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New apprenticeship standards are being developed by Trailblazer employers. Hilary Hall outlines how this is proceeding within her sector.

We got involved in the Trailblazer process because it has been clear since I started at the NHF almost two years ago there was a problem with training and assessment within the industry.

Employers complained young people who had completed training programmes were not at salon-ready standard. There were even stories about learners who had never actually cut hair on a real person.

This is a big problem for a sector which, although made up of lots of micro businesses, is a massive employer of apprentices, especially 16 and 17-year-olds.

We were delighted when the Richard Review came out, welcoming independent assessment and grading which would give employers confidence that learners had reached salon-ready.

We were on the phone to the Department for Business, Innovation and Skills (BIS) the day Trailblazers were announced.

We were overwhelmed by the number of NHF members who wanted to get involved, so we put in a bid along with Habia (the sector skills council), jointly supporting the employer-led group.

At first BIS was very insistent that only employers could be involved, especially large employers, and not training providers or awarding organizations.

In a sector where large employers are the exception rather than the rule, it was crucial for small businesses to be represented too.

There’s no funding for Trailblazers but there is a real cost to salon owners for taking time out of their business.

The NHF covered travel expenses for small business members to encourage them to stay on board.

BIS was very insistent that only employers could be involved, especially large employers, and not training providers or awarding organizations

Nevertheless, the dropout rate from the original Trailblazer group was high as timescales were ridiculously tight, information kept changing as policy emerged, and the number of meetings far exceeded our original expectations.

We soon re-organised to have a small strategic steering group, plus working groups for hairdressing, barbering, beauty and for assessment. Even so, from January to March this year alone there have been six meetings of the various groups.

Among the headaches for the group was the issue of level — employers would have preferred one apprenticeship which covered all the skills needed by a hairdresser, probably at level three and lasting three years.

But government policy dictates that level three means achieving Functional Skills at level two and, while employers do not want to perpetuate the myth that hairdressing is only for dummies, Functional Skills are a real barrier for some of the young people attracted into hairdressing.

Even though some of the content would previously have been at level three, the hairdressing apprenticeship is now set at level two.

Duration was another hotly debated issue. Employers wanted a minimum of two years, or even three, training providers wanted to keep it at one year as required by government policy. Announcements about funding reforms were a massive distraction as it became increasingly hard to separate out standards development from funding issues.

Arguments about level, duration and assessment took up a lot of time, but were primarily driven by funding concerns rather than standards, and the uncertainties about future funding models made all these discussions more difficult than they would otherwise have been.

The hair professional Trailblazer standard settled upon has a two-year duration and is at level two.

We do expect that a longer two-year duration for hairdressing and the independently assessed end test will increase costs, which will need to be taken into account with funding bands.

Employers still want learners to progress through a qualification as part of their programme, but we’re calling for fewer assessments to avoid duplication with the end test which would be the final stage of the qualification.

But let’s not forget that over the years hours have been cut back, and the quality of assessment is variable, mainly due to lack of current salon practice, to the point that employers strongly believe standards have been eroded.

And raising standards is precisely the reason employers got involved with Trailblazers in the first place.

Local enterprise partnerships (Leps) outside London were told by central government that they would not be getting Euro skills cash to dish out because of European Commission (EC) rules. Jim Sims explains the importance of this ruling for those in FE.

Regardless of your views about the reasons behind the recent announcement of changes to the way local areas and Local Enterprise Partnerships (Leps) will be involved in the delivery of the 2014-2020 European Union (EU) Growth it’s vital that managers in the FE sector understand the implications of the recent decision to ‘row back’ on a government commitment to give local areas more control over the distribution of EU funding.

Before rehearsing how the FE sector can respond to this issue, it’s probably worth explaining some of the reasons why many European specialists in the Lep Network believe that the outcome of the negotiations with the EC was inevitable and perfectly predictable.

Notwithstanding the fact the UK government appears to suggest it was the EC that railed against their plans for actively involving local areas in decisions about local investment priorities, it’s probably worth recognising that the EC has actually provided member states with some strong tools for devolving strategy formulation and decision making to local areas — in the form of Integrated Territorial Investments (ITIs) and Community-Led Local Development (CLLD).

Under these initiatives, localities are basically able to draw up Integrated Investment Strategies for local areas, nominate local bodies to be Intermediate Bodies (IBs) and then manage the dispersal of EU funding locally, in accordance with EU regulations.

What should the FE sector be doing to best utilise EU funding to deliver future skills priorities?

So, why hasn’t the UK universally taken advantage of these tools? Well, for the UK government — in common with many other member states — it’s all about risk and control. At the outset of the programme, it basically had two policy objectives which ultimately ended up being in conflict with each other. The first — more publicly-stated objective — was to try and devolve more control to local areas, by empowering Leps to have a central role in dispersing EU funding.

The second — less publicly-stated goal — was to minimise the UKs exposure to the risk of non-compliance and claw-back by the EC by effectively agreeing that devolving EU funding was a ‘red line’ not to be crossed.

Ultimately, this second objective won out, and we now find ourselves in a position that can best be characterised as European Regional Development Funding (ERDF) essentially operating to the traditional ‘open call’ model, with the majority of bidders being asked to bring match funding to the table; and European Social Funding (ESF) using a variety of ‘match at source’ models, through the Skills Funding Agency, Department for Work and Pensions (DWP) and BIG Lottery Opt-ins (with the potential for a local call model, in fairly defined areas like Youth Employment Initiative, City Deal etc.). And the European Agricultural Farming and Rural Development Funding (EAFRD) / European Maritime and Fisheries Fund (EMFF) basically uses Department for Environment Food & Rural Affairs core funding as match, but asking private sector bidders to bring additional match to the table.

That said, at the time of going to press only the EAFRD/EMFF Operational Programme has been signed off by the EC — although both the Department of Communities and Local Government (DCLG) and the DWP are hopeful theirs will be signed off soon. So much for a single European Growth Programme I hear you say.

So, given the above, what should the FE sector be doing to best utilise EU funding to deliver future skills priorities? Well, given the highly centralised (supply driven) structures that have been maintained under the ESF Operational Programme (and recognising the increasing government drive towards demand-led funding models) my own view is that the real winners in the sector are likely to be those organisations that are successful in working with Leps to make better use of ERDF and Skills Capital Funding to drive their business engagement and outreach activities.

Stewart Segal looks at the traineeship programme in light of a Department for Business, Innovation and Skills (BIS) one-year review.

There has always been a range of programmes designed to help young unemployed or under-employed young people into work.

The names of the programmes will be familiar to many — E2E, Programme-Led Apprenticeships, Access to Apprenticeships and many more.

So when the previous Skills Minister Matt Hancock announced traineeships in a blaze of publicity, it was not surprising that many people were a little sceptical.

The programme design itself was excellent. It followed many of the recommendations that we had made over a number of years.

It was a flexible design enabling the provider to create a programme around the individual. It could contain work preparation, work experience and English and maths and for the first time, the Skills Funding Agency would pay for non-qualification activities such as work experience.

However, the government couldn’t resist launching the programme with restrictions on learner eligibility, complicated funding rules, complex contracting arrangements and no exemptions to benefit rules. It has taken time, but gradually we are seeing some of those restrictions lifted. And we still need to lift the biggest restriction — the government continues to stop many providers delivering the programme, which means many employers cannot provide traineeship opportunities for young people.

Considering the complexity of the programme and the fact that the recent BIS survey was completed at a very early stage, the results are very positive.

Some of the main points made in the report are 67 per cent of trainees were in an apprenticeship, a job or further study and many more were job seeking and work experience was the most useful element of the training.

These results are very encouraging especially as the programme has already had a number of rule changes to respond to the issues AELP and providers had raised.

Since the start of the programme, the benefit rules, and work experience timings have been relaxed while the eligibility rules have been expanded to include level two learners over the age of 19.

The initial restriction of only allowing Ofsted grade one and two-rated providers to deliver traineeships should now be reviewed

The review does not really address the issue of those trainees on benefits and there are still some Job Centres where the benefits rules do restrict the delivery of traineeships.

This means that some JCPs are still not referring young people onto the programme because they are concerned that the programme may be too long.

This is further complicated by the fact that JCPs have their own programmes such as Work Experience or Sector Based Work Academies.

Our view is that traineeships should become the main programme for all young people looking for work.

The final issue is how young people get on the programme. The highest number of trainees came through a provider direct (25 per cent) which was more than the Job Centre (18 per cent). Even fewer came through the National Careers Service or the Apprenticeship Vacancy site. The latter now covers traineeships so we hope this will improve.

The majority of employers reported that referrals came through training providers. It is clear from the review that training providers are the only common link to all of the sources of referrals and they make the link with employers.

This is good evidence to support the fact that we have to increase the numbers of providers delivering the programme.

The initial restriction of only allowing Ofsted grade one and two-rated providers to deliver traineeships should now be reviewed.

Any provider that has evidence they can deliver a high quality traineeship programme should be allowed to deliver.

Many of these providers have existing relationships with employers and have established apprenticeship programmes.

They can make those links and ensure that the programme can be expanded and more employers will see the benefit of providing these important first work opportunities.

With these recommended changes, we have a real opportunity to develop a high quality, flexible programme delivered by quality providers in partnership with employers.