Latest news from FE Week

Jack Whitehall, Deborah Meaden and 300 more reasons to attend Festival of Education

The further education sector rarely gets the luxury of stepping back from the immediate demands of students and the curriculum, to focus on the longer-term questions shaping the future of education and skills.

The Festival of Education, returning to Wellington College on 2 and 3 July, offers a rare opportunity to do just that. Across two days, delegates can engage with big ideas about leadership, innovation, skills, and technology, while also exploring practical strategies they can take back to their colleges, training organisations and classrooms.

Among this year’s headline speakers is entrepreneur and Dragons’ Den investor Deborah Meaden. As one of Britain’s most recognisable business figures, Meaden’s perspective is particularly relevant to the FE sector, where preparing learners for the workplace and understanding the changing needs of employers are central priorities. Her keynote promises insights into leadership, entrepreneurship and the skills needed to thrive in an increasingly complex economy.

Closing the Festival is comedian, writer and actor Jack Whitehall. Best known for his role as Alfie Wickers in Bad Education, Whitehall’s appearance will bring humour and reflection to the end of the event, exploring the people and experiences that shape us throughout our education and working lives.

The keynote programme brings together voices from across education, business, science, media and public life. Delegates can hear from scientist Dame Maggie Aderin-Pocock, broadcaster and BBC Director-General Tim Davie, Ofcom chief executive Dame Melanie Dawes, former BBC producer Sam McAlister and novelist Elif Shafak, whose work features on the A-level English Literature syllabus. FE Commissioner Ellen Thinnesen OBE and Ofsted chief inspector Sir Martyn Oliver will also address delegates, ensuring policy and accountability remain firmly on the agenda.

Yet the Festival experience extends far beyond the keynote stage.

For FE leaders, lecturers and training providers, the programme offers opportunities to engage with many of the issues currently shaping the sector. Sessions explore artificial intelligence and digital innovation, leadership and organisational culture, apprenticeships and skills, V levels, workforce development, inclusion, wellbeing, and governance. There are also opportunities to examine the relationship between education and employment, helping delegates consider how institutions can respond to changing economic and workforce demands.

One of the Festival’s greatest strengths is the variety of voices it brings together. A delegate might spend one session discussing leadership and organisational improvement, the next exploring evidence-informed teaching, before joining a conversation about emerging technologies, social mobility or the future of skills. The result is an experience that encourages fresh thinking and unexpected connections across different parts of the education landscape.

For senior leaders, that breadth is particularly valuable. Conversations about staff wellbeing sit alongside debates on accountability, organisational improvement and educational reform, creating space to reflect not only on operational challenges but also on the wider forces shaping learners, employers and communities.

Just as important is the atmosphere.

Unlike traditional conferences, the Festival is designed to encourage exploration and conversation. Between sessions, delegates gather across the Wellington College campus, meeting peers from schools, colleges, universities, training providers, charities and industry. Ideas that begin in sessions often continue over coffee, lunch or a walk across the grounds, creating opportunities for collaboration that extend well beyond the event itself.

That combination of intellectual curiosity, practical learning and informal networking helps explain why so many education professionals return year after year. It is as much a gathering of the education community as it is a professional development event.

For anyone working in further education, skills, training or workforce development, the challenge will not be finding relevant content, but deciding what to miss.

The Festival of Education takes place at Wellington College on 2–3 July.

To view the full programme and secure tickets, visit: https://educationfest.co.uk

Movers & Shakers: Edition 538

Social media bans are no substitute for digital safeguarding

The government’s announcement of a social media ban for under-16s, including the possibility of evening curfews for 16 and 17 year olds, will understandably generate debate across education and safeguarding circles.

Alongside the proposed under-16 ban, ministers have also signalled wider changes to how platforms themselves are designed and accessed, which would also affect older teenagers. These include restrictions on infinite scrolling and autoplay features, potential limits on certain AI-driven interaction, safety settings being enabled by default, and tighter controls on stranger contact. Together, these changes point to a broader shift from user-led engagement towards more tightly governed environments for all young people.

For the further education sector, in particular those working with learners ranging from 14 to 19 years old, the question is not whether the policy is well-intentioned: it is. The question is what it changes in day-to-day safeguarding.

From our experience in observing Australia’s recent implementation, the answer is unfortunately additional diligence and effort.

The leaky gate of age verification

We know that age-verification technology is unreliable. In Australia, where a ban came into force in late 2025, most Australian children are saying that it doesn’t stop them from accessing social apps.

Whilst the Australian government reported large numbers of cancelled accounts, the rumour is that this was simply an expedient purge by the affected publishers.

The young people we want to protect are either walking through the leaky gates of age-verification or are moving to riskier places.

This raises a particular challenge for the FE sector. Many colleges and sixth forms already operate mixed environments, with 14-16 year old learners sharing some spaces with 16-18 year olds. They are often using the same types of devices, networks and social platforms.

So in practice, safeguarding systems are already having to account for different age thresholds within shared digital environments. Tightening platform rules and age-based restrictions risks adding further complexities. For colleges, this could mean ambiguity in monitoring, policy enforcement and digital safeguarding practice.

A worrying false sense of security

Our deepest concern is a false sense of security in online safety creeping into education and home settings, with parents and young people holding very different views on effectiveness.

In our hard-earned experience in digital safeguarding, parent engagement is crucial and a blunt ban is anathematic to that and good outcomes.

A move to darker places

Young people do not simply disengage from social media or the wider digital ecosystem when restrictions are imposed. They adapt, finding alternative routes, often moving into less visible, less regulated, and more harmful spaces online.

In Australia, early evidence suggests that whilst platforms have removed large numbers of underage accounts, safeguarding outcomes have not improved. The country’s eSafety commissioner has acknowledged no notable reduction in cyberbullying or image-based abuse complaints involving age-restricted accounts compared compared with the same period as the year before, which challenges the assumption that removing accounts equates to reduced harm.

Account access and the YouTube problem

Australia’s social media ban applies to YouTube, which is the most used education app in the world. Furthermore, the ban only applies to “accounts” not accessing the app (in a logged out state) itself.

This creates a perverse outcome: schools are giving access to YouTube without the ability to use Google’s embedded safety features, which require users to be signed in.

We have to do something

When pressed on the practical, behavioural and technical challenges of a social media ban, the Australian government and the backers of the plan typically retort that “we must do something”.

We’re not sure that action likely to generate confusion and harm is the right direction, especially when alternatives exist.

Parents face impossible challenges to protect their children, with many internet connected devices in the home and scores of apps being used. These platforms all have “parent settings” however they do not interoperate. This is not true in the business world where safety and security technology can be universally installed on user-devices and can interact with online platform tools.

How best to solve digital safety is a matter for another paper, but for now, we urge UK’s educators to be vigilant and double down on online safety education.

This means strengthening digital education for learners and staff, supporting parents with practical tools and realistic expectations, and placing clear expectations on technology providers to build safer, more transparent systems.

It also means recognising a core principle many educators already understand, that safeguarding is not achieved by removing access alone. Understanding where harm occurs, how learners experience digital spaces, and how risks evolve across platforms is essential.

A social media ban may be a positive step forward, but for FE providers working with highly digitally connected cohorts, it should not be mistaken for a complete solution. The real challenge lies in building a joined-up approach that reflects how young people actually live, learn, and connect in the digital world today.

If integration matters, why isn’t ESOL properly funded?

The results of the recent UK local elections have created a deeper shift in an already fragmented political landscape.

For ESOL (English for speakers of other languages) providers, this moment signals a significant change in the ways integration, migration and community cohesion are debated, and more importantly, funded.

For over 17 years, I have worked with marginalised communities providing access to lifelong learning for health, work and connection. In my role as head of strategic partnerships for the WEA, I see first-hand the impact ESOL learning has on new arrivals in supporting them to adapt to a new life and culture.

In the coming months, decisions will be made at local level to shape the future of the provision. For those working in ESOL, this is the moment to push for change and ensure investment in language learning is included in any serious strategy for building stronger, more connected communities.

Expectation vs capacity

Demand for ESOL is growing and has increased by 17 per cent since 2021. Yet funding for ESOL providers continues to significantly decline.

In 2024-25, there were 160,870 ESOL learners accessing courses in England, which covers just 4 per cent of all adults in the UK who speak English as a second or additional language. Integration efforts will be hopeless if provision is already failing to reach those who need it most.

The UK government’s proposed immigration policy states it will raise the English language requirements for most visa routes. Those seeking resettlement or citizenship would be required to show basic to upper-intermediate levels of progression in English to improve integration and employment.

ESOL providers are being asked to solve a political problem with less resource.

Bridging support gaps

When refugees and asylum seekers arrive in the UK, they bring with them a profound resilience forged through unimaginable hardship. Their arrival is not the end of their journey but the beginning of a complex new chapter.

Working closely with government departments – including the DWP, Home Office, HMRC and Ministry of Defence – the WEA has developed ESOL programmes that go beyond language alone, embedding learning around workers’ rights, gender equality awareness and understanding of local systems. These are not just “nice to haves” but are essential for participation in a new country.

True language learning is intricately linked to cultural understanding – providing it requires far more than a textbook. We can’t expect people who have faced severe trauma and displacement to simply sit at a desk and absorb a new language. This type of learning requires risk, vulnerability and confidence – traits often stripped away by the refugee experience.

This is where ESOL providers excel. Learning English is not linear and ESOL works because it adapts to the needs of the learner. This informal, community-rooted approach acts as a crucial stepping stone into further education, vocational training and employment; providing people with the foundations to successfully navigate life and work in the UK.

Learners will be left behind

English language skills are strongly linked to employment, health outcomes and community connection. The risk in this political environment is that language has become a marker of division rather than a bridge to inclusion.

Defunding ESOL won’t stop newcomers from arriving but it will isolate them once they are here, delaying their ability to enter the workforce, support their families and feel a true sense of belonging.

If we’re serious about integration, then investment in ESOL learning is the key to forming a bridge into society, not a barrier.

Skills England has exposed a social care timebomb

Skills England has just published its Sector Skills Needs Assessment for health and adult social care. The headline figures are stark. Adult social care alone faces demand for 685,000 workers over the next decade, 281,000 from sector growth and a further 404,000 to replace those who will retire or leave.

Behind those numbers is a workforce picture that makes the challenge harder still. Adult social care employs proportionally fewer workers aged 16 to 25 than the England average and significantly more aged 55 and over. This demographic imbalance points to an untapped opportunity. With over one million young people currently not in education, employment or training, adult social care represents one of the most viable and socially valuable pathways available. Adult social care, with its accessible entry requirements, earn-while-you-learn apprenticeship model, and clear progression ladder, is one of the few sectors genuinely positioned to absorb that talent at scale. Connecting those two realities is not just good workforce planning. It is good social policy.

The retirement wave is not approaching; it has already begun. And a 24 per cent fall in FE achievements at level 2 and 3 in health and social care means the very foundation of the pipeline is moving in the wrong direction at the worst possible time.

79 per cent of new roles in adult social care require level 2 or 3 qualifications, yet that is precisely where completions are falling fastest. Filling that gap is one of the sector’s most pressing challenges.

The skills profile of the sector adds another layer of complexity. Adult social care requires the highest listening proficiency of any priority sector assessed by Skills England. Working with others, speaking and adapting are not classroom skills. They are built through real experience in real care settings, supported by high-quality, work-embedded training over time.

For over 20 years, Aspiration Training has delivered specialist apprenticeship training across England and Wales, praised by Ofsted. Our health and social care apprenticeship offer is designed around a core insight that the Skills England report makes explicit: 83 per cent of adult social care apprenticeship starters are aged over 24. These are not fresh starters, they are experienced practitioners seeking recognition, progression, and professional development within a sector they are already committed to.

Our apprenticeship range spans the full career journey in adult care, from first qualification through to senior leadership.

This progression from level 2 to level 5 matters enormously in the context of the Skills England findings. The report shows 54 per cent growth in level 4-5 nursing and allied health apprenticeship completions and 20 per cent growth in level 4-5 health and social care apprenticeships, pointing to a sector increasingly using higher-level apprenticeships as a genuine career development mechanism, not just an entry route.

Our delivery model is built around the reality of working in care. Learners access dedicated assessor support, bespoke online tutorials, blended learning options including home study, and our e-portfolio system, so development fits around shift patterns and the demands of live care environments.

Each year, an estimated 40,400 workers need replacing within adult social care priority occupations, and that figure may be a substantial underestimate. This is where investment in young people becomes a workforce strategy, not just a social one. The sector currently skews heavily away from workers aged 16 to 25, yet this is precisely the age group that, if brought in early and supported well, could build the long-tenure workforce adult social care desperately needs. A NEET young person who enters through a level 2 apprenticeship today, progresses to level 3, and moves into a management role by their early thirties does not just fill one vacancy, they reduce replacement demand for a generation.

Keeping existing workers skilled, confident, and professionally recognised is not a secondary concern. It is central to retention, and retention is one of the most powerful levers available to address the supply gap.

The challenge is significant. The direction is clear. We are ready to support it.

Esports taught us the real lesson about curriculum innovation

At London South East Colleges, one of our recent curriculum innovations has been the introduction of esports. When we launched this course in 2022, we knew young people were highly engaged in gaming and digital culture. However, turning that interest into a meaningful curriculum with clear progression opportunities was another matter.

One of the earliest lessons we learned was that successful curriculum innovation requires a comprehensive approach that extends well beyond the introduction of a new qualification.

Initially, recruitment was slow and this was partly due to us not having the right person to lead and champion the provision. The turning point came when we recruited someone with genuine industry experience who was willing to train as a teacher while helping to shape the programme.

The difference was immediate. Students responded to someone who understood the industry and could connect learning to real practice in an authentic way.

This reinforced an important principle that applies across curriculum innovation – having the right staff teams in place is just as important as designing the right curriculum.

Today, our esports provision has grown from a single level 3 group into a broader offer across levels 2 and 3. Our students recently won the British Esports Student Championships, demonstrating how far the programme has developed.

However, one of the biggest challenges has not been delivery but perception.

Esports is often dismissed as ‘just gaming’, despite the fact that students develop skills across business, marketing, event management, broadcasting, digital production and teamwork. Indeed, in any innovative curriculum area, new subjects often face misconceptions.

Whether introducing esports or other emerging curriculum areas, colleges must be prepared to explain the skills being developed and the future progression or career pathways available. Employer endorsement and learner success stories are all critical in building confidence and credibility.

Innovation should never be driven solely by student interest. Students, parents and employers need confidence that qualifications lead somewhere meaningful, whether that is employment, apprenticeships, higher education or further training.

Within our esports provision, learners now progress into higher education and employment across media production, business, marketing and games development. Building those pathways from the outset, and communicating them to prospective students, was crucial to the programme’s success.

Employer engagement has also played a central role. Recent work experience placements have included opportunities with BLAST.TV at the BLAST Premier London Open at Wembley Arena, where students supported the delivery of a major international esports event.

Experiences like this bring learning to life, helping our students understand workplace expectations and the breadth of opportunities available. They also provide reassurance to parents and carers who may initially be uncertain about newer pathways.

Perhaps the most important lesson is that curriculum innovation is not simply about creating new subjects.

My own background is in hair and beauty, and I see daily how technology is reshaping professional practice. Artificial intelligence, facial recognition software and digital consultation tools are becoming increasingly common. Construction is evolving through retrofit and sustainable technologies. Healthcare continues to develop through advances in digital systems and patient care.

The challenge for colleges is therefore much broader than introducing new curriculum areas. It is about ensuring that all provision evolves alongside industry change.

That places significant importance on staff development. Colleges cannot expect staff to adapt to changing industries without investment in high-quality professional development. Innovation flourishes when staff feel supported to learn and build confidence in new approaches.

At the same time, innovation must complement rather than replace high-quality vocational education. Industries will continue to need skilled bricklayers, carers, beauty therapists, hairdressers and electricians. The goal is not to abandon established pathways but to ensure they remain relevant while creating opportunities in emerging sectors.

As colleges respond to curriculum reform and changing economic demands, the key lesson from our experience is that successful innovation is not just about the qualification itself. It is about strong leadership, industry credibility, employer partnerships, staff development and clear progression routes. Those principles helped make our esports programme successful and can now be applied to future innovation across all our curriculum areas.

Inclusion 2.0: New funding, new responsibility

Earlier this month, the DfE published the first funding redistribution mechanism under SEND reform: the inclusive mainstream fund (IMF) for 16-19 providers. In all, £83 million will flow directly to post-16 organisations. But with it comes significantly more responsibility.

I’ve spoken with sector leaders, SEND specialists and civil servants to build a clear picture of how reform is likely to play out. From those conversations, I’ve identified five second-order effects that leaders of educational organisations need to understand. This article names them; My deeper analysis piece, tells you what to do about them.

Effect 1: Five tiers not four

The reform defines four tiers of SEND support: Universal, targeted, targeted plus and specialist. The structure creates an ingenious incentive for leaders to absorb more non-complex needs into their universal offer, reducing the number of learners formally categorised as targeted.

Whether this is deliberate or accidental brilliance from civil servants, I’ll leave to your judgement. What’s clear is that educational organisations will create an unofficial fifth tier within universal: one that delivers the personalised adjustments expected at the targeted level, without that tier’s legal exposure or administrative burden. I call this the Ofsted inclusion tier.

Standard universal provision means, for example lesson plans adjusted to the cognitive profiles of each cohort. We’ve built Adaptify, a clinical-grade tool, to automate this without adding burden to educators.

The Ofsted inclusion tier goes further. It requires individual support plans with personalised adjustments, such as targeted learning strategies built around a learner’s own unique profile. We’re likely to see this level of support becoming embedded within universal as standard practice, rewriting the DNA of what ‘mainstream’ provision looks like.

Effect 2: Cat and mouse

Tensions will arise. The government wants fewer learners in more expensive specialist provision. Educational organisations generally want the opposite. General FE college leaders should expect significantly more complex learners sitting within their own responsibility than in specialist. Prepare to work hard for every learner you push up and out of targeted plus. Your specialists’ expertise will be stretched hardest here, across targeted plus and specialist tiers.

The average education, health and care plan (EHCP) requires 68 specialist hours for assessment and planning just to create and issue, yet the average SENCO spends just 11 hours per week learner-facing, with another 11 spent on paperwork.

There are not enough SEND specialists to deliver these reforms at scale. Specialists must be freed from admin, with learner-facing time used as the key measure. Non-specialist educators must be equipped with evidence-led technology delivering on-demand inclusion guidance.

Effect 3: Nonsense-ware

You could say the cavalry has arrived in the form of the inclusive mainstream fund.; the question is whether organisations deploy it against the right problems.

The sector must defend itself against a rising tide of non-validated SEND technologies. Procuring SEND solutions is not like buying antivirus software or a CRM. These tools directly inform decisions covered by the Equality Act, and the educational organisation holds legal liability for the validity of every tool it deploys. This procurement should be treated as a clinical decision. Ask one question: is it independently validated? If they hesitate, walk away.

Effect 4: AI co-creation

Individual support plans (ISPs) will balloon in volume, and there are not enough specialists to create them. Educators will need specialist-level knowledge at their fingertips to produce ISPs that hold up to challenge. Legal challenges from learners and parents are becoming easier to mount, and that trajectory will only steepen.

The answer is not to centralise ISP creation with specialists. Those who know the subject and learner well are best placed to design non-complex ISPs, with AI bringing clinical rigour to non-specialist hands. It’s the capability Cognassist is building for the sector.

Effect 5: Insurance premiums

Once the new SEND legislation takes effect, liability insurers will be watching the first wave of legal cases closely, and pricing accordingly. Expect them to scrutinise your operations: is a validated assessment tool in place? Are AI co-creation technologies deployed? The organisations that cannot answer yes will find their premiums reflect that.

The funding is starting to flow. How you procure and embed evidence-led inclusion at scale should now be on the top of every leadership agenda.

Employers’ contributions to teachers’ pensions ‘very likely’ to reduce – minister

A “considerable reduction” to the amount FE providers contribute to teachers’ pensions is “highly likely” following a revaluation of the scheme, a minister has revealed.

But teachers’ contributions and pension pots are not expected to be affected by the change.

Colleges and other further education providers currently pay a fee equivalent to 28.6 per cent of teachers’ wages every year into the teachers’ pension scheme.

But speaking in the House of Lords yesterday, skills minister Jacqui Smith said the rate is expected to drop significantly amid a review of the amounts paid into public sector schemes.

“[Rates] have gone from 16.48 per cent in 2019 to the current 28.6 per cent,” she said.

“It is highly likely… that there will be a considerable reduction in the average employer contribution rate as a result of that revaluation.”

Any change would come into effect next April and would remain in place for four years.

£12bn lower

Smith noted that the government actuary’s department has written to the Treasury stating the “average employer contribution rate across the unfunded public service pension schemes, of which the TPS is one, is expected to fall significantly”.

Across the schemes “contributions are expected to be over £12 billion lower in 2027-28 than in 2026-27”.

The expected reduction is due to an increase in the SCAPE discount rate, a government assumption used to calculate the value of future pension benefits.

Employee contribution rates of 9.6 per cent on average will not be affected by the change. Pension pots will not be impacted either.

‘Exceptional’ standards should be an achievable goal for providers

This week Ofsted has published an inspection report on Kleek Apprenticeships which finds that the national provider in hairdressing, barbering and beauty therapy has ‘strong’ standards across the board.

Are Kleek ecstatic? Far from it. The previously ‘outstanding’ provider believes that the new findings are a demotion and its leader feels demotivated.

The reason is a deeply held conviction that at least two of the judgements should have been ‘exceptional’ standards.

FIN believes that this latest development in the Ofsted reform process is definitely not a moan that the provider will ‘get over’ in a month or so but of real significance when the Milburn review is calling for a major reset of the skills system to provide more young people with a meaningful start to their lives. Ofsted is part of that system and needs to listen up.

Last year FIN sounded the alarm that exceptional standards would be out of reach to apprenticeship and other work-based learning providers. We feared that only schools and sixth-form colleges could achieve them and six months later, only one adult learning provider in the FE and skills sector has a single exceptional standard despite nine other independent and employer providers each achieving five strong standards.

Hard-working providers are entitled to ask why as we have other examples of FIN members who have found this grade unachievable for aspects of learning that are transformational. They find this very demotivating.

Perhaps Ofsted believes their achievement rates aren’t high enough. Half of Kleek’s apprentices need additional support and yet the inspectorate finds that they achieve as highly as their peers. Many had high levels of truancy at school, in fact they hated school or came from alternative provision. Even with so many requiring additional support, its apprentices have an 80 per cent achievement rate, up from 70.6 per cent last year.

At FIN we support over 200 providers and have supported many through inspection under the revised education inspection framework. Inclusion matters until it doesn’t. A work-based learning provider is not going to achieve a 90 per cent-plus achievement rate if half its intake needs extra support.

Ofsted might be tempted to award ‘exceptional’ if they see something ‘transformational’ for learners. In the absence of specific criteria, inspectors will apparently know it when they see it – an extremely frustrating situation, given our members can point out obvious examples without success.

In Kleek’s case, apprentices are sent to the Paris and London fashion weeks while 96 per cent achieve sustained employment. If going to Paris to work with the world’s top designers and models is not transformational, then I don’t know what is.

As the report acknowledges, other apprentices have been nominated and performed very well in prestigious national competitions, such as the Hair and Beauty Rising Star awards and WorldSkills. But in the ‘next steps’ section, Ofsted wants to see more of a transformational impact. FIN feels that the inspectorate should offer providers something much more tangible in defining exceptional and transformational and we can provide the inspectorate with many examples from our members of what is.

Despite providers facing challenging circumstances, Kleek’s commitment to and investment in quality stands out in the report. Have you ever read in another Ofsted report, “Leaders swiftly cease working with employers who do not provide apprentices with on-the-job training that is of a consistently high quality”? At the same time, the provider wants learners to have positive experiences of education and Ofsted observes in its report, “During Pride month apprentices demonstrated support for the LGBTQIA+ community by creating hidden rainbow hair colouring techniques symbolising hidden protected characteristics”.

As FIN members demonstrate constantly and Alan Milburn says in his interim report, becoming NEET does not have to be inevitable. Two changes are required as part of the system reset that Milburn demands. Firstly and unlike for other provider types, Ofsted doesn’t judge independent training providers on meeting local skills needs, so these providers are prevented from demonstrating to local young people and employers that they do this very well.

Secondly, when a provider achieves strong in all areas, lead inspectors should be mandated to look for examples of exceptional practice.

Milburn writes that his review unashamedly extols the virtues of good work. Ofsted’s reports on Kleek and other providers such as National Grid Electricity Distribution (South West) and Corndel show that helping young people secure this work is not an aspiration but an achievable reality. If the system is to be reset, Ofsted must be part of it.