Participation in education, employment and training among 16, 17 and 18-year-olds will not improve unless the government tackles problems with young people slipping through the net, a senior MP has warned.
During a hearing of the Public Accounts Committee’s inquiry into 16 to 18 participation, chair Margaret Hodge (pictured) warned Department for Education (DfE) Permanent Secretary Chris Wormald that the government had to deal with the issue of young people classified as “unknown”.
MPs grilled Mr Wormald over a National Audit Office (NAO) report entitled 16 to 18-year old participation in education and training, which showed a big disparity between local authority areas in the percentage of young people for whom the government had no information about their status.
Ms Hodge said: “If you’re going to get on top of Neets you’ve got to know. If you don’t even know where they are you’re never going to be able to find anything.”
Mr Wormald was given examples of the disparity. For example, in the London boroughs of Barking and Dagenham and Hackney, the figure was 19.8 per cent, but in nearby Thurrock, it was 0.3 per cent.
Daventry MP Chris Heaton-Harris said: “I was quite surprised to see the massive variation in those figures by local authority area, and I was just wondering if you can explain that for me.
“Is there any reason to suppose that the information is being captured inaccurately by the local authorities concerned? It is surprising that you have similar authorities in adjacent geographical locations with such dissimilar figures.”
Mr Wormald replied: “It’s possible, but I’m not going to comment on individual authorities without having discussed it with them.
“The figures you are giving me are intrinsically surprising, and I don’t off the top of my head see an obvious explanation. I’m quite happy to look at those cases and come back to you.”
Speaking about careers advice, Mr Wormald promised action from Education Secretary Nicky Morgan, but he was warned by Ms Hodge about contradicting evidence, after he claimed that “the vast majority of schools want to do well for their pupils”.
Ms Hodge said that Ofsted’s annual report showed that “one-in-four young people would have made a different choice if they had known about the options they had before them”, adding: “You’ve got a problem here”.
She said: “If you honestly say to us ‘we can’t do more because we haven’t got the money and we’ve decided to cut this’ I could buy that because I know the difficulty of getting a decent careers service going. But to pretend that schools do it well when the bulk of the evidence is against you is a bit difficult.”
The committee also discussed apprenticeship reforms and funding cuts, particularly for 18-year-old learners.
A spokesperson for the Association of Colleges (AoC) said: “AoC has always supported raising the participation age to 18, but we need to ensure the funding, careers advice and transport is in place so all students can access excellent education.
“It was good to see the MPs on the committee seeking to hold government to account and raise the variable performance of local councils in knowing whether 16 and 17-year-olds are actually in education or training.”
Dr Mary Bousted, general secretary of the Association of Teachers and Lecturers (ATL), said: “When so many young people are still out of work, the government needs to do much more to ensure that students everywhere, whether in school or college, have access to high quality, independent, face-to-face careers information, advice and guidance.”
Mr Wormald is due to appear in front of the committee again on November 17.
Concerns about the “ethical use of funding” have been raised after a sixth form college started advertising £500 incentives in a bid to lure high-achieving learners to its proposed new free school sixth form.
New College Pontefract applied to the Department for Education (DfE) last month to set up New College Doncaster, which would open in 2016 for up to 1,200 learners.
The website for the new sixth form advertises an ‘academic scholarship’ in which: “If you are predicted to achieve more than five A grades in your GCSEs, we will offer you the opportunity to receive £500 and a place in our Excellence Academy to support your post-16 education.”
But professor of education and public policy at Durham University Stephen Gorard (pictured top) said the use of public money to incentivise enrolments was a cause for concern.
He said: “I have never heard of this before and I can’t see that it would be an ethical use of funding, given that it would cost money from the public purse that could have been spent on something else.”
However, Richard Fletcher (pictured bottom), vice principal at New College Pontefract, defended the offer in an interview with FE Week sister publication Academies Week.
“The £500 is something quite new to the college. This is something that we are looking at doing,” he said.
“It’s an incentive — it might not be £500, and we might look at a laptop, an iPad, something to support them with their studies. It will be a choice of what the student wants, we’ve got the idea from some other colleges which is something schools and colleges seem to be doing at the moment. It is about raising aspirations I would say, an incentive to attract the best students from the area to sign up to our college.
“Until we got to the stage of opening and we had the students applying and enrolling we wouldn’t know how many students would receive this. There is no guarantee they would receive it until they had got their results, once they had their results then we would be committed to keeping to what we said. It wouldn’t be offered on predicted grades it would be offered on actual grades so when they come to enrol after their GCSE results.
“It is a little bit like a private school saying to someone who is good at rugby, come to our school and we’ll pay for your fees. It’s a scholarship for the brighter students.”
The DfE is due to confirm next month whether the college, rated outstanding by Ofsted, has reached the next stage in the free school application process.
The principal of a college at the centre of an alleged bomb plot has sought to reassure staff and learners after a teenager appeared in court charged with possession of a gun and pipe bombs.
Newcastle College boss Carole Kitching said it remained a safe place to study after Liam Lyburd, believed to be a former learner at the college, appeared before magistrates in nearby North Tyneside on Thursday (November 6) accused of plotting to “cause serious harm”.
Carole Kitching
He spoke only to confirm his details and was remanded in custody.
Ms Kitching confirmed that police officers would patrol the college campus for an undetermined period of time after 18-year-old Lyburd, of Hamilton Place, Newcastle, was arrested on Monday (November 3) following a report to police of concern for a person at an address at Hamilton Place.
Lyburd was charged on the Wednesday night with possessing a firearm with intent to endanger life, possessing ammunition with intent to endanger life, and five counts of possessing an explosive substance, namely a pipe bomb, with intent to endanger life.
Ms Kitching said: “I would like to reassure staff, students and their families that their safety has been paramount to us and the college remains a safe place to study.
“The security team already works in close partnership with the local neighbourhood policing team and this will continue. Officers will be on patrol around the campus to offer reassurance and anyone who is concerned can speak to an officer or contact the college’s welfare team.
“People should attend the college as usual. We have an extensive network of CCTV cameras monitoring key areas inside buildings and across the campus and our security staff are on duty 24 hours a-day.”
A police spokesperson said: “The investigation to date has revealed that there was intent to cause serious harm at Newcastle College, we are confident that we have prevented the incident from taking place.
He added: “Enquiries are continuing into this incident.”
The case has been sent to Newcastle Crown Court, where Lyburd is due to appear on November 20.
The Department for Education (DfE) has defended its continued refusal to exempt sixth form colleges from VAT after a controversial move to give academies borrowing powers.
The borrowing powers of sixth form colleges have long been seen by government as a justification for their continued payment of VAT, but an announcement that academies — and also colleges — will be allowed to borrow from the DfE’s condition improvement fund (CIF) has prompted the Sixth Form Colleges Association (SFCA) to renew its call for change.
SFCA deputy chief executive James Kewin said he was pleased sixth form colleges would also be able to take advantage of the low levels of interest offered by the DfE scheme — ranging from 1.5 per cent to 2.5 per cent — but said the inclusion of non VAT-paying academies in the deal was unfair.
Mr Kewin said: “The government’s position on the VAT treatment of sixth form colleges has always been shaky, but this latest development means it is now completely indefensible.
“We urge the government to drop this tax on learning that sees the average sixth form college redirect £335,000 a year away from the front line education of its students to pay VAT. Young people should receive the same level of investment in their education, irrespective of where they choose to study.”
He welcomed the fact sixth form colleges would have access to the CIF loans, adding: “We have been making the case to government for some time that the ability to borrow money has become an increasingly theoretical freedom for many sixth form colleges — many of our members are unable or unwilling to take out new loans as the ongoing reduction in funding hinders their ability to make repayments.
“So we are pleased that the Government has responded to our concerns and allowed Sixth Form Colleges to access loans for capital projects at the same non-commercial rates as schools and academies.”
A DfE spokesperson said: “To help schools get access to the funding for maintenance and improvement of buildings they can now choose to borrow from the
CIF at a favourable rate — with zero interest for energy efficiency projects. All loan repayments will be cycled back into the fund, meaning other schools will continue to benefit once the loan has been paid.
“The ONS categorises sixth form colleges as private sector organisations and, as such, they are liable for VAT. Academies are classed as public sector organisations and are not.
“Although academies are now able to borrow fixed sums of money from the CIF, they cannot borrow from the private sector. Sixth form colleges are still able to borrow from the open market.”
Concern has been raised about the workload of Education Funding Agency (SFA) chief executive Peter Lauener after the same role at the Skills Funding Agency (SFA) was added to his remit.
Mr Lauener took up the additional role on Monday (November 3) and Shadow Education Secretary Tristram Hunt told FE Week sister newspaper Academies Week: “The National Audit Office (NAO) has warned about the EFA becoming overloaded — yet ministers respond by appointing its chief executive as the joint chief executive of the SFA as well as the EFA.”
The EFA employs around 950 staff and manages £54bn of funding a year to support state-provided education for 8m children aged three to 16, and 1.6m 16 to 19-year-olds. Meanwhile, the SFA employs around 925 staff and contracts with more than 1,000 colleges, private training organisations and employers, with more than £4bn of funding each year.
The SFA job was advertised with a salary of £142,000, but Mr Lauener, who earns up to £145,000 with the EFA, will not receive a pay rise for his new role, said a government spokesperson.
A spokesperson for the Department for Education, which oversees the EFA, said: “Peter has a strong team of directors who take day-to-day responsibility of the EFA’s functions.” The SFA declined to comment.
One of these three former learners will be crowned apprentice champion of the year at the Skills Show in Birmingham on Thursday (November 13).
Ashley Terron, Kate Mooney and Michael Johnson are all contenders to be recognised as the person who has made the biggest contribution to promoting apprenticeships at the National Apprenticeship Awards.
All three have battled it out in the regional finals, with Ashley representing the North West, Kate representing London, and Michael representing the East Midlands.
National Apprenticeship Service director Sue Husband said: “The City & Guilds Apprenticeship Champion of the Year category is always hotly contested at the awards and this year proves no different.
“Kate, Michael and Ashley are exceptional ambassadors for apprenticeships both within their own workplaces and beyond.
“I hope their stories inspire others to find out how apprenticeships can help young people to get in and go far.”
Bricklayer Ashley, who is employed by Redrow Group Services Ltd, won gold at the 2013 WorldSkills competitions in Leipzig and since then has helped to promote apprenticeships through local, national and international media.
Kate completed an apprenticeship in business administration in 1996 and now leads the design of British Telecom’s apprenticeship programme as well as helping to develop training across the telecommunications sector.
Michael left school unqualified and became an apprentice with broadcast technology company Rediffusion.
He is now training and development manager for construction company Gelder Group and sees himself as an ambassador for apprenticeships.
The apprentice champion award is sponsored by City & Guilds.
The UK managing director of City & Guilds, Kirstie Donnelly, said: “It’s fantastic to recognise the achievements of these finalists.
“They are true examples of just how far apprenticeships can take you.
“I’m confident they will continue to inspire others, and I wish them the very best of luck.”
The apprenticeship awards will also see awards given out to apprentice of the year for intermediate, higher and advanced apprenticeships and apprentice employer of the year.
You can see the nominees for these categories on the front page and find out who the winners were in next week’s edition of FE Week, edition 118, dated Monday November 17.
Business Secretary Vince Cable has admitted that continuing with controversial plans to demand employer cash contributions for apprenticeships would be “difficult”.
In an exclusive interview with FE Week following an Industry Apprentice Council (IAC) reception at the House of Commons on Tuesday, Dr Cable indicated it was unlikely the reforms would go ahead as currently proposed — with a plan for employers to pay up to a third of the cost of training.
His comments come after Skills Minister Nick Boles also hinted that the contributions could be scrapped in an interview last month.
Dr Cable said: “I think there would be difficulty proceeding with the particular proposal that we had.
“If we are going to have more apprenticeships then there’s got to be contributions from the government and the employers, and the question is how we find a model which makes that work for business as well as for young people getting into a vocational trade.”
But, asked if a decision had been made to scrap employer contributions, he said: “Not quite.”
He added: “It’s not in the form that we originally envisaged.
Dr Vince Cable
“The pilot studies are still going ahead and we have been listening to the criticisms from small companies about not having more bureaucracy and obviously we want to have an arrangement which creates more apprenticeships rather than less, so we are having a fresh look at the whole issue.”
At the event, guests heard from apprentices about how vocational learning had improved their prospects.
John Coombes, aged 21, a third year advanced engineering apprentice with Ford, said: “While in sixth form, having been accepted into university, I found myself offered a great opportunity with Ford to do an engineering apprenticeship.
“I thought I was incredibly fortunate, but that wasn’t really shared in the opinions of the people around me. My teachers and peers seemed to think I’d taken a lesser route and expected better of me.”
IAC member Anna Schlautmann, 21, a fourth year logistics apprentice at MBDA, said: “The only option my college gave me during my A-levels was to go to university.
“A lot of my peers and my teachers weren’t very happy with my decision, for example, telling me: ‘I thought you were clever’. I said: ‘yes, I am clever, and that’s why I’m an apprentice’.”
Main Pic: Skills Minister Nick Boles with apprentices including John Coombes, far right
An influential MP has complained that Newcastle College Group (NCG) could still receive government bonus payments despite being set to lose a contract to find work for the long-term unemployed.
The Work Programme was launched by the Department for Work and Pensions (DWP) three years ago for private, public or voluntary organisations to help people find people jobs.
But FE Week reported in March that NCG had been issued a 12-month notice of termination by the DWP for its contract covering the North East Yorkshire and the Humber region.
A DWP spokesperson said at the time this was because NCG’s contract was the “lowest performing when assessed against a range of performance measures”.
But chair of the House of Commons Public Accounts Committee (PAC) Margaret Hodge raised concern on Thursday (November 6) that underperforming providers including NCG could still be paid bonuses.
The Barking MP, who was speaking following her committee’s publication of a report on the Work Programme, said: “The DWP has designed the contracts with providers in a way which exposes the taxpayer financially. Underperforming providers may still be able to claim bonus payments for 2014-15 because of the flawed performance measure whereby the fewer clients referred to a provider, the better their performance looks. This may include NCG whose contract has been terminated.”
The contract for North East Yorkshire and the Humber, which will terminate in March, is delivered through NCG’s subsidiary, Intraining, and up to eight subcontractors.
David Jessop, chief operating officer of Intraining, said: “This [PAC] report looks at historic data from the start of the Work Programme almost three and a half years ago, when our performance at the start did not achieve our expected standards.
“By the time the PAC considered this report in the summer we had already vastly improved our performance and by then were ranked eighth nationally, in the top quarter of performers. We are now exceeding DWP’s latest performance standard benchmarks.
“However, no incentive payments have ever been made to Intraining and we are currently in discussion with the DWP about this aspect of the contract.”
An NCG spokesperson said it was up to DWP to decide whether Intraining deserved bonus payments. He declined to comment on whether it would accept payments if they were offered. Intraining has retained the contract to deliver the programme for Birmingham, Solihull & the Black Country.
A DWP spokesperson said: “No money has been paid out in incentive payments and we are currently negotiating with providers.”
He added: “As this [PAC] report says, the Work Programme is helping more people than any previous employment programme, with over 330,000 people moving into lasting work.”
In the office of Carole Stott’s mentor and university lecturer Gerard Boynton, there was a sign hanging up that read: “All we need to make us really happy is something to be enthusiastic about.”
It is a motto that Stott, now chair of Skills Show organisers Find a Future, director and chair of the Association of Colleges (AoC) board and chair of governors at City of Bath College, says she’s seen reflected in her own career.
“I want to do things that make a difference, that are worthwhile. You want to do something that rocks your boat,” she tells me as we sit down in Find a Future’s offices, overlooking the rooftops of Victoria.
The people who are making the policy are the ones who actually influence what you can and can’t do as a teacher
And her enthusiasm for her various roles in the skills sector is obvious — her eyes light up as she looks forward to the Skills Show this week (which will also see Stott’s 63rd birthday).
She originally trained as an English teacher, partly inspired by being asked by her own teachers to explain concepts to the class.
“I love that feeling — when you feel you’ve grasped something and understood it,” she says.
“There’s nothing better in education than actually understanding — that’s what it’s all about, the joy of understanding.”
At home, in Bury, then part of Lancashire, she says, the three most important things were “hard work, education, family” — her parents, Kathleen and Jack, who had both left school at 14, “suffered from their lack of education”.
Stott aged five
“I came from a very working class background,” she says.
“I didn’t know it at the time, but looking back, we were quite poor — but my parents were very respectable, and that was really important to them.”
Both Stott and older brother Ken, her only sibling, passed the 11-plus and went to grammar school, something Stott says her parents saw as part of “the route to a better life”.
Despite this, Stott has no nostalgia for the grammar school system. “I might have just sunk at a secondary modern, but I think if there had been comprehensives, then I think I’d have probably done just as well,” she says.
“People sometimes see grammar schools as the only solution to social mobility and I just don’t believe that — I think bright kids in a good comprehensive can do just as well.
“I hate the idea that it’s decided at the age of 11 that you’re not very bright and you’re going to be classified like that.”
Stott left Bury at 18 to study English and drama teaching at St Mary’s in Twickenham and her final teaching training placement at a girls’ school in Surrey led to a job.
Stott with husband Steve
She married shortly after leaving university and spent the next few years moving from London to Bristol, to Devon, to Coventry.
Unfortunately, she says, “there was suddenly a dearth of jobs and an oversupply of teachers.”
As a result, Stott spent seven years looking after her two small children, Laura, born 1979, and James, born in 1982, and supply teaching, until an offhand comment led her to FE.
“In Devon, our next door neighbour was a head of department at a local FE college and he said to me: ‘You ought to think about teaching in further education, I think you’d like it’,” she says.
After moving to Coventry, Stott followed his advice, taking up a part-time lecturing job at Tile Hill College (now City College Coventry).
After four years there, Stott noticed Warwick University was offering part-time degrees for FE lecturers and although it was only supposed to be for full-time lecturers, Stott says she “pestered them until they said yes”.
Stott describes the experience as “transformational”.
Stott with husband Steve
“I enjoyed lecturing but that got me really interested in policy and curriculum and all of those issues,” she says.
“It made me realise you do stuff in the classroom but then the people who are making the policy are the ones who actually influence what you can and can’t do as a teacher,” she said.
Stott came to FE without any specific FE qualifications, and was in the minority as a qualified teacher — but she remains ambivalent about the issue.
“I think it’s good for people to aim to be qualified,” she says.
“But I think that idea of having qualifications in the area you’re teaching is equally important, and I don’t think we should put the emphasis on the teacher qualification at the expense of the emphasis on the other.”
On finishing a degree she was faced with a choice between a secure, full-time lecturing or a project-funded policy job at the National Institute of Adult Continuing Education (Niace).
Enthusiasm won, and she took the Niace role supporting unemployed adults.
After the funding dried up, Stott found herself interviewing for a job setting up the Central Access Network — the day after The Further and Higher Education Bill 1992 was published, proposing to turn colleges into corporations.
“I read this bill and thought: ‘well, the local authority isn’t going to want to fund this.’ The only way this is going to work is if we get the colleges to take ownership of this,” she says.
“And it was great — it was a really good model where we got all the colleges, the two universities and the local authority to work together.”
The job also provided Stott with some valuable learning experiences.
“I made some terrible mistakes,” she says.
“It makes me blush now to think about — I’d never had any budgetary responsibility and I completely forgot about cash flow, so of course we ran out of money.
“And when I had to tell my board, I was terrified but they were great — they just said ‘you’ll learn,’ and made sure I got a bit of support.
Stott on holiday at Butlins, aged six
“They taught me about governance and it was a lesson well-learned.”
Since those early days of incorporation, she’s seen the focus governance change, and she tells me, “that‘s no bad thing”.
When Stott was interviewed for the role as chair of governors at City Lit in 1999, she asked to be put on the quality assurance board — only to be told there wasn’t one.
“In those days it was less concerned about quality — the emphasis was on the financial management,” she says.
“That was a reaction to the times and to incorporation and suddenly being responsible for their own budgets.
“Now, I think we’ve shifted that balance, quite rightly, so the money’s there to support the quality, not the other way around.”
Stott moved on to work first for the London Open College Network (commuting back to Warwick) and then the national one, before founding a consultancy — which brought with it the choice of living anywhere for the first time.
So she settled in Bath, where she met her now-husband, Steve, who is also in education, focussing on teaching maths to those with learning difficulties.
In 2012, Stott was awarded an MBE for her services to FE.
“It was the proudest moment of my life,” she says.
“Not the MBE itself — my children wrote me a card saying ‘we’re so proud of you mum’ and I just thought that was wonderful.”
Stott graduating from her B. Phil Ed from Warwick in 1991
Looking to the future, the most important task for AoC and Find a Future, she says, is about creating “a culture shift”.
“I think politicians absolutely have to understand the importance of colleges and that if you undermine that infrastructure of colleges, then you’re actually undermining the future of the country,” she says.
“And for AoC it’s about constantly, constantly getting the message across, making sure that politicians and officials understand the consequences of their policies.”
And Stott shows no sign of backing off her many commitments, still living by her lecturer’s motto.
“If you’ve got something you’re enthusiastic about, that you really care about, then you’re proactive, then you do it,” she says.
“And I just think I’m very fortunate really to have been able to do things that I think are worthwhile and that I care about.
“Not everybody has that chance, do they?”
It’s a personal thing
What is your favourite book, and why?
Middlemarch by George Eliot — no question. It absolutely has been ever since I first read it when I was about 18. I think Dorothea is a wonderful heroine. She’s very strong, intelligent, humane and loyal, so she’s a brilliant heroine, and at a time when people didn’t write about strong women
like that
What is your pet hate?
Broken promises. It really irritates me if people say they are going to do something and then they don’t. I also hate it when you hear about teachers humiliating kids — kids feeling humiliated, being told they’re thick
What do you do to switch off after work?
Friends and family are the most important things. I also belong to a book club, so reading. And I love live music. And also travelling, when I get the chance
If you could invite anyone, living or dead, to a dinner party, who would it be?
George Eliot and Charles Dickens, as they were both kind of social reformers and I thought probably Desmond Tutu. You would get great conversation with those three. Oh, and [City of Bath College principal] Matt Atkinson said I should say him as well — because he’d enjoy the conversation too
What did you want to be when you were growing up?
First of all I wanted to be a vet, that was my first dream job, just because I liked animals really, but then I couldn’t do that because I was too squeamish. And I wanted to be a teacher from early on, but then if I’m perfectly honest, I wasn’t aware of many other options. As a little girl in the 1950s and 60s, it was: ‘Do you want to be a teacher or a librarian or a nurse?’
