A former “apprentice principal” has taken the reins at Great Yarmouth College (GYC).
Stuart Rimmer has left the director of quality and enterprise role he held for seven years at Lancaster and Morecambe College (LMC) to become a first-time principal in Norfolk.
The 38-year-old takes over following the retirement of Penny Wycherley, who became Great Yarmouth College principal three years ago, and having learned the principal trade from his previous employers.
“I served a great ‘apprenticeship’ for this new role under David Wood, principal at LMC,” said Mr Rimmer, previously Newcastle College’s programme manager for business, accounting and law.
“The journey that LMC went on in terms of finance, quality and curriculum development and the improvement in leadership was tremendous.
“It was excellent being a part of one of the success stories in Lancashire and I hope to apply some of that learning to my new post in Norfolk.”
Ms Wycherley, a former deputy chief executive at Eastleigh College and principal at South Kent College, joined GYC “for six months” in January 2011, but stayed on to lead the college from its inadequate Ofsted rating of late 2010 to last year’s good result.
“Working with the staff and students at GYC has been a pleasure and a privilege,”
she said.
“When I came here, it is was because I like a challenge and because I had met the staff and management team and believed they were committed to creating a good college at the centre of its community.
“While I have been here I have grown to love Great Yarmouth, a community with heart. I will leave with so many good memories and pride in what the team I have worked with has done.
“Their response to growing training to meet employers’ needs and to making a difference to the community is unrivalled and I look forward to hearing the impact of this as Great Yarmouth flourishes.”
Meanwhile, Brian Keenan has been appointed chief executive of Hertfordshire London Colleges Consortium (Hertvec) in Saudi Arabia. The consortium was awarded a £225m contract by the Kingdom’s College of Excellence programme in April to open three colleges in the Qassim and Riyadh Provinces this month.
He has held educational roles at Saudi Arabia’s King Fahd University of Petroleum and Minerals, British Aerospace and the Higher Colleges of Technology (HCT), in the United Arab Emirates, among others.
Mr Keenan, who has been based in the Middle East for nearly three decades, said: “Countries in the Middle East and North Africa region face serious employment challenges for their young populations.”
He added: “As incoming chief executive, I am honoured and excited by the challenges that lie ahead.”
Chairman of the board Andy Forbes, principal of Hertfordshire Regional College and president of the Hertfordshire London Colleges, said: “I am delighted that Brian
has been appointed. His knowledge and expertise from working across the Middle East will provide us with unrivalled leadership and insight.”
The Junior Shadow Minister for Education Rushanara Ali has stepped down after refusing to take part in yesterday’s vote on military action in Iraq.
The Labour MP who had responsibility for young people on the opposition’s front bench said she was concerned civilians would be caught in the crossfire.
Parliament was recalled yesterday to vote on whether or not to launch air strikes on Islamic State (Isil) fighters in Iraq.
Ms Ali wrote to Labour Leader Ed Miliband ahead of the vote, saying: “There can be no doubt that the actions of ISIL are horrific and barbaric, and I share the revulsion that everyone in our country feels towards them.
“However, I am not confident that this military action will be effective in the short-term in just targeting the terrorists and not harming innocent civilians.”
She added that she also did not believe that there was “a credible long-term strategy”.
She said serving as a shadow education minister had been “a privilege” and she had come to the decision with “regret” but that she could not, in conscience, support the motion to go to war.
No replacement for her has yet been announced.
Ms Ali represents Bethnal Green and Bow, a constituency with a large Muslim population and is herself a Muslim.
“I know that British Muslims stand united in the total condemnation of the murders that ISIL have committed,” she said.
“However, there is a genuine belief in Muslim and non-Muslim communities that military action will only create further bloodshed and further pain for the people of Iraq.”
She added that, “despite good intentions, too many mistakes have been made” in Iraq through “misconceived actions” by the UK and other countries.
In his reply to her resignation letter, Mr Miliband said: “I know that you have thought long and hard about this.
“I respect your decision.”
He added that she had “served with real distinction” as a shadow minister and described her as “someone with great ability and talent”.
Ms Ali will continue to represent her constituency.
A Labour Party spokesperson said Ms Ali’s replacment would be announced “in due course”.
FE Week profiled Ms Ali when she first became Shadow Education Minister in October last year. Click here to read it
Labour leader Ed Miliband’s 2014 conference address has prompted FE and skills sector questions about figures behind his pledge to bring the number of apprenticeship starts up in line with those at university.
In his speech in Manchester on Tuesday, Mr Miliband said he wanted the same number of school-leavers to go on to apprenticeships as university by 2025.
But Labour now faces calls to reveal the numbers behind the claim after one expert told FE Week the scale of the challenge would depend on whether Labour’s planned apprenticeship reforms, including a two-year minimum duration and abolition of courses below level three, were taken into account.
Labour leader Ed Miliband
Mick Fletcher, a founder member of the Policy Consortium, said: “It sounds an ambitious target, but he has wisely given himself a decade to get there, and depending on the precise calculation used it could be quite challenging, or we might be there already.
“There are currently about 650,000 18-year-olds and similar numbers aged 19 and 20. Around 35 per cent of 18-year-olds apply to higher education and a further 10 per cent of 19-year-olds apply for the first time each year, allowing for the fact that not all are accepted but that others apply later, perhaps a maximum of 300,000 will enter higher education by age the age of 24.
“The figure for 2012/13 was actually 273,000, but removing the cap on student numbers may increase participation a little by 2025.
“In 2012/13 the number of apprenticeship starts for the 19 to 24 age group was 161,000. Starts for those aged 16 to 18 were 112,000, giving 283,000 — on current year numbers therefore we are there already.
“Even if we only count the half of the 16 to 18 category who were 18 year olds, to meet the target still only requires an increase of 73,000 or 32 per cent — a bit under 3 per cent per year.
“On the other hand were Labour to scrap apprenticeships at level two and those lasting under two years there would be a real struggle — they’d have to at least treble the number of places offered at level three — currently there are fewer than 100,000 starting level three apprenticeships of all lengths.
“Creating more places is one issue — funding them is another. It is possible that the ambition could be funded by reducing the total of 222,000 who started an apprenticeship after the age of 24 — even allowing for the lower cost of older apprenticeships there’s plenty of headroom.”
Shadow Business Secretary Chuka Umunna MP
It comes after the FE sector called for an emphasis on quality and the establishment of an “apprentice charter” in response to Mr Miliband’s comments.
David Hughes, chief executive of the National Institute of Adult Continuing Education (Niace), said: “We are keen to support the next government’s ambition on apprentices by implementing an apprentice charter. This will be written from the perspective of each apprentice and signed-up to by government, employers, learners and providers.
“It will enable them to see what each apprenticeship will involve, setting out the opportunities, experiences, support and feedback an apprentice can expect at different stages. It will also give the apprentice a clear understanding of the contribution they must make.
“What’s needed is not just an apprenticeships revolution but an adult skills revolution that unlocks the talents of all.”
Richard Atkins, president of the Association of Colleges, said Mr Miliband was, “right to put pressure on employers,” adding: “Too few do so at the moment, both from the public and private sectors.
“Giving employers a strong say in apprenticeships is absolutely right, but at the same time the interests of apprentices need to be respected. They need to learn skills that are portable, and not specific to a single employer.
“Colleges have a long tradition in providing technical and vocational education, and are ideally placed to deliver training as part of the apprenticeships.”
Kirstie Donnelly, UK managing director of City & Guilds, said: “What we need now are details from Labour about how these additional apprenticeships will be created and how they intend to ensure that quality remains high.”
It comes after Association of Employment and Learning Providers chief executive Stewart Segal and 157 Group executive director Lynne Sedgmore warned Mr Miliband’s proposals to apparently increase apprentice numbers risked prioritising “quantity over quality”.
Mr Segal told FE Week: “It’s great that it’s such a top priority, but we don’t want to fall into the trap of being driven by numbers and by particular routes.
Shadow Education Secretary Tristram Hunt MP
But he warned that any law to force employers to hire apprentices based on quotas could backfire.
He said: “I don’t think it should be legislation. It’s too complex and there are too many variables to try to determine what employers have to do. But I do think there is a long was to go to encourage employers to run apprenticeships and make it easy.”
Dr Sedgmore said: “The pledges he is making are positive and I am pleased it is so high on his agenda.
“However, while it is important to increase the number of apprenticeships on offer it is crucial that all apprenticeships are of a high quality.
“We would like to see this initial pledge backed up very quickly by plans for how all apprenticeships will become a pathway to valuable and sustainable employment.
“I laud his vision of parity of esteem, it is a powerful one. But that vision will only be realised through building a world class apprenticeship system where all apprentices, young people and adults, are given the best possible learning experience with long-term benefits for them and for the economy.”
Conference also heard from Shadow Education Secretary Tristram Hunt, who
told delegates improving technical education was one of his three key campaign
He said: “A Labour Government will ensure Further Education colleges focused on training for local jobs, proper apprenticeships lasting two years, a technical baccalaureate, with respected qualifications, careers advice, technical degrees so young people can earn and learn.”
The Department for Education’s application window for the opening of free schools closes on October 10. Pauline Hagen discusses her experience of the process.
Last January, after much research, we decided to apply to the Department for Education to open a free school sixth form college.
Our primary motive was a moral one — the need for alternative post-16 provision in our chosen area is well-documented.
There was also a pragmatic driver. Alongside all the other colleges who make a significant contribution to the government’s priorities of narrowing gaps, raising attainment and improving social mobility, we have taken a funding battering in recent years, and our unprotected budget remains vulnerable.
Despite being a high-performing college, it seems we are not as interesting or understood by the Coalition as the new breeds in the education marketplace.
In addition, we recognise the benefits of sharing resources and expertise across two colleges. And we felt confident that our vision was deliverable.
In three years, we have reversed the declining performance of a college and taken it to outstanding. We have done this in a context similar to the one in our chosen area which has similar levels of deprivation and prior attainment.
We decided that not only was this project something which needed doing, but also that we could do it.
The last eight months have been spent gathering data, creating a vision, producing staffing, curriculum and financial plans, developing a governance model, enlisting governors and researching suitable sites.
Be prepared for reactions which will include overt hostility, regardless of how strong the evidence is about the need for alternative provision
It seems presumptuous to give advice to others who are considering doing the same thing. After all, our application may not be approved next month, and even if it is, that will generate a whole new raft of work.
But one member of the team said to me the other day: “We’ve produced a handbook on how to open a college” — and that does encapsulate what is needed in an application.
In the process we have been able to reflect on our own college and the way we run it.
We have learned much from the process, not just about how to put together an application, but about communicating messages, seeking allies and building support. But there are things we would do differently if we had known eight months ago what we know now.
Planning a long lead-in is essential.We thought we had plenty of time, when the idea of a 2016 opening seemed reassuringly remote.
But the process has its own momentum and it put considerable stress on our small team who already have a day job. Expect to work though holidays and weekends.
One thing we should definitely have started earlier is the ‘thousand names project’. All free school applications must demonstrate that they will be at full capacity or oversubscribed by the first year of ‘steady state’. For us, this meant getting 1,000 students of the right age to indicate that the proposed college would be their first choice. We built a micro-site and produced a mini-prospectus and sent teams of staff into the town to talk to potential students and parents. We started this work quite late, in June and July, as the school year approached its end. Given that we had no direct access to students in the appropriate year groups, this was quite stressful.
Early on, we applied successfully for a place on the development programme delivered by the New Schools Network (NSN). This independent charity works to improve education by increasing the number of innovative state schools.
We attended a weekend training event, and have been supported by an adviser and consultants who have provided feedback on all aspects of our application. Places on this programme are dependent on the strength of your vision, and on meeting the NSN’s own internal deadlines.
Be prepared for reactions which will include overt hostility, regardless of how strong the evidence is about the need for alternative provision.
For us, this hostility had the advantage of making us very clear on our mission, which is reaffirmed every time we come across an argument which has nothing at all to do with the success of young people, and everything to do with protecting poor performance.
It’s the warning that exasperated mums and dads up and down the country issue their teenage children — “If you don’t work hard enough in school, you could end up working in McDonalds”.
But it’s a comment that gets under Sue Husband’s skin, having risen through the ranks at the fast food giant as a 16-year-old Saturday worker to become its UK head of Education two decades later.
“All jobs should be respected,” she says 43-year-old Husband, who was appointed director of the Skills Funding Agency’s apprenticeship division this year.
Husband (centre) as a manager with colleagues in Queen’s street McDonalds, Cardiff
“I’ve never understood how you could disrespect somebody over their job, whether its cleaning the tube or changing hotel sheets or whatever, somebody needs to do those jobs and I think good on the people who do because they’re really hard jobs.”
She describes the restaurant chain as “a real meritocratic environment” and she progressed quickly.
“They saw some potential, even though I was only there part-time,” she says.
“I was the fastest on till — I could take the most money and still be really polite.
“I started cashing up, so I’d be counting money on a Saturday, thousands of pounds, and then three months into the job I was doing the payroll.
“I was 16, going in on a Sunday I’d ride in on my bike, turn up, take all the clock cards and do all the calculations.
“Then somebody would come in a taxi, you’d hand it over and it would go off, people would get paid and nobody checked it.
“I thought ‘this is great, somebody trusts me to do this’.”
I’ve never understood how you could disrespect somebody over their job
The experience was a “real eye opener” for Husband, who admits that, up until that point, she’d had a very “protected” existence in the small village of Lisvane, just north of Cardiff.
“There were people from all walks of life,” she says.
“You’re talking about people who’d had a really bad experience up until that point — they could have been in a home, in a single parent families, in families where no one else worked and people who’d been to prison,” she says.
“I was exposed to people I’d never been exposed to before and it was just a brilliant life lesson for me.
“I worked shifts, I worked weekends, you work long hours and it really teaches you the value of work and about teamwork.”
At 18, having done well in her A-levels, Husband realised she didn’t want to go to university, and opted to stay at McDonalds.
“I just thought, ‘I want to work, I really enjoy this’ and ended up running a restaurant, and then supervising restaurants — I worked with franchisees, consulting them on their business,” she says.
“That was a real learning curve because I was probably 25, 26, and most franchisees are 50 or 60-year-old business people and that’s quite weird, supervising someone who’s lived quite a life, on how to run their business.”
In 2007, shortly after the Leitch Review of Skills was published, Husband was headhunted to run McDonalds’s education programme.
“As a company they’ve always done training,” she says
Husband with partner Ralph
“But when the Leitch Review said most people who’ve got literacy and numeracy problems are already in the workplace, so to solve the problem we need to tackle it there, the business was in a position where it thought, ‘we can do something about this’.”
When Husband joined the education team, 50 people had completed a maths or English qualification online. By the time she left in February this year, 58,000 qualifications, from level one literacy and numeracy to foundation degrees in business management, had been completed.
“Some employees would ring us up and say ‘I’ve got my certificate, I passed, it’s the first thing I’ve ever passed in my life’ — I miss that,” she says.
She has, she feels, “left a good legacy” — McDonalds won the President’s Award at this year’s Adult Learners’ Week Awards for its training programme.
“It gives me great pleasure to see them go from success to success and I know they’ll carry on building on that,” she says.
But, when she hit 40, Husband decided it was time for a change.
“I got to that point, like a lot of people at 30 or 40, the milestones, where I thought I need to do something different, if only for the fact that I can look back on my life and think ‘I tried a few different things’,” she says.
“There’s a wonderful momentum around apprenticeships
“It took me two to three years to decide to leave, because I really loved McDonalds, so it was tough but when this job came up I thought this is right, this is the opportunity.
“I just saw everything I’d loved about the job in McDonalds, in that last six or seven years doing education, on a bigger scale and being able impact more things.”
She adds: “A key thing for me is that I retain all of the lessons I’ve had through my years of working in business and I believe that’s a key reason why I’ve been brought into this [SFA] role — I need to really remind people and really connect to that side of things.”
But the SFA’s glass-fronted office across from the Houses of Parliament is a far-cry from the family farm where Husband grew up, with parents Marion and Alan, and where she says she learned her work ethic.
She says: “I’ve been brought up to believe if you do your best, you can almost do anything and I don’t believe in saying it’s too hard — I’ll just keep going.”
Husband’s parents still live on the farm, but lease out the land. Husband still lives on the farm at weekends and visits Shrewsbury to see partner Ralph, a McDonalds franchisee — plus trips to London during the week for her SFA role.
But the commuting doesn’t bother her.
Husband (centre) aged 8, with sisters, from left, Kate and Deb
“When you know you’re doing the right thing, all those things, you deal with them and I think that’s the reality of it,” she says.
She adds: “I love that I got this job, I was just so excited because I just think it’s got so much potential it’s a really brilliant opportunity.
“We have to do everything we can to help businesses do more to develop their workforce, particularly those who really need support, and that is something I feel passionately about.”
And, predictably, her thoughts on business and education turns to apprenticeships.
“There’s a wonderful momentum
around apprenticeships that’s starting to become more common now, hearing people talking about apprenticeships and really believing that this is the way to go. That’s
a key indicator,” she says.
“We all have to work together to get the outcome that we all need, which is about better quality apprenticeships, more of them, more businesses involved and
being truly employer-led.”
What’s your favourite book?
Memoirs of a Geisha by Arthur Golden – I was completely immersed in it. I was completely in that world because it was so beautifully written
What’s your pet hate?
Tardiness — I don’t mind people being late if something’s happened. I understand that, but I don’t like it when people don’t respect that there are other things that you’ve got to do
What do you do to switch off from work?
Loads of things. Most of it revolves around family and friends. I live in Cardiff and stay in London during the week, and obviously travel to Coventry with the job [SFA headquarters are in Coventry], so when I have time away from work it’s really important to catch up with people
What did you want to be when you grew up?
I wanted to be a teacher. I knew from a very young age. I went to a local primary where there were lovely teachers that lived in the village where everybody knew everybody. And I had a teacher called Mr Williams and a teacher called Miss Jenkins and they just fascinated me. Even now my mum still sees them and they’ll still ask after me
If you could invite anyone, living or dead, to a dinner party who would it be?
Gandhi, Helen Keller, my parents, business management writer Tom Peters and educationalist Ken Robinson. And Ralph, my boyfriend, would do the cooking (he’s quite a good cook)
Seeing a party leader actually talking about FE and skills policy is both encouraging and unnerving. Nobody was as pleased as me to hear about apprenticeships in Ed Miliband’s otherwise tepid speech, but when we’re this close to election, it also makes me worry. Apprenticeships are already a heavily political issue, with every party considering them to be our best bet when it comes to job creation and meeting the skills shortage.
I sincerely hope that, once the other parties have responded, as I am sure they will, and when someone enters Downing Street next May, what we end up with is better quality apprenticeships with more funding and more support, not just a burned-out car of an election pledge with no more thrust.
“Education, education, education” were Tony Blair’s famous words at a Labour Party conference many years ago, but it’s important to remember it’s not just schools that help shape our young people into the budding good citizens of tomorrow. It was spiriting to hear Shadow Education Secretary Tristram Hunt at least mention FE colleges, but until we see a pledge to reverse this government’s savage cuts to our sector, I suspect we will take Dr Hunt’s words with more than a pinch of salt.
Apprentice minimum wage
There is hot air all around as the party leaders bluster around over proposed increases to the minimum wage. Mr Miliband has pledged a rise to £8, without explaining that it could get there anyway based on inflation and pledges already made by David Cameron. Natalie Bennett, of the Green Party, has promised to raise it to £10, which is a bit more like it but still pales in comparison to the actual cost of living. The debate is a refreshing one, but what nobody seems to be talking about is what this will all mean for apprentices.
At the moment, unless you have access to the Bank of Mum and Dad, savings in the bank or are willing to work 20+ hours in Tesco over the weekend, it is nearly impossible to live on the apprenticeship minimum wage — currently a measly £2.68 per hour. Young apprentices who cannot live at home face the prospect of paying rent, bills and living costs on around £100 a-week. It’s time to address the lack of parity of esteem here, and bring apprentices into line with other workers. Minimum should mean minimum, not “minimum, unless you’re training on the job”.
Re-sits and more re-sits
Conference season is a time for divided opinions, but I am pleased to see there is one area we can all agree on. The government is right to want all 16-year-olds without English and maths to continue to study those subjects until they reach the equivalent level. This will go a long way to help tackle the huge problem with literacy and numeracy levels in this country, but the government has to end its obsession with GCSEs before this will work.
If a learner has failed to get their GCSE it can be for a number of reasons, but sometimes it is just that the qualification itself was not suitable. Simply encouraging them to re-sit the exams over and over again until they achieve is not appropriate, so Functional Skills and other equivalent qualifications need to be give equal footing if we are going to upskill our young people in this way.
Yes, Minister?
Does anyone else think it’s time we heard something about FE from Skills Minister Nick Boles? It’s been months now since his appointment and I’m not sure I’ve heard him utter a word about one of the most important parts of his portfolio. I will be keeping an eye on the coverage of Tory conference, but not holding my breath.
The Secret Pricipal features on the last Monday of every month
Lesoco brand cost college around £290k less than two years ago
Learners “didn’t identify with Lesoco” – governors might now drop it
“How did no one involved with the rebranding spot it was a terrible idea?” UCU
A London-based college spent almost £290,000 on a “terrible” rebrand — and governors are now looking at dumping the new name after less than two years, FE Week can reveal.
The 2012 merger of Lewisham and Southwark colleges resulted, after the rebranding exercise, in Lesoco — or LeSoCo, as the college intended.
And an FE Week Freedom of Information (FoI) request to the college has uncovered it forked out £279,000 in 2012/13 and £9,900 in 2013/14 to develop the brand.
In 2011/12, the former West Nottinghamshire College spent just £19,436 on rebranding to Vision West Nottinghamshire College.
And Lesoco revealed, in its FoI response, that its name could be binned and replaced with Lewisham Southwark College.
It also conceded that Lesoco had proven “ambiguous and not recognisable as a college,” and that learners “did not identify with the Lesoco”.
However, there was stronger criticism from the University and College Union (UCU).
A UCU spokesperson told FE Week: “Why anyone thought LeSoCo was a good name for a college is beyond us.
“In our literature we explain that LeSoCo is a college in South London that was a result of a merger so people know what we are talking about. How did no one involved with the rebranding spot it was a terrible idea?
“This would be funny if it wasn’t so tragic and just another example of an out of touch management wasting thousands of pounds that could be better spent on securing staff jobs and delivering education to the local community.”
Former principal Maxine Room, who stood down in June, oversaw the merger and the renaming. She was replaced on an interim basis by former 157 Group chair Ioan Morgan, who could be heard referring repeatedly to Lewisham Southwark College — rather than Lesoco — in a recorded message on the main college switchboard in July.
A college spokesperson, in the FOI response, said: “It has become clear that the name Lesoco without the extension to Lewisham Southwark College is ambiguous and is not recognisable as a college.
“Having discussed the name with students at the end of the last academic year, they said that they did not identify with Lesoco.
“A decision will be made by governors as to whether to formally request that the name be formally changed to Lewisham Southwark College.”
She added the college was now using the extended name on “all new material that we would have otherwise produced”.
She said: “The design of the extended name [logo] has been done in-house at nil cost and will be used as materials are reused.
“As a result of that, there is no method of calculating rebranding costs distinct from those contained within business as usual budgets.
“It is hoped that this will be seen as a common sense move that will help the college be more identifiable as a college for employment, jobs and work.”
FE Week cartoon from edition 53
Editorial
Hand up to logo folly
The lure of a shiny new logo, designed by a flash advertising consultancy, has got the better of many a company managing director or chief executive.
But how firms in the private sector spend their money is their own business (okay, so maybe shareholders might want an explanation).
Unfortunately, it’s a temptation that can also take its aesthetic and financial toll on the public sector.
Lesoco being a case in point — and no, I’m not typing the tiresome and just plain silly LeSoCo over and over again. To this end, we just couldn’t resist reprinting, above, our cartoon from way back in edition 53 (January 21 last year).
Anyway, as the UCU rightly points out, the college (it’s Lewisham Southwark College, in case you couldn’t tell) spending £290k for what it ended up with would be “funny if it wasn’t so tragic”.
Put simply, it just hasn’t worked. And at quite some taxpayers’ expense.
Well done to the current leadership — not just for conceding the name and logo wasn’t right, but for coming up with the simple and obvious solution of Lewisham Southwark College.
Too many learners are dropping out of traineeships, Ofsted FE and skills director Lorna Fitzjohn (pictured) has warned.
Ms Fitzjohn raised concerns about drop-out rates among learners on the government’s flagship youth unemployment programme in an exclusive interview with FE Week.
The education watchdog was unable to reveal any figures to back up the concerns, but the June Statistical First Release showed there had been around 7,400 traineeship starts from August last year to April.
It comes after a report from the National Audit Office (NAO) said just 200 out of 459 eligible training providers who said they would deliver traineeships had recorded starts as of June this year.
She said: “Traineeships do offer something important for young people who are perhaps not quite ready for an apprenticeship who need something else to take them on to apprenticeships.
“It’s very disappointing that over half of the providers who are able to offer them have not taken up that opportunity.
“We are also beginning to see quite high drop-out rates from traineeships programmes, people are not staying on them, because they’re not the right thing for them, so I do think the programmes themselves need closely looking at to make sure they are what a young person needs.”
A spokesperson for the education watchdog said Ms Fitzjohn’s traineeship drop-out concerns were based on the study programmes report which came out earlier his month
“We don’t mention specific figures, but during our sampling of providers for the report we noted that ‘the early drop-out rate was high’ for traineeships,” he said.
But it is not the first time concerns over the traineeship programme have been aired without the backing of official statistics. Last November, interim chief executive of the Skills Funding Agency (SFA) Keith Smith, who was the SFA executive director for funding and programmes at the time, said colleges would deliver 57 per cent of projected 19 to 23 traineeships, while then-Ofsted FE and skills director Matthew Coffey described recruitment to the scheme as “disappointing”.
Neither the SFA, which said Mr Smith’s figures were unofficial, nor Ofsted were able to give out figures at the time.
A spokesperson for the Department for Business, Innovation and Skills (BIS) said: “Traineeships are useful qualifications that are focused on giving young people the skills and vital experience needed to compete successfully for an apprenticeship or other job.”
She added: “BIS and the Department for Education published a revised Framework for Delivery for 2014/15 — giving providers improved guidance on the delivery of the programme following feedback from those involved.
“We expect this new framework to support providers in developing their programmes based on their own experience. We also encourage them to become involved in the Education and Training Foundation’s traineeship support staff programme, which will help them share best practice.”
