A magistrate football fan and chartered surveyor has been announced as the new governors’ chair at Guildford College Group.
John Denning has been elected to the post and will take over from Stephen Caswell at the end of his term next month.
John Denning
Mr Denning has been a college governor since March 2013 and is an experienced non-executive with local community and business knowledge.
He is an 11 years’ retired chartered surveyor, but continues to play an active part in business.
He was previously managing director of Bass Leisure Retail and chief executive of the Voyager Pub Company, but is currently senior independent director and deputy chairman of the Royal Surrey County Hospital, and chair of the Retirement Lease Housing Association, based in Aldershot,
Grandfather-of-five Mr Denning is also a magistrate on the North Hampshire Bench, a board trustee of the Queen Elizabeth Foundation for Disabled People, based in Leatherhead, and a director of Aldershot Town Football Club.
Stephen Caswell, who has been chair of the Guildford College Group for the past six years, said: “I am confident that when I step down in March I will be leaving the college in John’s very capable hands to build on our successes and continue the journey begun by the board and our new principal, Mike Potter.”
The Guildford College Group includes Guildford College, Merrist Wood College and Farnham Sixth Form College.
Mr Potter CBE, principal and chief executive of the Guildford College Group, said: “The governors have set the college a medium term target of getting the college to outstanding, not only in Ofsted terms but also as an integral part of the communities which it serves.
“A lot of the groundwork has been undertaken but work still remains to be done. This seamless transition from Stephen to John will help us continue our journey towards this destination and the whole college and I would like to pay a special thank you to Stephen for his huge commitment and support over the past eight years”.
Stephen Caswell
Mr Denning said: “I believe that with Mike at the helm, we have the capability of achieving our strategic objectives.
“The most important fundamental relationship in any successful organisation is that between the chief executive and chair, providing purpose and leadership.
“My main contribution will be to provide support and encouragement to Mike and his team for the benefit of our students.
“We will create a drive towards a greater sense of urgency and accountability through every level at the college, while preserving the values that have brought Stephen and the board success to date.”
If you want to let us know of any new faces at the top of your college or training provider, please let us know by emailing news@feweek.co.uk
It’s one thing being inspected by Ofsted — and feeling aggrieved by the process or outcome — but it’s another thing to be carrying out the inspection and potentially exposing managing directors and principals to the ugly truth about their organisations.
Here, just weeks after ex-Newcastle College Group chief executive Dame Jackie Fisher revealed why she had thrown Ofsted out mid-inspection back in 2012 (pictured inset), former inspector Phil Hatton speaks to FE Week about his experience from the other side of the fence.
The debate about complaints against Ofsted has prompted discussions about the current process in the sector.
Over the past year, since I gave up being a full-time inspector, I have worked with a wide selection of providers and colleges and have spoken with many more at conferences.
There is a very definite feeling among them that the appeals procedure is heavily loaded one way and that complaining about any aspect of inspection would be ‘a waste of time’.
This is a sad reflection of how the inspection process is currently viewed by those subject to it.
‘Iron Fist’
Of the four inspectorates I worked for in 20 years as an inspector, the one that was probably viewed best by the sector was the Adult Learning Inspectorate (ALI).
Before being merged into Ofsted, an independent review of inspectorates described the ALI as being viewed by the sector as ‘an iron fist in a velvet glove’.
Communication with the sector was particularly strong, with the monthly newsletter, Talisman, being eagerly read.
Full-time inspectors met to share findings frequently and part-time inspectors worked for the inspectorate rather than a third party, with their performance and development being closely monitored.
Part of the quality assurance of complaints in the ALI was for myself and another inspector to review and analyse the reasons for all the complaints that arose in a particular year.
Over the two years I did this it was extremely rare for any to get to the stage of judicial review.
The ALI, just like any really good provider, learned from what had gone wrong to prevent reoccurrence.
That should be the raison d’être for any complaints system if the culture of an organisation is really about improvement, rather than paying it lip service.
Communication breakdown
One of the forgotten quality assurance methods when I was a part-time inspector for the Further Education Funding Council was for college nominees to be able to sit in on observations with inspectors.
This meant that nominees developed confidence in judgements made about teaching and learning, with real transparency of the process as viewed by colleges at the time.
In my experience complaints arise when there are breakdowns in communication.
As a lead inspector, both you and the provider nominee want to ensure that an inspection runs smoothly, so that your team of inspectors get to see every positive attribute of the provider.
This was always my very clear message when first talking to a provider, ‘show us everything that you do well’ before we reach the grading meeting.
My experienced colleagues that I have worked with over the years have that same attitude, so that if there is a close call between two grades we would be questioning to see if there were any positives that had been missed or which had not been given sufficient weighting.
Conflict
The role of the nominee is absolutely crucial in preventing potential conflict.
Any provider, whether one with 20 or 40,000 learners, needs to ensure that communication during inspection throws up that potential conflict quickly.
Over the years I have had to deal with inspectors whose personality was such that they came across as too cold and unfriendly, or whose grasp of the area they were inspecting was just not good enough.
Along with this, there were occasionally those who were of the glass being half-empty rather than half-full variety.
In such cases the lead inspector or their assist would usually observe the inspector where such concerns were raised, and look at their evidence base to check the validity of judgements and the understanding of what was being observed or spoken about.
This usually worked very well, with feedback to the inspector ironing out the difficulties. In such cases, with honest two-way communication with the nominee, the outcome of inspection was not impacted on.
Where there are unresolved problems it is usually down to clashes of personality. That can be a two-way street, with elements of blame on both sides.
Intimidation
Speaking with total frankness and honesty, there are some providers (or usually a particular individual) whose point-blank refusal to understand why they are less than perfect cannot be shaken, despite the evidence being irrefutable as to why they are not.
Truly outstanding providers will say ‘but is there anything else that we could improve?’
I have personally been subjected to intimidation on a number of occasions. In one particular case an external observer on the inspection wondered why there was no punitive action for a provider who tried to make the inspection very difficult to carry out.
The complaints process was crystal clear to all in the ALI and any action that was needed was rapidly taken.
An inspection manager, unconnected with the problematic inspection and knowledgeable about the area being inspected, would quickly visit a complaining provider to hear their side of the story, alongside reviewing the complete evidence base for the inspection. This worked well in the vast majority of cases, with a two-way dialogue. Providers felt listened to and that the complaints process was transparent and fair.
The timings of the current Ofsted complaints system need to be aligned with the report publication schedule (five weeks to publish, six to deal with complaints?).
The fact it exceeds the publication schedule sends the wrong message and does not demonstrate joined up thinking if you are really wanting to engage positively with the sector, rather than to give the impression of a hard-nosed ‘publish or be damned’ organisation.
Mistakes
It is an obvious fact that anyone can make a mistake. An acknowledgement of this when one is made would prevent some complaints reaching the latter stages.
Communication will most likely be good when inspectors know the areas that they are inspecting well and they can demonstrate a record of high achievement in them to those that they are inspecting. This cuts out the ‘who are you to be telling me what to do’ element of potential conflict.
By the end of August a record year for the number of Learning and Skills inspections carried out will have ended, many led by recently-recruited inspectors.
The Freedom of Informaton request by FE Week does point to failings in the process of inspection in the last academic year, with nine step two complaints by providers being upheld (over one-third of those reached).
What is even more worrying is the 100 per cent rate quoted so far for this academic year, with all four complaints having been upheld.
Hopefully, the need to ramp up quality assurance of inspections in the field will be recognised and will impact quickly to prevent mistrust. I know that inspection can be a truly valuable improvement process for the sector.
Phil Hatton is a former HMI with 20 years’ experience, leading hundreds of college and work-based learning inspections. He now works at the Learning Improvement Service — www.learningimprovementservice.co.uk—as an adviser.
The employer skills survey pointed out, in general, how skills shortages were threatening to undermine any economic recovery. Mick Fletcher takes a closer, critical look at the survey.
The UK Commission for Employment and Skills (UKCES) has been sensibly even-handed with its National Employer Skills Survey (NESS), simultaneously urging employers to raise their ambitions and FE colleges to do more to place themselves at the cutting edge of training.
What has been missing from the commentary is any serious interrogation of the report and its assumptions.
It’s as though the evident reliability of the data has blinded users to some serious questions that might be raised about its validity.
It may, of course, just be that a narrative about the need for more training is convenient for almost all stakeholders, and no-one wants to rock the boat.
The reliability of evidence relates to whether or not the results might have occurred by chance.
Although it is based on interviewing a sample of employers, NESS is based on more than 90,000 interviews with a carefully- constructed cross section of establishments. If it were to be repeated it is highly likely that it would produce a similar set of results, as is illustrated by the stability of the time series data.
The validity of evidence, however, is the extent to which it measures what you think it is measuring.
It’s a fragile basis for drawing far-reaching conclusions
It’s not a question of how many people you ask, but whether their answers mean what you think they do.
The concept of ‘skill shortage’ on which so much of the report’s analysis rests, is one that requires much further scrutiny.
Contrary to much of the commentary, employers cannot ‘report’ a skill shortage.
They can report a vacancy and they can give their ideas as to why that vacancy has not been filled.
One reason given might be the lack of applicants with suitable skills (NESS wisely probes with an open-ended question).
This, however, is not the same as evidence that there are no potential applicants with suitable skills out there, which is what you might think a skills shortage means.
It could be that no-one with the right skills was prepared to work at the rate offered, it could be that the workplace was in the middle of nowhere with poor transport links or that the employer used a poor recruitment strategy.
It’s a fragile basis for drawing far-reaching conclusions about the need to alter the balance of college programmes or the careers advice given to young people.
The report defines skill shortages as “vacancies which are proving difficult to fill due to the establishment not being able to find applicants with the appropriate skills, qualifications or experience”.
It then presents the apparently worrying fact that more than a fifth (22 per cent) of all vacancies and 30 per cent of those that are hard to fill are caused by skill shortages. But turn this around.
The same figure means that 70 per cent of hard to fill vacancies have applicants with the appropriate skills, qualifications and experience.
Maybe they don’t want the job. Maybe the employer has a valid reason for not wanting a well-qualified applicant.
Whichever it is, increasing skills supply does not appear to be the appropriate response to the issue, and lack of skills may not be the main thing that is holding back the economy.
There is, of course, another simpler way of analysing skill shortages. One can look at wage rates.
Economics does not explain everything, but in a well-functioning market if a particular skill is in short supply employers will bid up wages.
It happened a few years ago with plumbers and maths skills always earn a premium.
The best way to align education with the needs of the labour market is to give clear and unbiased information on the opportunities, including wages, offered in different occupations and let the opportunities for training be driven by the resulting choices.
Vocational education seems to be viewed as a soft option for public funding cuts, but it’s a view that has far-reaching consequences for the economy, says Kirstie Donnelly.
There’s a theme emerging around a lot of the policy changes in the FE sector of late — cuts.
First, there was the announcement of a 17.5 per cent funding rate cut for 18-year-olds, described by Education Secretary Michael Gove as the ‘least detrimental’ scenario. But for who? Certainly not young adults, who see vocational qualifications as a way of getting on the skills and employment ladder.
Then, the Skills Funding Agency (SFA) announced plans to cut funding for almost 1,500 qualifications that fall below the 15-credit threshold.
We weren’t all aware the threshold had increased from 12 to 15 credits, but for the most part we were prepared for something — we just didn’t know the full extent of it, or how it might impact on all would-be vocational learners.
While there is logic in de-cluttering the system — something we welcomed from the Whitehead review — this goes too far.
It looks like random cuts are being made to compensate for a funding hole elsewhere, and sadly the adult vocational market is not seen as a priority, but rather an easy target.
This latest announcement is cutting funding for the sake of it without considering the wider, longer-term impact of the changes.
We know youth unemployment remains high, stubbornly so.
Don’t just cut back and ‘cleanse the system’ without considering all the evidence and all the facts. Don’t make any more snap decisions
We also know that employers are facing skills gaps in certain industries, which could destabilise the UK’s economic recovery.
And yet we’ve surely all seen research detailing employers’ fears that young people aren’t prepared for the workplace.
To me, vocational qualifications are the solution. They give people the chance to develop the skills and confidence they need for the workplace.
They enable future progression or specialism within an industry. Ultimately, they bridge the gap between education and employment.
The government needs to think carefully about any further changes it makes to the system — particularly when it comes to funding cuts.
First and foremost, employers and their needs must be the focus of any changes and developments. After all, they’re the ones who hire people in the first place. But I doubt they have been consulted.
Some of the qualifications that will cease to receive funding on the back of the SFA announcement may indeed have less value to employers.
But equally, we can’t assume that just because a qualification is niche to a certain industry, or has limited take-up, that it is worthless. In fact it could be the complete opposite.
We also need to consider how different sectors operate. Some require more specific or atomised learning. This blanket approach cannot work for all industries.
Employers aside, we mustn’t forget the impact on the learners themselves, particularly adult learners or the long-term unemployed. Or even the likes of ex-service personnel or those leaving prison.
Many won’t have the skills or confidence to jump straight into a long-term programme of study. Shorter courses can help them to learn the ropes and act as a stepping-stone onto further learning.
And what about those already in work who want to enhance their skills further? Does
the government realise it could be denying them the opportunity to further their careers? This surely this goes against everything vocational education and training stands for.
I urge the government, the SFA and others to proceed with caution. Don’t just cut back and ‘cleanse the system’ without considering all the evidence and all the facts. Don’t make any more snap decisions. Think about the future impact this will have on the economy. Think about the individuals this will affect.
Vocational pathways can and do deliver quality results. It’s about time this country recognises that, instead of treating them as the poor relation that can be cast aside whenever the purse strings are tightened.
Kirstie Donnelly, UK managing director, City & Guilds
While the building trade is a big employer of apprentices, the wider construction industry suffers skills gaps elsewhere. But Laing O’Rourke has teamed up with FE and skills bodies, including a number of colleges, to boost the development of industry-needed skills, explains Alison Lamplough.
he construction industry is a major UK employer and, as well as being one of our essential sectors, it has also been a major exporter for nearly a century.
Yet the industry is facing up to a ticking time bomb — caused by a skills shortage and an ageing workforce.
Apprenticeships have long played a part in the building sector of the construction industry.
But on the civil engineering side, the demand and attractiveness of formal apprenticeships has not been strong.
Coupling this with the demographic timebomb of an aging workforce means unless urgent action is taken, the problem of a skills gap is about to hit home.
It is anticipated that over the next decade the UK will see an increase in investment in major civil engineering infrastructure development.
Projects such as Crossrail have already shown we have skill gaps in areas such as tunnelling and civil engineering specific trades.
Unless the skills gap in the workforce is addressed, UK contractors will have to look to Europe to meet the skill requirements.
In the past, the industry has used major projects such as Terminal 5 at Heathrow and the London Olympics as catalysts for improving skills.
Laing O’Rourke, as a direct employer, is fully aware of these skill gaps.
Unless the skills gap in the workforce is addressed, UK contractors will have to look to Europe to meet the skill requirements
Last year, the company won funding from the UK Commission for Employment and Skills, under the Employer Ownership Pilot, to develop a new level two apprenticeship for steelfixing — identified nationally as one of the gaps in core skills.
Laing O’Rourke selected a group of colleges to deliver the formal training component. These were Bridgwater College, Gateshead College and the National Construction College.
After a full tendering process the company appointed awarding organisation NOCN to support the development of the qualification. Its managing director, Graham Hasting-Evans, is on the UK National Steering Committee for the Build Up Skills programme, a UK initiative backed by the European Commission which aims to support closing the training and skills gap in the UK workforce to enable it to meet the EU 2020 energy efficiency targets.
In February 2013, at NOCN’s offices in London, Laing O’Rourke brought together a team to develop both the qualification and how the apprenticeship would be delivered.
The development also included input from operational staff, Laing O’Rourke’s suppliers and BAM Nuttall as a representative of other major contractors.
The team defined the employers’ standards, the quality control requirements, the knowledge qualification, workplace learning (NVQ), the approach to up-skilling, the training exercises and delivery of the apprenticeship.
The process was undertaken in line with the Richard Review principles.
A full package has been brought together including Functional Skills, ERR and trainee/pre-apprenticeships pathways at entry and level one. A level three is planned for team leaders in order to give a full pathway. The local enterprise partnership and local agencies are involved in recruiting potential apprentices and the apprenticeship has been approved by Ofqual and is on the Apprenticeship Framework.
The initial trainee programme has started and the first cohort of apprentices is planned to begin the level two apprenticeship in March.
A quality control group with the employers will oversee the new style apprenticeships.
The qualification has been designed in such a way as to also provide a framework for up-skilling the existing workforce and introduce the use of new technology into site based work.
Bringing everyone together in this way is an innovative approach to the development of employer-led apprenticeships and qualifications. All involved have enjoyed this collaborative approach and see this as an excellent way of working. It’s the way of the future for employer-led apprenticeships and qualifications.
Alison Lamplough, head of operational training, Laing O’Rourke
Employers in big town and city locations make an attractive proposition for young workers and providers who, claims Salena Dawson, are becoming less interested in rural provision. She looks at whether such communities are being let down by businesses and providers.
I am a small business owner in a rural Norfolk market town. I am passionate about my community and, like many small independent business owners, I want to be integral to its continued existence.
Unfortunately, we the community (both business and residential) do not seem to be inspiring our young people to stay local.
Losing our young people or failing to attract younger people into our market town will have a detrimental effect on the prosperity and sustainability of our community and in the long term the loss of young people will impact the economic viability of local businesses like mine.
Like many market towns we have seen an expansion in population, but mainly on the outskirts of town.
This makes the accessibility to the nearest city shopping mall a better shopping experience than our high street with its many vacant retail units, or occupied shops — none of which sell young people’s clothes, shoes or jewellery.
We have no cinema, public swimming pool, bars or anything remotely extreme sport-orientated to entice our young people to remain local.
Quaint we are, cosmopolitan we are not.
We have an academy, but with no sixth form college. Those lucky enough to make the GCSE grade are shipped out to a shiny new world spending their pounds elsewhere.
Those not wanting FE are left often to find their own way — NEET [not in education, employment or training]. Aspiration in these young people remains low.
However, what we do have locally is around 1,000 small independent businesses, all with potential employers who could give work experience, employment, and mentoring to our younger people.
But we don’t.
It beggars belief that small businesses in market towns seem to be invisible providers
I have sat on the local chamber, been a member of the local partnership and even sat as an independent governor at the local school.
But more and more I become frustrated at the lack of communication between these groups to act to assist young people into local business. Instead we leave our young people to simply leave.
With the growth in apprenticeship schemes we would expect better communication by commercially-minded providers, but it beggars belief that small businesses in market towns seem to be invisible providers.
We small business owners find it onerous and time-consuming to proactively seek the right candidate.
There is a plethora of providers and the information at times is overwhelming.
Further time is wasted by mismatched candidates being sent for interviews because the provider is trying to pigeonhole candidates into unsuitable placements or into careers the candidates do not want.
Is it any wonder that small businesses give up trying to access the apprenticeship scheme as a viable way employing young people?
So how do we keep our young people local? We create an educational environment which sustains young people locally beyond the age of 16.
We provide better communication between schools and the business community by appointing a local business leader to be the conduit between the two. We start giving impartial careers advice.
We start making apprenticeship providers more accountable — it’s time for them to not only make the quick easy placements to large business, but also to take the time to know local business and match the candidate accordingly
Without retaining young people locally our community dies. It is incumbent on us in business to seek to retain skills locally and to create an environment where young people want to remain. To survive we need to pocket their pound too.
I remain passionate about my community and I hope to be integral in providing an environment which nurtures young people to one day feel this passion about their community also.
In early 2006 Peter Marples, fresh off the back of a merger between his provider Assa and training giant Carter & Carter, was vaunted in national press as “one of the least known and more powerful people in further education”.
When I tell him this, he laughs and describes it as “an inappropriate comment by an exuberant journalist”.
“It’s certainly not true now,” he says.
The claim may not be true, but current venture Aspire Achieve Advance certainly has some clout.
As of last month, it held subcontractor contracts worth £5.8m, according to the Skills Funding Agency, and works with around 1,500 apprentices.
However, one of Marples’s biggest regrets is the Assa deal (which he pitches more as a sale than a merger) despite the fact it resulted in his appointment to the role of business development director at Carter & Carter.
He had been managing director of Assa when the deal was struck in August 2005. The £24.2m Carter & Carter paid for Assa made Marples — who had led a management buyout of the transport, aerospace and food and drink industries provider just two years earlier — a multi-millionaire almost overnight.
But, he says: “I think the timing was not right to sell Assa at that point.
“I think the business could have gone on independently to probably have been now the biggest and best provider in the sector.”
He chose to go ahead with the deal partly, he says, because of a “genuine belief that being part of something bigger would have helped us grow faster”.
But Carter & Carter’s subsequent demise meant his dreams for Assa were not to be.
Inset: Peter Marples with wife Sarah at a Radio 2 driving experience in aid of Children in Need
Carter & Carter had begun life in 1992 with a contract to improve the accident and repair division at the Vauxhall car firm. Five years later it moved into training, winning the British Audi Academy contract.
In 2005 Carter & Carter was floated on the stock market with an £80m valuation before Assa was acquired and by April 2007, Carter & Carter shares were trading hands for more than £12 each, valuing it at £550m-plus.
But the growth strategy came to an abrupt end with the tragic death of founder Phillip Carter, who died along with his 17-year-old son, Andrew, in a helicopter crash in May 2007.
Within eight months the 27,000-learner company was in administration with shares tumbling to 85p before they were suspended.
It was eventually bought out in the main by NCG (formerly Newcastle College Group). The deal was thought to have helped save the jobs of around 1,500 of Carter & Carter’s 2,200 staff.
“It was very difficult personally because I should have been with Phil in that helicopter — the company lost its charismatic leader,” says Marples, who resigned following the tragedy.
He adds: “I had an allegiance to Phil and respected his vision and drive and I didn’t trust the vision and drive of those who replaced him.”
Despite this, he tells me he was “of course” surprised the company declined so rapidly. He is also defensive about the huge growth of Carter & Carter.
“It was part of a strategy that the board fully supported and that business would have continued to prosper with Phil at the helm,” he says, refuting any suggestion that the growth had made the company unstable.
“There isn’t a negative perception of so much growth at NCG or at Vision West Notts, or at Learndirect,” he adds, defiantly.
The attitude betrays “an entrepreneurial streak” that Marples, now 49, says first evidenced itself during his childhood in the village of Wirksworth, in the Derbyshire Peak District.
His mother and father, Jean and Walter, ran the local Post Office where Marples tells me he was bought up sitting on the counter, counting money from the age of three and his choice to go into accountancy was, he says, down to his mother.
There isn’t a negative perception of so much growth at NCG or at Vision West Notts, or at Learndirect“
“My mother said I was no good with my hands, so I was either going to be a bank manager or an accountant,” he says.
Marples took on an accountancy apprenticeship at Derbyshire County Council at 16, before joining the Audit Commission in 1987 and then being “head-hunted” by consultancy firm KPMG in 1990.
After nearly 13 years he left to join Assa and then, helped by profits from the company’s sale to Carter & Carter and in true millionaire style, he led a consortium that bought Derby County Football Club in 2006. It was, he says, “probably the craziest thing I’ve done”.
“I felt I could run it like a business, and make it successful using business principles,” he says.
But he quickly found that running a football club was not like running a business.
“It’s one of those things that you get caught up in the emotion of buying your club you support, and when you get into it you realise it’s not quite what it seems,” he says.
Under Marples, the club made it to the Premier League, something he is evidently proud of, but in 2008 he decided to sell the club.
His next move was to set up Aspire Achieve Advance with former West Nottinghamshire College principal Di McEvoy-Robinson.
“I didn’t need to do it, but I’m very driven by trying to be successful at whatever I do — and apprenticeships are something that’s really important to me,” he says.
Though nowhere near as large as Carter & Carter, Aspire Achieve Advance has also grown quickly. In September 2012 it teamed up with City of Liverpool College to buy the “majority” of business from First4Skills — a provider behind around 10,000 apprenticeships across the country that had gone into administration.
But Marples insists there should be no concern about over-expansion.
“We spend a lot of time on the quality side and… talking to employers, learners and staff about how we can continuously improve that quality,” he says.
Marples, who is married to the Aspire Achieve Advance quality and compliance director Sarah and has two children, Thomas, aged 20, and Samantha, 23, is reticent about his life outside of work.
He seems to be someone who does not switch off easily, although he’s clearly committed to his charity work with Children in Need and Frazer’s House, which helps parents of children suffering with brain tumours.
“Being successful brings lots of different types of rewards,” he says.
“It’s not about writing cheques. Anyone can write a cheque and walk away. It’s about putting your energy and the skills you’ve got into those sorts of things.”
Further education figures were left disappointed by a lack of sector talk as Skills Minister Matthew Hancock and Professor Alison Wolf both appeared on BBC Question Time.
Professor Wolf, whose government-commissioned review of vocational education for 14 to 19-year-olds was published in early 2011, and Mr Hancock answered a broad range of questions — but nothing was raised about the FE and skills sector.
They were quizzed about anonymity in rape cases in light of the acquittal of Coronation Street actor William Roache and whether workers in essential services should have the right to strike, among other issues.
Sue McLeod, principal of MidKent College, where the show was filmed, was one such disappointed viewer, tweeting that the show was “feisty but lacking in #FE relevance”.
There remains no end in sight to the problems faced by providers trying to use new funding software to calculate how much government cash they are due.
Skills Funding Agency (SFA) deputy director for programme delivery and performance Rich Williams and deputy director for funding systems Una Bennett (pictured) spoke in a webinar hosted exclusively by FE Week publisher Lsect, presented by FE funding consultant Nick Linford. They spoke about ongoing issues with the new Funding Information System (Fis) software.
I cannot say we have fixes for every one of the [25] known issues for FIS but we are working very hard on that.”
It should have been available in August last year, but was not released until November — and providers say it is still giving unreliable funding data reports.
Mr Williams admitted Fis was still creating inaccurate data and could not say when the issues would be resolved.
He said: “I cannot say we have fixes for every one of the [25] known issues for FIS but we are working very hard on that.”
A spreadsheet on the Data Service’s website has listed more than 70 problems with Fis.
A report issued this week by the SFA also conceded Fis was producing inaccurate data in five out of 12 key reporting areas.
The government’s Learning Aim Reference System (Lars) online search engine should also have been available by last August.
It is supposed to help providers’ management information system (MIS) officers check whether qualifications are eligible for funding, and how much per learner providers should receive.
However, it is still not available and providers are having to use Lars Lite instead — a temporary downloadable database from the SFA that providers claim is also producing unreliable data.
When asked when Lars will be released, Mr Williams said: “Any date I give I would be making up, so I’m not going to give you a date.”
When asked if development of Lars had been paused while the other funding software issues were being resolved, he added: “The focus has been elsewhere, absolutely.”
Many in the sector have claimed the problems with Fis and Lars Lite corrupted key information in the Statistical First Release published on January 30.
A note in the report itself stated: “There is evidence of increased data lag for the first three months of 2013/14 compared to the same period of the previous year.”
