It’s quite possible that despite the hours of typing, the most overused part on a journalists’ keyboard is the ‘delete’ button.

No, that’s not because we “always make mistakes”, in reality it’s what we do with a large proportion of e-mails.

Although some we permanently strike from our worldwide web records are spam, a large amount will be press releases.

There can be a number of reasons. But instead of a rant about why, I thought I’d put together a few steps on how to win our hearts and get your work on our pages.

After all, it’s about highlighting what your college is doing to stand out from the rest and showing a sense of pride in your institution.

By making your releases or statements attractive, clearly-written, easy-to-digest and brimming with information, the rest comes easily.

Style

There is a structure to a well-written story – and it can be a good place to start with your copy. It’s not essential, but it’s by all means very helpful to us.

The first paragraph must tell us all there is to know about the story; don’t bury it in the middle. Tell it to us straight and right to the point and we’ll be interested. Also, in the main copy, shy away from using “we” or “us” as that’s what quotes are for, but I’ll come to that.

Pictures

A picture, they say, is worth a thousand words. In this case, its quality can be the difference between publication or trash can. And there’s many ways of getting around it. Firstly, invest.

While a top of the range pro DSLR camera can set you back a fair few pennies, cheaper options, like the so-called “DSLRs for amateurs”, will give good results. Another tip: call your local press to pop along and take a few shots. While a specialist publication like ours may be too many miles away to make your press call, your local rag could be more than happy to oblige. They may also, with the right persuasion, provide a JPEG of their shot to send on to other publications – as long as they are guaranteed a ‘credit’ and you may have to pay for the right in such instances.

Quotes

So you’ve already told us in the intro about the amazing thing at your college that you want to shout about – and us to publish. Now tell us why and beef up how amazing it is with quotes. Principals, the high-profile visitors to an event, the students, the teachers – you name it. We want to hear from them about why what it is your telling us, is good for them. And don’t forget the simple elements, like a full name and title, job and – for the students – their age and where they are from.

Timing

We know our deadlines, because we work so stringently to them. So if you’re not sure on them, ask us. And if you have something coming up in the next day or so that you think is really important, give us some notice.

We may be able to hold a space or remove something which we may deem less important. Likewise, sending us something minutes before going to press is unlikely to result in it being used – unless it’s Earth shattering news.

Background

There is no such thing as too much detail. As a journalist, we thrive on knowing exactly what the whole situation is with a story, including the history behind it. It gives context to a story, meaning a reader can be fully informed.

Contacts

And finally, this one may seem a little bit obvious, but believe it or not, some releases wing their way into our 21st century pigeonholes with no details on how best to request further information. The e-mail address it was sent from will never suffice – particularly if it gets to us right on deadline. So send us your telephone numbers with it.

This is by no means an extensive list, but a good starting point. If you’re in any doubt, don’t be afraid to ask questions.

By Nick Reinis

Graham Hoyle, Chief Executive of the Association of Employment and Learning Providers talks to FE Week

How do you feel about condensed apprenticeships, such as those being delivered in 12 weeks?

An apprenticeship is quite clear. One, they’re employed.  Two, an apprenticeship must be a delivery of a complete, sector designed framework which is cleared by the Sector Skills Council (SSC).

It has to have the individual qualifications within the framework, properly accredited by an accredited awarding body, and it should not be transferred.

As far as I’m concerned, if something fits those boxes, it’s okay. If a sector said within their design of a framework that the timeframe was acceptable, fit for purpose and what they wanted, theoretically I would go with it.

However, I do believe very strongly that an apprenticeship is work based learning, it is competence based and a competence which we’re talking about in my view is not the clearance of a snapshot assessment on a day.

When is it Train to Gain, and when is it called an apprenticeship?

Train to Gain is not a term that anybody uses, nor can we use it. I don’t. I simply don’t know what that provision is.

There’s an apprenticeship, there’s pre-apprenticeship, and there’s access to apprenticeships. My members say that Train to Gain doesn’t exist and hasn’t existed. The legacy was finished during the last financial year, and my members have now got a flexible adult budget which includes apprenticeships where there is significant pressure, which we do not resist, to maintain and expand the number of apprenticeships.

We’re happy with that, it’s our core business. In addition however, it allows them to do other training which is on the government agenda, through NVQs, through access to, or pre apprenticeships. I don’t have a title for that.

So if the SSC says that the start and end date of an apprenticeship is okay… it’s okay?

I’m saying that fundamentally I think it’s for the sector to say what the normal expectation is. I think the framework ought to give an indication of normality. I would still not have it rigid, because it takes us into another rather controversial area, and how to apply that.

So let’s take apprentices aged 25 or above. Where people are being taken in by employees from another part, you’ve got the employee, who has developed skills through a variety of methods, over a variety of time and completed significant elements of a full framework.

Then you have the employer, the government and providers who are now in a position to say that it can be mutually beneficial for them to complete the whole darn thing.

To complete the framework, there is a belief that there’s an advantage in doing that. The trouble is, however, that you can’t have a pre-determined time scale which is appropriate for a 16 year old starting from scratch, and a 35 year-old who is two thirds of the way through their experience.

So who should specify the time for completion? The SSC?

It’s got to be the employer. The SSC, in my view, should have an indicative norm for the completion of the whole framework. The problem is if someone starts from scratch and then develops the framework in 12 weeks… then I would say that needs to be reviewed.

Also, there ought to be scope for the norm to be broken in exceptional circumstances. But if an SSC has said their norm is 12 months, I would have thought they might just have something to say about someone doing it in three.

How do you feel about the contract City & Guilds has with ASDA?

That’s an interesting drawing about the role and the remit of City & Guilds, because it moves them away from an awarding body and into a delivery. I can understand the synergy but it’s a very… I think there are some very interesting questions about conflicts of interest there. The individual qualification within the framework is properly accredited by an accredited awarding body. Now, although I stick by that, I have to say it’s an interesting concept within that definition.

I am not envisaging that the awarding body and the provider, or employer, are the same. I’m not saying it can’t happen or shouldn’t happen, but at the moment I am not envisaging that and it’s the way it’s been.

There are some questions which would need to be cleared – and I’m not saying they haven’t been cleared. I think if an awarding body are delivering training which they then credit, then I just want to be reassured about the independence and the objectivity about the apprenticeship. And that’s not to say it can’t be done.

Do you think the ASDA contract should have been tendered for?

That’s a good question. When does public money stop becoming public money?  At what point down the chain of public expenditure does it actually pass into the private sector? That’s a good question to ask, because at the moment, I want to know that.

If an employer wishes to have a direct contract I believe they ought to do. We’re worried about direct contracts to employers as a mandatory, but we’re not against it as an option. It’s a market mechanism, we understand the market, both the good and the bad, so we’re saying if an employer wishes to have a direct contract, we don’t actually object to that.

They can then decide to deliver it totally in-house, as a very small number of employers have the capacity to do. Very, very few have taken up that option, or they take them up and sub-contact it out to a provider. So our provider gets it from here, gets it from there. We can live with it.

Who should pay?

Everybody who’s been in this game for the last decade or more has got it wrong. What we have got wrong since the introduction of modern apprenticeships in 1994, is once we opened modern apprenticeships to government investment, what inadvertently happened was they quite reasonably wanted to keep the control over their investment.

And that’s right and proper. But what happened is, you moved apprenticeships out of the ownership and development of employers, and made it a government programme.

Now no-one ever said those words, but the perception is we developed a government programme to which employers had to contribute. Which means when times get tough as they are now, the debate is all about how we actually get employers to contribute more.

Now this is the wrong, wrong base point. It’s always been employer designed, employer funded, and maybe with a contribution from the individual.

That’s the way it’s always been until the middle 90s. We should never have lost that picture, and we should be promoting apprenticeships to employers as an investment which they cannot afford not to make.

We ought to be going straight to employers, and saying this is an investment in your bottom line productivity, profitability, and here are the predicted returns from the database. Oh and by the way, the government will actually contribute towards it!

I remember distinctly the first time I attended my first ever College Corporation meeting as a student governor back in 2006. After a day of A levels, I’d change in to my new suit, replace my textbooks with equally heavy meeting papers and enter past the “no food or drinks past this point” sign on the classroom door for pre-meeting drinks and nibbles.

It was one of the most daunting events I have ever experienced. At the time there was very little training available, the other governors didn’t really know what to say to me andthe meeting papers I had brought with me might as well have been in a foreign language. To top it all, I was by myself.

Huge benefits were to be reaped from having two student governors; some places even have three.”

Luckily a year later the law changed. The Further Education and Training Act 2007 placed in statute a duty for FE corporations and the Learning and Skills Councils to consult with learners on decisions likely to affect them. Later this would result in things like Learner Involvement Strategies but what I was most interested in at that point, was that on 17th December 2007, a revised version of the Instrument and Articles of Government for FE and Sixth Form was released which meant that there would now be two student governors.

Huge benefits were to be reaped from having two student governors; some places even have three. This was a huge step forward, and the result of years of a textbook campaigning spearheaded by the National Union of Students.

Last week the NUS, along with UCU and UNISON, raised their outrage at last minute amendment tabled by Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State Lord Hill, Michael Gove’s representative in the House of Lords, which would effectively allow corporations to modify or replace their own Instrument and Articles, effectively repealing the duty to comply with having two student members on the corporation.

No one will be shocked to learn that my view is that student governors must stay and that the legal right of learners have access to membership of the very top levels of governance at their institution has to be protected. We should be proud of the fact, that when our mission statements have lines like, “putting learners first” we nail our colours to the mast and without shame give learners an equal vote around the table on the big strategic decisions and hold their senior managers to account.

Here are some arguments which I imagine will arise as this debate develops and why I think they are all wrong.

Arguement 1: The legislation has done its job. This doesn’t need to be law any more.

There is no evidence that we even have full compliance of this legislation four years on, let alone to suggest that the job’s done. And since when was law used to overcome short term problems, only then to be repealed later on when a Minister says so?

Aside from the fact that there’s no ‘job done’ evidence, a duty to consult with learners is a powerful signal as to the nature and ethos of further education.

Arguement 2: You don’t need student members on the board; we have better ways to consult with our learners.

My view is that no Governing Body is legitimate unless the user group whom they serve are properly represented; and if we’re being honest, if we’re talking about properly represented; the debate should be on increasing the number of Student Governors. It’s a matter of volume. How many local employers are represented, compare that with how many learners you have – then consider the diversity of programmes within that group – then tell me even two is enough.

Arguement 3: Student Governors are just not effective.

Which is an excuse to give up? In years gone by training and development opportunities for Student Governors has been weak – but new schemes such as the Student Governor Support Programme by NUS is proving incredibly effective.

Arguement 4: We’ll form some kind of sub-committee.

Some places already have some kind of ‘Student Affairs Sub Committee’ of the Corporation. This is a great addition, but , as I said at the beginning, the point is about having a vote at the same table as the rest of the Governors.

We continue to see deregulation as an all or nothing issue. But out of all of the different categories of membership within FE Governance, it is the student positions that are always vulnerable which is why they have to stay in statute. I am not immediately against those who may well be campaigning for greater freedoms; so long as they do so without abdicating their responsibilities to their learners.

Shane Chowen was VP for FE at the NUS and is currently an FE consultant tweeting as @shanechowen

Update: FE Week has approached the Association of Colleges (AoC) and asked whether they support the policy change.

Martin Doel, Chief Executive of AoC, said, “AoC has argued consistently for greater freedoms for colleges so they can provide an even more effective service to the students, communities and businesses they support.  Even if there is not a statutory requirement, we believe that it would continue to be good practice if college Boards were to benefit from the contribution of student and staff governors.”

A spokesperson from the AoC refused to clarify whether this meant they supported the ammendment.