A deputy further education commissioner has been appointed to Ofsted’s board.
Frances Wadsworth is one of five recruits to the watchdog’s governance team announced today.
Other new members include Ark academy trust CEO Lucy Heller, child safeguarding expert Sir Alan Wood, former academy trust boss and Department for Education civil servant Hardip Begol, and journalist Jo Coburn.
It comes after former Ofsted chief inspector Christine Gilbert was appointed last year as chair of the watchdog’s board.
It followed criticism in her review of Ofsted’s response to the death of headteacher Ruth Perry that the board’s role “appears curiously limited, apparently leaving some of Ofsted’s most critical activities outside of its control, unless Her Majesty’s chief inspector (HMCI) chooses to let it have some control”.
“This degree of autonomy and entitlement for HMCI does not make for effective governance,” the review said.
Wadsworth is a former teacher, college principal, interim chair of Ofqual and a serving magistrate.
She was appointed as a deputy FE commissioner in May 2018 and is due to complete her extended term next month.
Wadsworth was made a CBE for services to education in the Queen’s 2022 birthday honours.
The DfE said Wood had declared he was a member of the Labour Party while none of the other four new Ofsted board members declared any political activity.
Heller, Wood, Wadsworth and Coburn will serve for three years from February 1. Begol will serve for three years from August 1. They will be paid an annual salary of £8,292 for 20 days per year.
They join Gilbert and serving members Martyn Oliver, Ofsted’s chief inspector, and Martin Spencer, Laura Wyld, Jon Yates, Felicity Gillespie, Joanne Moran and David Meyer.
Three college leaders have been selected for the higher education regulator’s “critical friend” expert group that aims to alert it to any emerging risks in the sector.
The Office for Students’ (OfS) new provider panel features 11 senior leaders from higher and further education institutions to offer advice and constructive challenge on current and future OfS regulation.
Former Leicester College principal Verity Hancock will serve as chair in tandem with her OfS board membership.
Debra Gray, principal and chief executive of Hull College, and Denise Brown, group CEO of South Essex Colleges Group, join the 11-strong panel.
Josh Allerson, managing director of degree apprenticeships provider Corndel College London – part of apprenticeship giant Corndel Limited, is also a panel member alongside five university vice-chancellors and two chief executives of arts higher education schools.
Members will act as a “critical friend” to the OfS and help shape the future of higher education regulation as part of the watchdog’s endeavours to work “collaboratively” with universities and colleges.
The OfS said the panel will help understand the views of the diverse institutions it regulates, as well as alerting it to emerging risks across the higher education sector.
Recruitment for the panel was launched in September and received over 80 applications from sector leaders, according to the OfS October board minutes.
Hancock was first appointed to the Office for Students’ board in 2019 on a five year-term. She stepped down as principal and CEO of Leicester College last summer after 12 years at the helm due to health reasons.
Hancock said the new panel will facilitate a “two-way” dialogue between the regulator and education providers.
Last year, the regulator published its aims for 2025-26, which included engaging routinely and collaboratively with universities and colleges to build trusted and productive relationships.
It also forms part of the OfS’s change to its governance structure to “to better oversee the OfS’s work as we mature as a regulator”.
She said: “Last year, the OfS told universities, colleges, and other higher education providers that we wanted to work more collaboratively with them in the pursuit of our priorities. The provider panel is an example of that commitment in action, and I’m excited to take up my role as its chair.
“As a longstanding board member and former college principal, I know how important it is for the OfS to have a two-way dialogue with the institutions we regulate. Every panel member will have their own perspective of the risks and opportunities facing the sector, and I’m looking forward to working with them over the coming year.”
Chair of the OfS, Edward Peck, said the panel was the next “important step” in strengthening its relationship with the sector in recent years.
“The members we have announced today are a true reflection the rich diversity of the English higher education sector,” he said.
“Their views will help us to develop future policies and understand how our regulation impacts institutions of all types and sizes.
“Our goal is to foster a thriving higher education ecosystem that is equipped to continue creating opportunity for all students and driving growth across the country. We look forward to working closely with the provider panel in the coming months as we strive to deliver exemplary regulation in the interests of students.”
The 11 new members of the OfS provider panel:
Panel member
Job title
Verity Hancock (Chair)
OfS board member and former principal and CEO of Leicester College
Professor Karen O’Brien
Vice-Chancellor and warden of Durham University
Professor Mark Power
Vice-Chancellor and chief executive of Liverpool John Moores University
Professor David Mba
Vice-Chancellor of Birmingham City University
Professor Larry Kramer
President and vice-chancellor of the London School of Economics
Professor Nick Jennings
Vice-Chancellor and president of Loughborough University
Josh Allerson
Managing director, Corndel College London
Debra Gray
Principal and chief executive of Hull College
Denise Brown
Group chief executive officer of South Essex Colleges Group
Clare Connor
Chief executive of London Contemporary Dance School (LCDS)
Dr. Matt Lilley
President of Hult International Business School
Josette Bushell-Mingo
Principal and CEO of The Royal Central School of Speech and Drama
Staff in half the colleges that voted to strike this week have called off their industrial action after agreeing to pay deals or to allow time for further talks.
Teacher members of the University and College Union in 33 colleges voted to strike in November and were set to walk out today, tomorrow and Friday.
But since then a number have settled their disputes with pay deals of up to 7 per cent, while a further ten colleges suspended the action at the last minute so union representatives can further negotiate with college bosses.
Members of the UCU from 16 colleges across England will continue to protest low pay offers and poor working conditions (see list below).
Strikes due at The Sheffield College, Abingdon & Witney College, Lancaster and Morecambe College, Stanmore College, Barnet & Southgate College, the City of Bristol College, New College Swindon, Wirral Met, Kirklees College, and Hugh Baird College have been abandoned in recent days.
UCU opened a nationwide ballot in October after the “disappointing” 4 per cent pay rise recommendation from the Association of Colleges for this year.
The union’s New Deal for FE campaign, alongside sister unions NEU, GMB, UNISON and Unite, is demanding pay parity with schoolteachers, national workload agreements and a binding national bargaining framework.
Union members at 33 of the 54 balloted colleges passed the legally required 50 per cent turnout threshold and backed strike action.
A total of 68 colleges were in dispute with bosses before the ballot. Twenty-one colleges failed to meet the turnout threshold, and 20 colleges have since settled their disputes.
Teachers take to the streets
UCU members at Sheffield College and Kirklees College voted to pause action for two of the three strike action days and will be consulted on whether to put down tools on Friday.*
Leaders at Sheffield have put in contingency plans to “minimise” potential disruption should teachers agree to walk out on Friday as well.
“We welcome the cancellation of strikes for two days this week,” said Paul Simpson, executive director for people at The Sheffield College.
“We are continuing discussions with UCU and committed to resolving this dispute, which affects a number of further education colleges nationally.”
Meanwhile, Daniel Braithwaite, principal & CEO of Lancaster and Morecambe College (LMC), said he has offered teachers a salary rise of 4 per cent due to a “sustained” increase in student numbers and “efficient” financial management.
He said: “We are now focusing on further development of our curriculum to support the continued growth of our 16-18 cohort and expanding our level 3 technical pathways provision.”
UCU members at LMC also accepted pay measures such as a £30,366 starting salary, an additional spine point at the top of the pay scale, and an agreement on workload protections, including a reduction in annual teaching hours, additional safety protections and prioritised time for planning and marking.
Lecturers at Abingdon and Witney College have suspended their strike action to consider a new 4 per cent offer by management.
UCU general secretary Jo Grady at picket line. Photo credit: Rehan Jamil
Representatives will also negotiate an offer to remove the current average annual teaching hours agreement and replace it with a maximum number of annual teaching hours, an action plan on workload concerns, and close the college for two weeks over Christmas so staff will not need to take annual leave.
Staff at City of Bristol College have also voted to suspend this week’s planned strike to allow for further talks on pay scales with bosses.
UCU general secretary Jo Grady said: “It is down to the determination and solidarity of our members which shows what can be achieved when workers unionise and stand together.
“To avoid disruption on campus this week, leaders at colleges where we are still in dispute need to make meaningful offers and show they value their staff.”
Capital City College sixth form teachers march on
National Education Union members at a sixth form college in Angel, part of Capital City College, are also striking today for three days as part of a long-running but separate dispute.
Union representatives claim the current offer will leave “experienced” sixth form teachers at the highest end of the college’s pay scales £1,614 per year behind other sixth form teachers on the same contracts.
The ongoing dispute has led to 16 days of industrial action due to CCC’s “intolerable” plans to freeze sixth-form teacher salaries for two to three years to bring them in line with FE lecturers.
NEU members, who coordinated this week’s strike with UCU to “march separately but strike together”, will also join a national strike rally this Friday in central London.
UCU counterparts at the college group are also striking this week. Members rejected a pay offer of 4 per cent, a 4.5 per cent rise for those on a salary of £25,000 or less, and a one-off payment of £200-250 for those earning £34,000 or less.
The current list of colleges on strike between January 14, 15, 16 (correct at the time of publication):
Bournemouth and Poole College of FE
Capital City College
Chesterfield College
City College Norwich
City of Liverpool College
City of Portsmouth College
City of Wolverhampton College
Isle of Wight College
Loughborough College Group
Morley College
SK College Group
South & City College Birmingham
South Bank Colleges
Truro & Penwith College
Windsor Forest Colleges Group
Working Men’s College
*[Thursday January 15, 5:45pm] Staff at Kirklees College and The Sheffield College pulled out of the third strike day after accepting pay deals of 4.5 per cent and up to 5 per cent respectively.
Kirklees College staff negotiated a deal that will also add an extra 0.5 per cent for lecturers on scale point 3, further negotiations to its workload agreement by April 2026 and potential time off in lieu for open days, parents’ evenings and recruitment events.
Lecturers at Sheffield College will see a 5 per cent pay rise and all other college staff will receive a 4 per cent bump as well as further work on a workload agreement.
There’s a line in the classic eighties vampire movie The Lost Boys that came to me as new learners entered their FE classrooms in September: “You’ll never grow old, and you’ll never die. But you must feed…”
For many young people studying English and maths, FE can feel exactly like this – an endless cycle of resits, repeated exams, and familiar teaching approaches that never quite meet them where they are.
Learners are expected to keep going, to keep feeding the system with effort and compliance, yet are rarely given the time or conditions needed to rebuild what was missing long before they arrived.
They are not failing because they lack ability; they are lost inside a system that has never fully taken responsibility for their journey.
I came to my college last year new not just to the institution but to the FE sector – new to the acronyms, systems, and the particular language of FE that can feel like a world of its own. I’m still learning how funding rules shape curriculum decisions, how resit requirements drive timetables and how accountability measures ripple through daily practice.
I was struck by the contrast between the college’s forward-thinking approach to vocational education and its more traditional approach to English and maths.
In workshops, studios and training spaces, teaching is applied, responsive and clearly aligned to real-world outcomes. Learners are trusted to learn by doing, to problem-solve, to make mistakes and improve.
By contrast, English and maths delivery often remains exam-driven, content-heavy and disconnected from how learners succeed elsewhere.
I have worked in education for over 20 years, from early years to key stage 5. One truth has remained constant: when pathways are unclear, outcomes are prioritised over understanding and SEND systems fail to intervene early, learners do not fall behind by accident. They are pushed there by design.
National datasets and Ofqual-reported outcomes consistently show that only around two-thirds of GCSE entries achieve a grade 4 or above. Post-16 resit success rates – particularly in maths – remain significantly lower. FE colleges therefore receive large numbers of learners with grades 1 to 3 or U, many of whom have struggled with reading, number confidence or exam anxiety for years.
FE is effectively asked to compress long-term foundational gaps into a single academic year, while being held accountable for outcomes it did not create.
Alongside this academic fragility, learner complexity continues to rise.
Increasing numbers of post-16 learners present with identified or emerging special educational needs, often without complete documentation.
Exam access arrangements are frequently inconsistent, with learners reporting support approved at one stage and removed at another.
When they enter FE, the process begins again – gathering evidence, reassessing, reapplying – while learners continue to sit assessments without the support they require.
One of the clearest tensions in FE is between vocational success and academic exhaustion. Many learners thrive in applied settings, gaining confidence as their skills visibly improve. Attendance and engagement reflect this.
Yet those same learners often disengage rapidly in English and maths lessons when teaching relies heavily on worksheets, abstract tasks and exam-style questions.
Teaching conditions cannot be separated from this experience. Across the country, many English and maths teams are doing thoughtful, creative and highly effective work in extremely challenging circumstances. At the same time, practitioners are managing mixed-level groups, SEND, emotional histories and high-stakes exams with limited subject-specific professional development.
Where pedagogy does not evolve to reflect post-16 learners, motivation fades quickly.
Inspection commentary, sector research and practitioner evidence increasingly point to the limitations of a resit-driven model.
Government proposals for new ‘stepping stone’ English and maths qualifications acknowledge the need for greater learner confidence and alternative pathways, but their impact will depend on whether they genuinely prioritise skills development over repeated assessment.
A skills-focused approach, prioritising literacy, numeracy, communication and problem-solving in meaningful contexts, offers a more realistic way forward.
Our learners are not disengaged by choice. They are navigating a system that values outcomes over understanding. They are not the Lost Boys. The system is lost, and it is our responsibility to get it back on track.
The first results are out – and the outcomes of Ofsted’s inspections under the new education inspection framework look encouraging.
After last year’s extensive consultations, there’s an argument that all’s well that ends well. But employers and providers need to be confident that inspections will still be conducted fairly throughout 2026 and beyond.
The Fellowship of Inspection Nominees (FIN) has supported providers scrutinised under the new regime, although not enough yet to flag up definitively what our members believe is good or bad about the experience. However, we can offer pointers for those preparing for inspection in the coming months.
A key observation is inspectors are closely following the toolkit when making visits, even using it as a checklist, so providers should use the document as the template for preparation.
But following this simple recommendation won’t on its own guarantee a positive outcome. As FIN called out last year, the toolkit contains some frustrating ambiguities: What is meant by “typically”, and how often is “regularly” – every month or every six months?
Providers, and hopefully inspectors, should apply common sense in interpreting what is required to secure an expected or strong standard.
“Embedded” and “transformational” practice were seen in recent inspections as evidence of being strong across the board. At this stage though, it is not clear whether being consistently strong with no improvements required merits the awarding of “exceptional”. It will be interesting to see how many independent training providers achieve the highest standard compared with, say, sixth-form colleges.
Providers must be ready to showcase evidence and push for the award of a strong standard if they feel it’s deserved. Our members report that to meet an expected standard, perhaps even more evidence is required than under previous frameworks.
In terms of process, not every lead inspector wants to watch a presentation from the nominee at the start of a visit. Providers may instead be given a template to follow by Ofsted as an opening brief.
As expected, inclusion is a major feature of the new framework, whether it’s part of a monitoring visit or a full inspection. Providers should know the barriers to be overcome by every learner and be prepared to present evidence on how overcoming them is being achieved, and the distance travelled.
Furthermore, the provider should proactively identify the barriers rather than waiting for the learner to declare any. Again, in this respect, Ofsted is referring to all learners, not just the ones with special or additional needs.
Safeguarding is another area for particular focus. Inspectors will expect leaders to have undergone safeguarding training. One inspector wanted to see the name and phone number of the provider’s safeguarding officer in the safeguarding policy document, even though names can often change.
In a visit before Christmas, a nominee felt that repeated questions from the inspectors on inclusion and safeguarding were a means of establishing whether a strong standard had been achieved.
FIN keeps emphasising to members of all provider types, including employer providers, the importance of maintaining strong governance, and the recent inspections have underlined this requirement. With our support, members are preparing presentations to inspectors on this.
One aspect that hasn’t changed is Ofsted wishing to see evidence of good careers guidance. It’s advisable for each provider to have a strategy document for CIAG and to show it to the inspection team. Inspectors are less likely to dig further if the approach seems sound.
During the consultation period last year, we wanted Ofsted to recognise it must understand the context in which each individual provider operates. The early inspections indicate that providers should ensure the Ofsted teams are on top of this because our members feel they aren’t. For example, do inspectors appreciate that where apprenticeship standards incorporate a professional qualification, apprentices might not be interested in completing the programme once the qualification has been achieved?
It’s too early to confirm that FIN was justifiably concerned about whether inspectors would be consistent in their judgements under the scorecard system. But based on recent inspections, we hope to see much greater recognition of individual leaners’ distance travelled than inspectors’ reliance on achievement data.
Poor progress in English and maths tracks “right back to primary school” and requires intervention at the earliest stage to break the “treadmill” of GCSE resits in post-16 education, Ofqual’s chief regulator has said.
Sir Ian Bauckham was quizzed by MPs on Parliament’s education committee today for the first time since his pre-appointment hearing in December 2024.
Here’s what we learned…
Tackle the ‘root cause’ of poor English and maths
The chief regulator said he “agreed” with the committee’s September 2025 report into further education that expressed “strong views about the treadmill of resits” in colleges.
Government mandates students who have not achieved a grade 4 pass in English and/or maths GCSE by age 16 study towards these qualifications as a condition of their post-16 places being funded. Most resit the exams.
Bauckham outlined his concern that a big contributing factor was “too many” students in primary education not reaching the expected standards in English and maths.
He told MPs that there is “no point” in a student who has spent 11 years studying English and maths and “only achieved a grade one or grade two repeatedly sitting an examination in the hope that by luck, one day they might scrape enough marks to pass”.
Bauckham urged the government to “look at the root causes of students making so little progress” and try to “address that much earlier on”.
“It tracks right back through primary, through secondary, to try to ensure that we don’t have students who have got these gaps in their learning,” he said.
He added that Ofqual is working “intensively” with the Department for Education on promised new level 1 “stepping stone” qualifications for students struggling with English and maths but could not give a date for when they could arrive in schools and colleges.
V Levels should not be dictated by T Levels
Bauckham was also questioned on his response to last year’s curriculum and assessment review, of which he was an observer on the review panel.
“What I witnessed was a very rigorous, very thorough overview of the whole curriculum, assessment and qualifications landscape in England,” he said.
He told the committee that he found independent reviewer Becky Francis’ recommendations to be “broadly sensible” and did not think anything was left out of her final report.
Regarding the proposal to introduce V Levels as small vocational qualifications to sit between T Levels and A Levels, Bauckham warned that the development should prioritise “distinctiveness”.
“The policy intention is not to force V Levels into a mould dictated either by T Levels or A Levels, but to create and then maintain a distinctiveness for V Levels,” he said.
The government’s consultation on V Levels closed yesterday.
AI ‘not ready’ to solely mark work
Bauckham said he wasn’t convinced that AI was ready to be the only marker of student work and exams.
That was because it still makes mistakes and is hard to challenge.
He added that it can be used to quality assure and detect “unexpected” patterns in examiner marking but hallucinations meant it is not yet ready to undertake sole marking.
Bauckham also cast doubt on how contested exam grades would be reviewed if they were marked by a “complex series of algorithms inside an impenetrable black box”.
And he said he had “signalled my anxiety” to the DfE about the use of AI cheating in qualifications with extended writing coursework.
He said there is “relatively little” of this coursework, but highlighted history and English A Level, where 20 per cent of the qualification is extended writing.
The chief regulator has commissioned a “significant piece of work internally at Ofqual to ascertain the extent to which this risk is being realised at the moment and what the options might be in any reform of those qualifications for closing down that risk and assuring ourselves of the integrity of these qualifications”.
He added: “I would not be being transparent if I didn’t say I am concerned about that, I visited a number of providers up and down the country, spoken to teachers and a number have raised this with me.”
‘Justice delayed is justice denied’
MPs also asked the chief regulator to comment on the “significant” number of fines handed out last year to awarding bodies for regulation breaches.
Bauckham said Ofqual had used its legal enforcement powers on more than two dozen occasions last year, including handing out fines and imposing special conditions.
After “inheriting” a large backlog of cases when he became chief regulator, partly due to covid, Bauckham admitted that Ofqual did not always prioritise closing cases quickly and his ethos was to send strong messages to exam boards when there are breaches.
“Justice delayed is justice denied applies in this circumstance,” he said.
“It feels to me as if those powers were given to us by Parliament, not only to send clear, strong messages to exam boards and to the sector that where there are breaches that are potentially damaging for the integrity of the qualification or for students, they are sanctioned and clear, strong messages are sent,” he added.
“I’m particularly keen that that’s done in a timely way.”
Boards didn’t like Bauckham’s new ‘rebuke’
Ofqual recently gave itself new powers to publicly “rebuke” rule-breaking awarding bodies where the case is not serious enough to warrant a financial penalty.
Bauckham told the committee that following a consultation with exam body chief executives, he concluded that public shaming was the right approach.
“We got very sharp feedback from awarding organisations who said they would find it a very difficult thing to receive indeed,” he said.
He added that it would lead CEOs to have difficult talks with their boards and even impact share prices of publicly listed awarding bodies.
“They didn’t like it very much, which gave me assurance that it might be effective.”
A care worker apprenticeship training provider is being chased for £1.2 million by the Department for Education after investigators uncovered systemic contract breaches.
A financial investigation outcome report published today said the sum is “being recovered” from Park Education and Training Centre after officials found missing evidence to support many apprentice funding claims over four academic years.
Investigators flagged a range of issues including a lack of signed apprenticeship agreements, enrolment checks, unverifiable signatures and absent off-the-job training records.
They also found no evidence that the north west London-based company had taken steps to address conflicts of interest between the provider and temporary employment agencies apprentices were employed by.
There was also a lack of proof to show apprentices received wages at or above the national minimum wage.
But company owner Aiah Kanda told FE Week the DfE’s clawback demand “has not been done fairly” and argued that Park Education and Training Centre should only have to repay “about a quarter” of the £1,203,085 sum claimed.
Kanda, who also part-owned home care agency Own Care until October last year, blamed “very, very high” staff turnover in the care industry for the lack of funding claim evidence.
The company owner said the department is now asking for “all the money” it paid for apprenticeship training since the company’s registration in 2021.
He questioned why the company should have to repay funding claims for apprentices who have received their diplomas but not yet completed their end point assessment, arguing that many fail to complete because of high turnover in the care industry.
He added: “So that because this person didn’t achieve something at the end, therefore you have to pay everything back. That doesn’t make any logical sense to me.”
Kanda suggested that missing evidence of learning could be obtained by calling learners.
He claimed that “over 80 per cent” of learners achieved but was unable to estimate how many completed their end-point assessment.
The businessman told FE Week the future of his company is now uncertain in light of the clawback demand.
He said: “With that huge amount of money, where is it going to come from? Because this money is not going to be lying down there, you’re paying teachers, you’re paying rent, you’re paying all those things.”
Inspectors found a “varied experience” for the company’s 215 apprentices, with many making “slow progress” and receiving inconsistent training or reviews.
The DfE’s published data shows Park Education and Training Centre recorded a 62.2 per cent total apprenticeship achievement rate in 2023-24 for 50 leavers. It no longer appears on the apprenticeship provider and assessment register (APAR).
The department’s investigation report is the second the DfE has published on an ITP’s use of public funding since it updated its policy in December 2023.
The first FE provider to receive Ofsted’s new highest mark has been revealed – as the watchdog published the first batch of new-style report cards.
System People Limited was deemed ‘exceptional’ for achievement in its adult learning programmes in its inspection outcome published this morning.
The Carlisle-based independent training provider (ITP) was the only provider out of a batch of 19 ITPs and adult learning providers to receive the rare grade, which is meant to showcase “truly among the very best nationally”.
Early inspections under the new revised framework began in November last year, and were led only by the most senior Ofsted inspectors.
Following a consultation last year, Ofsted abandoned overall headline grades in favour of a five-point scale in 16 individual areas – including inclusion for the first time.
Education providers will now be awarded grades from ‘exceptional’, ‘strong standard’ and ‘expected standard’ to ‘needs attention’ and ‘urgent improvement’.
Ofsted’s baseline expectation is for providers to achieve the ‘expected standard grade’. Anything below will be deemed ‘needs attention or ‘urgent improvement’ and above will get a ‘strong standard’ or ‘exemplary’ grade.
The new look report shows how many times the provider was graded across the five-point scale, with a breakdown of each inspection area further down.
Meeting safeguarding standards remains a tick box, with providers either meeting or not meeting their legal requirement.
The report card then details each grade for inclusion and leadership and governance and also the training programmes it delivers.
Ofsted have also provided a new facts and figures data breakdown for the inspected provider. Via a drop-down box, viewers can find the number of learners and achievement rates of the provider, which is accurate from the time of inspection.
No ‘urgent improvement’ judgments
FE Week analysis found no provider in today’s batch had ‘urgent improvement’ in any area. All but one ITP – AKR Growth Ventures – were given mostly ‘expected standard’ grades in most areas of inspection.
AKR Growth Ventures, an ITP which delivers early years, marketing and information technology apprenticeships was handed ‘needs attention’ across the board.
The watchdog found issues with “underdeveloped” understanding from leaders and governors and slow progress in English and maths achievements at the provider.
Meanwhile, six providers had at least one ‘needs attention’ grade and eight received at least one ‘strong standard’ rating.
New accountability rules set out by the Department for Education (DfE) will not rely on specific Ofsted grades to place poorly performing apprenticeship training providers in intervention for the next 12 months.
Under its previous apprenticeship accountability framework, training providers judged ‘inadequate’ for apprenticeships or overall effectiveness can lead to “contractual action”. Ofsted grades are one of several measures taken into consideration.
But the new rules will now mean that DfE will instead decide whether or not to take action on a case-by-case basis.
One ‘exceptional’ grade
Chief inspector Sir Martyn Oliver previously said the ‘exceptional’ grade would demonstrate exemplary practice nationally.
“Strong standard marks out excellent practice. Anything graded ‘exceptional’ is exactly that – truly among the very best nationally,” he told college leaders last year.
System People got an ‘exceptional’ for the achievement category for its adult education programmes.
Inspectors found that learners consistently make “extensive” progress from their starting points and the training has a “transformational” impact on learners’ future careers.
The provider had the majority of learners on apprenticeships (345) and around 50 on skills bootcamps.
The report pointed out “exceptionally well” preparedness of large goods vehicle (LGV) apprentices and learners, adding that almost all progress into sustained employment.
System People reported a 74 per cent achievement rate in 2023-24, above the 61 per cent national average.
Guinea pig small providers
No colleges were part of this morning’s batch release as smaller providers were favoured for the early inspections.
The new report cards will award a grade to colleges on how well they are contributing to local skills demands, which will now lead to targeted support or being placed in intervention if they receive ‘urgent improvement’.
Ofsted began judging colleges on local skills needs contributions in 2022 through “enhanced inspections”.
Until now, colleges have been rated along a scale of either ‘strong’, ‘reasonable’ or ‘limited’ for this category, none of which have been used to trigger intervention.
Any ‘urgent improvement’ finding may also lead to a college receiving a letter to improve, and an FE Commissioner-led improvement review, both of which will not be made publicly available.
Most of the 19 providers – bar four – receiving a report card today had small learner cohorts of under 100 at the time of inspection.
The largest was from Bury Metropolitan Borough Council, which had 670 learners on adult education programmes at the time of inspection.
It received ‘needs attention’ in leadership and governance and ‘expected standard’ for inclusion. For its adult learning programmes, ‘expected standard’ was found for achievement and curriculum and teaching, but participation and development ‘needs attention’.
Inspectors said council leaders have laid out a strategic plan to improve tutor training, but the report said ongoing external factors “beyond their control” have impeded leaders’ ability to improve quickly.
The council last received a ‘good’ at its last full in inspection in 2010.
A Labour think tank director who tried to unseat Jeremy Corbyn has been appointed as an “expert adviser” on skills to work and pensions secretary Pat McFadden.
Praful Nargund will work alongside civil servants and special advisers to help “make the best use” of the transfer of adult skills policy from the Department for Education to the Department for Work and Pensions (DWP).
The director and founder of think tank The Good Growth Foundation will work on the unpaid advisory role for at least two days per week until July, with an option to extend further.
Nargund was a prominent member of Labour’s council of skills advisers, working alongside former education secretary Lord David Blunkett. The council proposed reforming the apprenticeship levy into what is now known as the growth and skills levy in 2022.
Nargund also ran a failed bid to unseat former Labour MP Jeremy Corbyn in the 2024 general election and has a range of other roles, including as a college governor, a Labour councillor, and a shareholder in a venture capital firm.
According to an announcement this morning, Nargund will work with experts to ensure McFadden has “access to high-quality advice” on growth as the new adult skills policy area is embedded in the department.
His job description says he will seek to: “Drive and support innovative thinking in terms of how adult skills can help the government to increase opportunity and drive economic growth.”
The director was appointed directly by McFadden, FE Week understands.
Praful Nargund said: “I’m delighted to be appointed skills adviser to the secretary of state for DWP, Pat McFadden.
“Whether it’s supporting the nearly one million young people not in education, employment or training into work, or driving economic growth, skills reform is at the heart of making it happen.”
The Good Growth Foundation is a non-profit think tank that says it’s “on a mission to crack the politics of economic growth”.
A recent report by the foundation, ‘Take Back Control’, recommended that the immigration system requires skilled migrants to train British workers to improve public feelings about the issue.
He was previously chief executive of private IVF treatment providers Create Fertility and abc IVF, which were majority owned by his family until their sale for an undisclosed sum in 2021.
He is also a non-executive director at venture capital firm Social Impact Enterprises and a governor at Capital City College Group.
In 2024 he was a director at Executive Pipeline Limited, a leadership training company, alongside high-profile Labour donor Lord Waheed Alli.
