring victory. The UK’s skills challenge is too important to be left to an echo chamber. If we are serious about a stronger economy, better social mobility and the jobs of the future, every conversation must start somewhere different: not with what we hope employers will do, but with what makes it possible for them to do it. Get that right, and we might finally stop talking about change and start delivering it.

Apprenticeship units must become an employer-led success

Around three-quarters of businesses investing in AI are not getting the return they hoped for, according to a recent IBM survey of chief executives. The reason is rarely the technology itself – it is people: the leaders and teams who do not yet have the skills, or the confidence, to put AI to work. I hear this from employers almost every day.

At the same time, the apprenticeship budget is set to reach £3.3 billion in 2026-27. For all that potential investment, conversations about the levy too often feel like a chore. Spend it, transfer it, or lose it. At the same time, the government’s Employer Skills Survey showed that the percentage of employers offering training has dropped from 66 per cent in 2017 to 59 per cent in 2024. The opportunity is to reverse that decline by using the levy to build the capability businesses actually need.

No organisation can hire its way to AI transformation. Success depends on building capability across the whole workforce, from the senior people who set strategy and sign off the risk, to the teams putting AI tools to use day to day.

The employers already pulling ahead are the ones aligning their levy spend with their business priorities. They treat AI as a leadership and people challenge rather than just a technology project, and they invest accordingly. This is what turns a promising commitment to AI adoption into lasting productivity, and one-off training into productivity that sticks.

This is why the emerging reforms to the growth and skills levy matter. One of the most significant is the arrival of apprenticeship units: shorter, focused modules that give employers more flexibility and targeted development in priority areas. Three of the first seven units focus on AI leadership, covering strategy, governance, procurement, and organisational transformation.

This is good news. The people who set an organisation’s risk appetite and sign off its AI investment are often the least confident about the technology, and the least likely to commit to a full apprenticeship. A focused unit gives them an accessible, convenient way in and avoids employers being encouraged to use apprenticeships where is too long and doesn’t align with the learner’s job role or their ability to complete the programme.

Units will not fix everything though, and we should be honest about that. They will add to the skills system, not replace full apprenticeships. Critically, they must not become a backdoor to thinner, cheaper, lower-quality training. The apprenticeship quality requirements built up over the past decade exist for good reason, and they need to stay. The real value of a unit is as a gateway: a way for employers to engage with structured, quality training, and to see for themselves what deeper investment might deliver.

Their success will depend on two things above all. The first is how quickly the model evolves. As employers, learners, and providers start using units in practice, we need to gather feedback in real time and adapt, because AI is moving far too fast for the skills system to stand still.

The second is whether employers help to shape units rather than simply taking products off the shelf – they need to be genuinely employer-led, not formulated by well-meaning civil servants or ministers. The strongest apprenticeship standards have always been the ones employers built, and the same will be true here.

Units are only one part of a skills system that is evolving at every stage. From Alan Milburn’s review of young people and work, to the emergence of V Levels and the Francis review’s recommendations for schools and colleges, through to ensuring the growth and skills levy continues to support adults already in work, change is happening across the entire landscape. The real opportunity lies in joining these reforms together rather than treating them in isolation. Only then can the system deliver more than the sum of its parts.

The real prize in the growth and skills levy is not simply greater flexibility. It is the chance to reposition skills development as what it truly is: an opportunity, not a compliance chore. The organisations that thrive in the AI era will not be the ones that spend the most on technology. They will be the ones that invest most effectively in their people.

Apprenticeship units are the latest chance to do exactly that, and we should embrace them, and help to shape them.

Jacqui Smith reappointed minister for skills

Jacqui Smith has been reappointed as skills minister in prime minister Andy Burnham’s government, retaining her joint role across the Department for Education and the Department for Work and Pensions.

Number 10 confirmed Baroness Smith’s reappointment as a DfE and DWP minister this evening. FE Week understands she will retain the skills brief she has held since July 2024.

She will continue to work across two departments, responsible for apprenticeships and adult skills at DWP and 16-19 further education and higher education at the Department for Education.

Work and pensions secretary Pat McFadden was reappointed yesterday. Burnham appointed Lucy Powell to replace Bridget Phillipson as education secretary.

Alongside McFadden, Smith’s reappointment provides some continuity as ministers battle stubbornly high youth unemployment. She will also play a key role in Burnham’s pledge for parity of status between academic and technical learning across the education system.

Before becoming prime minister, Burnham clashed with Smith over skills devolution while serving as mayor of Greater Manchester. He called DfE his “biggest frustration” and warned that its resistance to giving mayors greater control of skills funding risked becoming “anti-growth”.

Smith later acknowledged “tension” with mayors and said there was potential to devolve more, but ruled out handing them full control of 16-to-19 funding.

Fellow DfE minister Georgia Gould and DWP minister Andrew Western have also been reappointed, though their portfolios have not been confirmed.

As Smith sits in the House of Lords, ministers from DfE and DWP who are MPs respond to further education and skills-related questions in the House of Commons.

For DfE, that role had fallen to Josh MacAlister. He has so far not been given a government job. For DWP, that role has been shared between McFadden and Western.

Smith is the only Lords minister at the DfE, meaning she is also responsible for representing all of the department’s policy areas in the upper chamber.

Smith and Burnham previously served together in Gordon Brown’s cabinet between 2007 and 2009, when she was home secretary and he held posts including chief secretary to the Treasury and culture secretary.

Meanwhile, Phillipson remains in cabinet as minister for women and equalities. In a machinery of government change announced earlier today, the equalities office was moved to the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government.

Elsewhere, former defence secretary John Healey was appointed chancellor of the exchequer yesterday. Healey served as adult skills minister between 2001 and 2002, his first government post, before moving to the Treasury.

Movers & Shakers: Edition 543

Who is Lucy Powell? 10 facts about the new education secretary

Lucy Powell has been appointed secretary of state for education by new prime minister Andy Burnham as he forms his first cabinet.

Taking over from former education secretary Bridget Phillipson, Powell is the tenth person to hold the role in 10 years.

As we await details of how Burnham’s government will approach education policy, here’s what we know about the minister who will deliver it…

1. She’s Mancunian

She was born and raised in Manchester.

A Labour Party bio says she is a “proud Mancunian” whose politics “were shaped growing up in the North under Thatcher”.

2. She’s from a family of teachers

Powell’s mother was a headteacher.

“I’m from a family of teachers,” Powell told Schools Week in 2015. “Practically everyone in my family is a teacher, apart from my dad, who is a social worker.”

Her parents were also active Labour supporters, and she joined the party at just 15.

“My mother went into labour on election day and refused to have me until she’d voted,” she told an interview with Vogue in January. “We are a very Labour family.”

3. Powell is state educated

Born in Moss Side in 1974, she attended Didsbury state schools Beaver Road Primary School, and Parrs Wood High School.

She studied A Levels at Xaverian College, a large Roman Catholic sixth form in central Manchester.

She excelled academically, taking maths, further maths, physics and chemistry. She was singled out by a teacher who encouraged her to apply for Oxbridge, and was reportedly the only pupil in her year to get an offer from Oxford.

4. She left Oxford after a year

Powell cried when she found out she’d secured a place to study chemistry at Somerville College, Oxford.

“I didn’t want to go at all,” she told GB News in 2021. “But what do you do? You’ve got an offer at Oxford, and everyone’s like ‘oh that’s amazing, that’s great’, so you’re on this treadmill.”

Once there, however, she felt “like a fish out of water” and left after her first year. “I was a state-educated, northern girl doing science. I couldn’t have been more a fish out of water, really.

“I’m sort of glad I went to see how the other half live in a way, but I didn’t thrive there at all.”

She transferred to King’s College London, where she completed her degree.

5. She spent time outside of politics

Powell reportedly considered a PhD but instead went into politics. After leaving university, she worked at Labour’s Millbank headquarters during its triumphant 1997 general election campaign, before spending two years working for MP Beverley Hughes.

She went on to spend the best part of a decade in public affairs, PR and campaigning roles at the Britain in Europe group and the National Endowment for Science, Technology and the Arts (Nesta).

6. She’s been an MP since 2012

Powell first ran at the 2010 general election as Labour candidate for Manchester Withington, but came second to incumbent Lib Dem MP John Leech.

She was elected as Labour MP for Manchester Central in a by-election in 2012 – a role she has held ever since.

She joined the opposition frontbench, holding roles as shadow childcare and early years minister, and later shadow minister for the Cabinet Office under Ed Miliband.

In 2015, Miliband made her vice-chair of the 2015 UK general election campaign. It would be one of Labour’s heaviest defeats in decades. Powell later described it as “crushing and gutting”.

7. She backed Burnham as leader a decade ago

In the 2015 Labour Party leadership election, she nominated Andy Burnham in his second attempt at the job. But he was beaten by Jeremy Corbyn.

Powell has been a staunch advocate of Burnham and has praised his record as Greater Manchester mayor.

8. She was shadow education secretary

Powell has experience with the education brief.

Corbyn appointed her shadow education secretary in September 2015, replacing Tristram Hunt, who had served under Miliband.

During her tenure, she said investment in, and focus on, post-16 education is vital for young people getting decent jobs and for creating a productive economy.

She resigned from this role in June 2016, along with many other shadow cabinet members, to oppose Corbyn’s leadership.

9. Powell beat Phillipson in deputy leader race

Powell was appointed Leader of the House of Commons in July 2024, when Keir Starmer formed his first cabinet.

She was dismissed in September 2025. But a month later, in October 2025, she beat Bridget Phillipson in the race to become deputy leader of the Labour Party, following the resignation of Angela Rayner (her friend, and fellow Manchester MP).

Powell secured 87,407 votes – almost 14,000 more than Phillipson.

10. She loves Glasto

She lives with her two children, Katie and Tom, and adult stepson Joe, according to her interview with Vogue. Her children attend the same state school she did.

Her husband James Williamson is a doctor who works in emergency medicine. They have been married since 2009.

Her Vogue interview also revealed she’s been to Glastonbury 23 times.

‘I don’t teach English as a subject, I teach it as a lifeline’

From a Syrian refugee turned business graduate to a nursery worker who once lacked the confidence to try, FE Week revisits last year’s Mayor of London adult learning awards winners as nominations for the fifth edition close on Monday

When Hamzeh Moullem arrived in London from Syria in 2019, he spoke barely any English. Separated from his parents, he took on a paternal role when his younger brother joined him two years later while working full time in a restaurant to fund his studies at City of Westminster College. He rarely missed a class.

In November, he was announced in City Hall as the Mayor of London’s inspirational adult learner of the year, having completed a business HND with a distinction and secured a place at the University of West London to top it up to a degree.

“The learning has had a huge impact,” he said. “I now speak English with confidence, and I understand the UK business environment in a way that opens real opportunities for me.” His brother has since enrolled at college, which Moullem counts among the most rewarding parts of the journey.

Moullem (pictured, centre, above) was one of ten winners at the adult learning awards, the Mayor’s flagship celebration of the capital’s adult education sector, delivered with the support of Ascentis and FE Week as sponsors.

Nominations for this year’s awards have been extended to close on Monday, July 27 ahead of a City Hall ceremony in the autumn.

Over its first four years, the awards drew more than 1,000 nominations and recognised over 90 winners and finalists. Last year‘s round alone attracted 252 nominations across ten categories, whittled down to ten winners and ten highly commended runners-up.

Second chances

Judith Guarte Lee, who won the learning for professional progression award last year, moved to the UK from the Philippines five years ago after meeting her husband online in a support group for people with cerebral palsy. Attitudes to her disability had held her back from pursuing a careers at home. After ESOL classes and level 1 and 2 childcare qualifications at Redbridge Institute of Adult Education, she is now a childcare practitioner at an Ilford nursery with her sights on nursery management.

“I want to show my son that if you put your heart and soul into something, good things can happen,” she said.

Left to right:
David Coleman, assistant principal, Redbridge Institute of Adult Education
William Pickford, principal, Redbridge Institute of Adult Education
Judit Guarte-Lee,
Maria Sotiriou, assistant principal, Redbridge Institute of Adult Education
Rachel Harris, tutor, Redbridge Institute of Adult Education and Judith’s husband

Pictured left to right: David Coleman, assistant principal, Redbridge Institute of Adult Education, William Pickford, principal, Redbridge Institute of Adult Education, Judith Guarte-Lee, Maria Sotiriou, assistant principal, Redbridge Institute of Adult Education, Rachel Harris, tutor, Redbridge Institute of Adult Education and Judith’s husband

The category was so competitive that the judging panel took the unusual step of awarding all three remaining shortlisted nominees with highly commended status.

Among them was Shukria Wisa, denied schooling in Afghanistan, who taught herself how to read and write before joining Lewisham College’s entry level 1 functional skills English course. Another, 74 year old Rukiya Mukadam, a former GP living with dementia, rebuilt her digital confidence through Open Age courses ranging from touch typing to an introduction to AI.

Jennifer Flanigan, highly commended in the learner of the year category, took up British Sign Language in her fifties, despite eyesight problems and little confidence with technology, so she could hold meaninful conversations with her non-speaking son for the first time.

“Before I learned BSL, most of our communication was nods and pointing,” she said. “I felt shut out of his world.” She now sits as co-chair of governors at his Deaf school.

Keighly Luff took the learning for good work award after a facilities management apprenticeship at Chelsea FC, delivered by Capital City College, have her the confidence to speak up in meetings and mentor the club’s second apprentice. “This apprenticeship hasn’t just just changed my career,” she said. “It’s changed how I see myself.”

Teachers who’ve lived it

Several of the staff winners know their learners’ circumstances first hand. Iryna Hura arrived in London as a refugee from Ukraine and joined the ESOL teaching team at Hammersmith and Fulham’s adult learning and skills service. She researches trauma-informed teaching strategies in her own time and helps students with visa renewals and employability skills.

“I understand my students’ struggles, fear, loss, isolation, because I’ve lived them too,” she said. “I don’t teach English as a subject, I teach it as a lifeline.”

Darren Avery, strategic workforce development manager at London Ambulance Service, won the inspirational professional award for building apprenticeship pathways that have brought more than 2,500 apprentices into the service since 2017, including over 350 paramedics trained with a 90 per cent completion rate.

Employers and providers

Highways contractor Marlborough Highways took apprenticeship employer of the year for a programme targeting people not in education, employment or training, with all apprentices paid the London living wage.

West London College, where adults make up roughly 70 per cent of the student body, won the inclusive provider award, while Kundakala, a Camden charity teaching tailoring and sewing skills to women from ethnic minority and low-income backgrounds, won the outreach category.

More than 150 women have been through its co-designed programme, many launching businesses or returning to education.

What’s new for 2026

Higher education institutions are now eligible through the new participation and excellence in higher education award, recognising universities widening participation, strengthening progression pathways and supporting Londoners through higher education.

To make room, the two employer categories have been merged. The standalone apprenticeship employer of the year award, won by Marlborough Highways last year, has been folded into a single champion employer for skills and apprenticeships award covering training programmes, early careers engagement and apprenticeships.

The ten categories for 2026 are: inspirational adult learner of the year, learning for good work, learning for personal progression, the Ascentis award for distinguished provider of adult education, inclusive provider of adult education, inspirational tutor in adult education, inspirational professional in adult education, champion employer for skills and apprenticeships, participation and excellence in higher education, and the inclusive talent award for outreach and engagement into learning.

Nominations are made online at www.london.gov.uk/london-adult-learning-awards and close at 11.59pm on Monday 27 July. Winners, selected by a judging panel drawn from the capital’s adult learning sector, will be revealed at City Hall in the autumn.

Lucy Powell appointed education secretary

Lucy Powell has been appointed education secretary by prime minister Andy Burnham, returning to government less than a year after she was sacked by Keir Starmer.

The Labour deputy leader succeeds Bridget Phillipson, who had held the role since Labour entered government in July 2024 and who will remain in cabinet as minister for women and equalities.

Powell previously served as shadow education secretary between 2015 and 2016 and was a member of the Commons education committee from 2017 to 2020. She later served as leader of the House of Commons before being removed from government in September 2025.

In a post on X, Powell said she was “thrilled” to have been appointed education secretary.

“For me there’s no more important job for any government than making sure young people have the best education, the best opportunities and the best future they can. Lots to do and I look forward to getting started”.

During a debate on the technical and further education bill in 2016, Powell warned that “pernicious and deep cuts” to FE and technical education had caused lasting damage and left England behind international competitors on post-16 funding.

She also raised concerns about creating a binary divide between academic and technical education that would force 16-year-olds to choose between the two routes. Burnham has repeatedly stated his intention to raise the parity of technical education in his role as mayor of Greater Manchester and in the run-up to becoming prime minister.

As an education committee member, Powell worked on inquiries into apprenticeships, college funding and adult skills.

She will now inherit responsibility for colleges, 16-to-19 education, technical qualifications, major SEND reforms and higher education.

Her immediate post-16 challenges include overseeing the introduction of the first V Levels from September 2027, implementing new level 2 qualifications and managing continuing pressure over college finances, pay and workforce shortages.

Pepe DiIasio, general secretary of the Association of School and College Leaders, said: “Prime minister Andy Burnham has said that a ‘complete rethink’ of education is needed which builds parity between academic and technical routes and provides every young person with great opportunities. This is particularly important as we currently have one million young people who are not in education, employment, or training.

“However, a great deal of policy detail is needed about how to turn those aspirations into reality. School and college leaders are absolutely ready and willing to be part of that process and we look forward to working with the new administration to shape a fairer future.”

Responsibility for adult education, apprenticeships and Skills England was transferred from the Department for Education to the Department for Work and Pensions last September.

Powell will work alongside Pat McFadden, who has been reappointed as work and pensions secretary, to deliver the government’s post-16 education and skills reforms.

Appointments for ministers of state and junior ministers are expected in the coming days. Baroness Jacqui Smith currently holds the skills brief as a joint minister across DfE and DWP.

Powell was elected Labour deputy leader last year following her dismissal from government, with Burnham publicly supporting her campaign.

She studied for A Levels at Xaverian College, a Catholic sixth-form college in Manchester.

A spokesperson from the Sixth Form Colleges Association said: “Lucy is a longstanding champion of sixth form education and is a former sixth form college student. We know that the new secretary of state values, understands and appreciates the transformative power of 16-19 education and we look forward to working with her in the years ahead”.