Ofsted has today launched a consultation on much-anticipated proposals that would allow learners to compare the post-16 performance of general FE colleges with schools.

The education watchdog is looking at introducing separate judgements for sixth forms in its school inspection reports.

As reported in FE Week last year, the extra grade would reverse a decision made three years ago to produce a single overall grade for schools.

Ofsted’s national director for schools, Michael Cladingbowl, said: “It’s important that parents and young people have a clear understanding of how well the school’s sixth form is doing so they can make informed choices about where to continue their studies when they reach 16.”

The eight-week consultation, which ends on May 13, asks: Should there be a separate graded judgement on the effectiveness of a school’s sixth form? The change would apply to maintained schools and academies.

An Ofsted spokesperson told FE Week in July: “We are planning whether to provide a separate grading for a school’s sixth form within inspection reports.”

She added that the effectiveness of post-16 provision did already inform wider inspection judgements on a school and that Ofsted recognised the importance of the importance of sixth forms in helping students to progress to employment or higher education.

The consultation also proposes introducing separate graded judgements on the quality of nursery and reception in its inspection reports.

A spokesperson for the education watchdog said evidence from the 7,000 inspections it carried out each year indicated that “not all schools need to be inspected in the same way”.

Mr Cladingbowl added: “We are keen to hear the views of parents and learners as well as providers about our proposals to bring in these separate judgements.

“We are also giving a lot of thought to how school inspection might develop over the longer term and will bring forward proposals for consultation in due course.”

Visit the Ofsted website for details on how to take part in the consultation.

The government risks “throwing the baby out with the bathwater” with cuts to qualifications it sees as worthless, FE sector leaders have warned.

A host of speakers at a seminar on the future of adult vocational qualifications urged Skills Minister Matthew Hancock to think carefully about public funding cuts to apparently unpopular qualifications.

It comes after the minister was accused of belittling some qualifications in an announcement that 5,000 faced the public funding axe.

At the seminar, organised by the Westminster Employment Forum and held at the former Whitehall Palace building in central London, Lifetime Awarding managing director John McNamara said he accepted that “any awarding body worth its salt” would cull qualifications that weren’t selling.

But he said the government risked “throwing the baby out with the bathwater”, and warned against belittling qualifications.

Mr McNamara said: “There might be qualifications that appear to be low quality but they are a vehicle to get people with learning difficulties, people who are unemployed and divorced from the system back into work. We throw those out at our peril.”

His comments were echoed by Association of Employment and Learning Providers (AELP) chief executive Stewart Segal, who said: “Most of the qualifications I looked at I am sure come about through a very distinct requirement from a very small number of employers. We need to be very careful.”

Department for Business, Innovation and Skills deputy director for standards and qualifications Bobbie McClelland defended the qualifications reform as being in the “wider context of a more responsive system”, and spoke about a move towards increased use of “destination data”.

She said: “We are looking to bring in new outcome success measures so rather than just focusing on qualification success rates, we are working on matching data to look at destinations into jobs and inter learning and the earning change that happens to people throughout their lives.

“We will be publishing experimental data on this at provider level in July.”

The panels also discussed the employer ownership of skills agenda, a key government policy which has so far seen £578m spent on two pilot projects with businesses across the UK.

The policy itself was widely welcomed by most, but doubt was cast over the effectiveness to date of the pilot schemes.

BAE Systems chief executive Nigel Whitehead, who is a commissioner for the UK Commission for Employment and Skills (UKCES) and authored a review of adult qualifications last year, said: “Today there is limited employer ownership of skills in its broader sense. We have an over-centralised and over-complex system today.

“Our view was that employer engagement through industrial partnerships was the way to go. Employers need to work together in partnership and step forward. If we are to prepare people for the world of work my personal belief is we have to give opportunities in the workplace. It has made me think about the way I open up my doors.”

Mara Bogdanovic, head of business engagement at awarding body OCR, said she was underwhelmed by the impact of the policy so far.

She said: “Employer ownership of skills is a good vision, a great vision, because employers know what they need from their workforce. But I have to ask: ‘Where is the pattern going? What is the plan for making employer ownership of skills a reality? How is everything going to fit together?’

“There is a lot going on at the moment for awarding bodies. It feels a bit like background noise. We were really excited about the original announcement and the possibilities that might bring. Up until now we don’t see that anything very earth-shattering has happened.

“I just think we would like to see what the plan is and whether we are up to the plan. I am not sure we are seeing all the momentum we should be seeing.”

And Ofqual’s regulation director, Fiona Pethick, had tough words for awarding organisations, which she said would be held to account by the watchdog over the qualifications they offer.

She said: “We are going to be expecting awarding organisations to address the shortcomings and remove qualifications where they cannot be sure of the quality. If we find problems, we will take action. That is my final message.”

Barking and Dagenham College’s head of business Janet Bywater spoke about how colleges had a distinct role to play in delivering skills to meet the demand in the UK.

She said: “We recognise our job is to deliver the skills the UK economy needs. You cannot be based in an area like Barking and Dagenham and not realise that your job is to help people through. We get it. We understand we need to be working with employers.”

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Click here to read David Hughes Expert piece on ‘Seeing value in qualifications’

Further education providers face a 15 per cent cut in their adult skills budget allocations, the Skills Funding Agency (SFA) has revealed.

In a letter to providers, SFA chief executive Barbara Spicer said although funding for apprenticeships and traineeships was being “prioritised”, remaining funding would be cut by 15 per cent.

It provides the first indication of the impact of a 19 per cent two-year adult skills budget cut outlined in the Skills Funding Statement last month, and means the average-sized college could see between £400,000 and £800,000 wiped from its non-apprentice and traineeship adult skills funding.

Ms Spicer said: “In prioritising the funding for apprenticeships and traineeships, the remainder of the ASB will reduce by 15 per cent.”

Meanwhile, FE Loan pots have also gone up as directed by the 2013-16 Skills Funding Statement.

Martin Doel, chief executive of the Association of Colleges (AoC), said it had been a “significant” week for colleges, after a letter from Skills Minister Matthew Hancock last night revealed a 2 per cent cap on the financial impact of a 17.5 per cent funding rate cut for full-time 18-year-old learners.

He said: “Firstly, they received confirmation that the funding they receive to provide adults with skills and qualifications will decline by 15 per cent on average — a major, if not unexpected, disappointment.

“They then heard about the mitigation put in place to help those affected particularly badly by the cut in funding for 18-year-olds. We are pleased that the Minister has heard the concerns of colleges and MPs across the country.

“Both AoC and colleges understand that they need to take their fair share of austerity as the government seeks to rebalance the books.

“However, it is time for politicians to think seriously about what they want colleges to achieve on behalf of the nation and to what extent this should be funded by the taxpayer and to what extent by employers and the students themselves.

“For example, the Department for Education cannot continue to protect some of its budget and not the rest — this is unsustainable especially as we raise the education participation age to 18.

“Meanwhile, the Department for Business, Innovation and Skills needs to review the amount of money it devotes to adult students, in both further and higher education, and consider whether they are being treated equally with other students.”