The BIS Select Committee have announced details of their final evidence session on Apprenticeships. On the 16 May at 9.50am John Hayes MP, Minister of State for Further Education, Skills and Lifelong Learning will join Gila Sacks, Deputy Director of the Apprenticeships Unit (BIS/DfE), will give their evidence. The session will be streamed live on Parliament TV and is open to the public on a first come, first served basis.
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When Skills Funding Agency (SFA) replaced the Learning and Skills Council in April 2010 a critical difference in function was a very public end to central planning.
This was accelerated by the coalition government when in June 2010 they scrapped the Summary Statement of Activity (a national template for provider plans) and introduced the ‘freedoms and flexibilites’ of a single Adult Skills Budget.
Yet, take a forensic look at how the SFA have been managing the £4bn budget, and you would be forgiven for thinking they did not want anyone else to stick to a plan either.
• In August colleges are unexpectedly told that despite policy announcements the previous November to the contrary, many unemployed learners on ‘wider benefit’s’ might remain eligible for full funding after all.
• In November colleges unexpectedly start being offered millions by the SFA to be spent on NEETs before the end of the academic year. With no explanation as to how this would be recorded nor monitored, the SFA simply told FE Week: “The funding forms part of the existing Adult Skills Budget that is being redeployed as part of our normal quarterly performance review”.
• In March colleges are unexpectedly given a share of £23 million in Discretionary Learner Support funding, to be spent before August. One principal told FE Week: “getting that sort of sum of money, in an unplanned way late in the year, just isn’t doing anybody any favour”.
• In April FE Week analysis of an SFA document shows that overall in-year allocations have increased a staggering £240 million since August. Newham College, for example, has received an in-year increase of more than £4m.
• In May the SFA unexpectedly announce they are adjusting 797 qualification funding rates with just three months of the year remaining. All 797 went up, some by more than 400 per cent. (See page 2 in the next edition of FE Week).
So it seems colleges and training providers are getting almost monthly calls from their friendly Skills Funding Agency account manager. If so, does the Agency say something like:
Forget the reduced funding rates and cut to your allocation while you were planning your courses, or that you made redundancies to find efficiencies. Now that your courses have started can you help us out? We have a couple of hundred million in unspent funding to offload. Sound good?”
It may sound good, but how can providers be expected to sensibly plan the resources to deliver high quality courses with all these short-term ‘unexpected’ giveaways?
One claim from the SFA is these in-year increases reward success, and providers don’t earn the funding unless the courses are actually delivered. But this is not true. When funding went unspent last year the SFA said: “A tolerance of three per cent will be applied to the final out turn for 2010/11, so clawback will be waived for providers who have delivered 97 per cent or more.”
The other problem is that without an enforceable plan, colleges and providers can and do decide to use the funding for courses that the Skills Funding Agency do not want to purchase. For example, it is clear that 25+ apprenticeships starts continue to grow exponentially whilst the high priority 16-24 year-old starts have stalled.
So despite the end to central planning, when allocating funding for next year the SFA said that they don’t want “maintenance of current recruitment levels for those aged over 25” and “will monitor the pattern and volume of 25+ Apprenticeship delivery in-year”. Case of the SFA wanting to have one’s cake and eat it too?
Few support the principle of central control or giving money back to the Treasury, but Agitator sees a sector increasingly struggling to see the point of doing their own business planning much beyond lunch, let alone for the next academic year.
The Department for Business, Innovation and Skills (BIS) has revealed to FE Week that the new FE loans system will be called “24+ Advanced Learning Loans” when it’s introduced next year.
A BIS spokesperson told FE Week: “It is important that the name for the loans reflects the type of learners and learning that it will apply to.
“The vast majority of public funding for further education will continue to be grant funded, with loans representing between 10-15 per cent of the total FE budget.”
The spokesperson added: “After carrying out testing with a sample of learners we have chosen the name “24+ Advanced Learning Loans”.
“This describes the loan offer which covers learners aged 24 and above studying at level 3 and above.”
(Note: Look out for coverage of the roundtable debate on FE loans, held by FE Week, in our next printed edition)
The UK Commission for Employment and Skills (UKCES) has appointed four new commissioners.
Gail Cartmail, assistant general secretary for Unite the Union, Scott Johnson, chief executive of Chas Smith Shopfitters Ltd, Toby Peyton-Jones, HR director at Siemens UK & North West Europe and Neil Mclean, chair of the Leeds City Region Local Enterprise Partnership have been appointed on a three year term.
They will join the 23 existing commissioners led by Charlie Mayfield, chairman of the John Lewis Partnership.
“I am extremely pleased to welcome four Commissioners of such high calibre,” Mr Mayfield said.
“They join the Commission at an exciting time, as we seek to ensure that skills development is really embedded within industrial policy to help boost jobs and growth.
“Gail, Scott, Neil and Toby join our other new Commissioners, Paul McKelvie and Scott Waddington, who were appointed by the Scottish and Welsh government respectively, and joined us last month.”
The appointments were announced by business secretary Vince Cable earlier today.
“Building a skilled workforce is a key part of our efforts to stimulate economic recovery and growth,” Mr Cable said.
“I am therefore delighted to announce these appointments, the diverse backgrounds and viewpoints represented by the new Commissioners will strengthen the Commission’s capacity to deliver skills for growth across all sectors.”
Work has started on Derby College’s new £3.5 million Construction Academy in Pride Park which is due to open to students this September.
The college is working with developers Cedar House to construct a 3,000 sq metre building on land currently owned by the Homes and Communities Agency and originally earmarked by former East Midlands Developments Agency for the Railway Technical Centre.
It will house 650 full time and part time students as well as apprentices in bricklaying, joinery and carpentry, painting and decorating and plastering.
Head of faculty Dawn Kemp said: “We are very excited that work has started on the new Construction Academy which has already attracted a great deal of interest in potential learners looking to come to College in September to learn a trade.
Members of the University and College Union (UCU) at Chesterfield College today (Friday) voted to take industrial action in a row over jobs and pay.
Nine in ten (88 per cent) of those who voted voted for strike action. A date for the action will be announced next week.
The union’s action is in response to the college’s plans to make 39 teaching staff redundant by the end of the academic year – details of which were revealed by FE Week last week.
UCU regional official, Anne O’Sullivan, said: “It is a real shame that things have to come to this, but we are not prepared sit back while jobs and pay are attacked in this way. These plans are little more than an attempt to deliver teaching on the cheap and are bad for staff and students.”
Weston College pampered 24 pensioners to help launch Age UK Somerset’s year-long ‘Joining in Together’ service to reduce isolation.
Men and women aged from 50 to nearly 90 enjoyed £5 professional facials, manicures and pedicures at the College’s bespoke salon.
Dennis Newbury, 82 of Worlebury, who had top to toe treatments, said: “I’ve never had a facial. I thought it wasn’t the sort of thing a man did but I thoroughly enjoyed it all.”
Pauline Roberts, 86, of Ridgeway in Weston town centre, said: “This was my first facial and I worried I was too old but it’s been lovely and I’ve had my nails painted lilac.”
The ‘Joining in Together’ service is supported by Somerset Racial Equality Council and funded by the Fair Share Trust.
Age UK Somerset campaign co-ordinator, Linda Jones, said: “This pamper day has been an incredible success which couldn’t have happened without Weston College.”
Doncaster College’s Academy of Commercial Enterprise hosted its own version of The Dragons’ Den and MasterChef as part of Aspirations Week.
For the third year running, students from all programme areas of the Academy have been involved in a variety of activities designed to raise their aspirations and motivate them to consider the next step in their career or in their education. At the popular Dragons’ Den judges listened to innovative ideas pitched by five groups of students from each of the Academy’s teaching sections.
After much deliberation it was decided that the Floristry students pitch would ultimately take the splendid glass trophy.
To round off the week a MasterChef competition was held in the college’s spacious kitchens and judged in the Waterfront restaurant before an audience of students.
Principal Gill Parkes said: “It has been hugely successful in opening students’ eyes to a broad variety of opportunities in their vocational areas and has been very motivating for both staff and students as so much fun was had along the way.”
Stratford-upon-Avon College’s new Construction Academy was given a thorough workout when it hosted the regional heat of the Guild of Bricklayers Competition.
The £750,000 Academy, opened in February by MP Nadhim Zahawi, was the venue as young bricklayers from schools and colleges from across the West Midlands took part across three age categories with the winners of the Junior and Senior competitions going on to the national finals.
Stratford College’s own Kieran Nicholls won the schools competition while the Junior competition was won by Bryn Wilson-Harris of Bourneville College.
The Senior contest saw some intense competition with South Birmingham College student Jordan Brewster coming out with the top prize. James Garrett from Warwickshire College walked away with the coveted Derek Spencer Award for his outstanding effort during the event.
