National adult education procurement results delayed

The Education and Skills Funding Agency will miss its deadline to reveal the winners of its national adult education budget procurement just weeks before contracts are due to start.

The Association of Employment and Learning Providers (AELP) is now calling for existing contracts to be extended.

Training providers were initially told the results would be revealed in mid-June. That was then delayed to “before the end of June” in a notification to providers last Thursday. 

A further update today confirmed that this deadline will once again be missed. 

Adult education procurement launches with ‘more robust’ contract management

“Due to unforeseen delays in final clearances, we are unable to meet this expectation.

“We are committed to providing notification as soon as possible and do not expect this delay to be lengthy, and we will you keep you updated through the Jaggaer messaging system.”

The new adult education budget contracts are due to begin in just over four weeks, on August 1. The procurement was launched in February. 

Today’s update suggested there could be mitigations that “take into account the impact these delays may have on successful bidders’ delivery of the contract, in terms of targets and associated KPI.”

There was no further detail on what those mitigations might look like. 

Simon Ashworth, director of policy at AELP, said it was “extremely disappointing” that “yet again an ESFA procurement exercise fails to be delivered on time.”

“Existing contract holders have been left hanging when they have commitments for staff and premises and successful bidders will have a limited notice period to be ready for starting delivery from August” Ashworth said.

He added: “To mitigate this the ESFA should offer an extension to existing contract holders to support with the transition, whilst also ensuring performance management arrangements for new contracts holders allows for a slower start to delivery than would have been expected.”

The Agency appears to have not learned the lessons from the last national AEB procurement in 2021 which was also beset with delays. In that round, bid results were only released to providers two weeks before contracts were due to start.

The Department for Education was approached for comment. A spokesperson repeated:

“We are committed to providing a notification to bidders as soon as possible and do not expect this delay to be lengthy.

“Any impact of these delays will be taken into account in terms of targets and associated KPIs.”

Nearly 1 in 6 clinical training places to be offered as apprenticeships by 2028

The amount of NHS clinicians that the government plans to train through apprenticeships will more than double in the next five years, according to a long-awaited report into boosting the NHS workforce.

The NHS workforce plan, published today, sets out the government’s goals for the medical workforce in England, which will invest £2.4 billion into upskilling the national health service over the next five years.

Just 7 per cent of clinical staff training in the NHS is currently routed through apprenticeships.

The government aims to increase that to nearly one in six (16 per cent) by 2028/29, including over 850 medical doctor degree apprentices.

This will increase to over one in five (22 per cent) of all training for clinical staff to be done through apprenticeships by 2031/32.

“Apprenticeships will help widen access to opportunities for people from all backgrounds and in underserved areas to join the NHS,” the report said.

The plan also reveals ambitions to boost overall adult nursing training places by 92 per cent, taking the total number of places to nearly 38,000 by 2031/32, achieved by expanding places to over 44,000 by 2028/29.

By 2028/29, the NHS will have 20 per cent of registered nurses qualifying through apprenticeship routes compared to just 9 per cent now.

NHS Long Term Workforce Plan

Over one in ten doctors to qualify through apprenticeships

The workforce plan explained that the new pilot degree apprenticeship for doctors will start in 2024 with 200 places. 

The report says it will “enable individuals from under-represented backgrounds” to start medical training who otherwise would not have done so through full-time higher education and training routes.

The medical degree apprenticeships standard was originally approved in July 2022. An FE Week investigation earlier this year revealed that some in the medical profession worry that pushing medic degrees was more about reducing the cost of training, rather than widening participation.

In five years’, the programme plans to offer more than 850 students the degree apprenticeship route. It aims that by 2031/32, 2,000 medical students will train via a degree apprenticeship. 

The report added that there is “potential” to expand training via the apprenticeship route for pharmacy technicians and the government is considering bringing in a pharmacist degree apprenticeship.

Alongside apprenticeships, T Levels got a very brief nod in the report.

The report said next to initiatives like the lifelong loan entitlement, T Levels and Higher Technical Qualifications, “apprenticeships enable people to gain a qualification while earning a salary.”

It added that the education sector would need measures to increase its capacity to deliver “more visible NHS career routes from T Levels through to enhanced careers.”

The workforce plan entails three principles: “train, retain, and reform,” said prime minister Rishi Sunak in a speech today, adding that the long-term plan’s aim is to cut agency spending by £10 million and reduce the need for international recruitment.

“We’re going to drive the biggest ever expansion of apprenticeships and the NHS so that 1/5 of all clinical training will be offered through degree apprenticeships, helping to bring staff into the NHS from a much wider range of backgrounds and will give staff in the NHS more opportunities to progress such as becoming a nurse or a doctor, as well as making sure that the workforce of the future has the advanced knowledge they need to care for our ageing population,” Sunak added.

How will this be funded?

An additional £2.4 billion has been committed over the next six years to boost training places across the NHS workforce on top of existing training budgets.

The report outlines that NHS England will develop an apprenticeship funding approach to better supports employers with the cost of employing an apprentice.

This will entail working with NHS employers, integrated care systems (ICSs), providers and partners to develop a national policy framework that can be used locally. It will target apprenticeship schemes that would “have the greatest impact on patient outcomes.”

“NHS England will work jointly across government to ensure that any changes to NHS England’s apprenticeship funding approach are supported by, and align with, wider government apprenticeship funding policy,” the report said.

“For example, NHS England and DHSC will work with the Department for Education (DfE) to enable apprenticeship levy funds to be more easily transferred between employers in an ICS and ensure that data on the use of apprenticeship funding in the NHS is more visible to decision-makers at national and local level.”

Specialist college sweeps ‘outstanding’ in first inspection

A specialist college for 19-25-year-olds where learners are “encouraged to behave as independent adults” has been graded ‘outstanding’ in all areas by Ofsted. 

This is the first full inspection for Skills for Independent and Employability Limited, trading as The Oaks Specialist College, since it opened its doors to ten learners in 2018.

Inspectors were impressed with the college’s “expertly” tailored curriculum and learners’ use of mobile apps to help them independently navigate through their education “and the world around them.”

At the time of the May inspection, the Kent-based college had 109 learners, most were on entry-level courses. There were 23 learners on pre-entry level provision and 18 were studying at levels 1 and 2. All learners have education, health and care plans. 

The full inspection report, published today, explained that learners have a direct influence on the curriculum, which “helps them to explore their interests and talents and build their social and communication skills.”

Oak specialist college principal Ros Leach

All learners provide feedback to college leaders, with some “supported to represent their peers”.

The use of technology in teaching practical skills and enabling learners to live independently was a common theme in the report. 

College principal Ros Leach said “This is a great place with huge ambition for our learners. We are also a Microsoft showcase college, the only specialist college to achieve such status, and we use technology to great effect to improve the lives and increase the opportunities for our learners when they leave.”

“Highly-skilled and qualified” teaching staff were praised for “seamlessly” meeting the complex needs of learners and for providing real-life scenarios, like travel and shopping, which all helps learners’ progress.

Simon Harris, chair of trustees, said, “The inspection was incredibly rigorous, over three days and with very experienced inspectors. That they were blown away by what the college does every day is a testament to the skills and experience of the staff and the incredible progress and amazing personal development our learners make here.”

Trustees properly challenge college leaders to maintain high educational standards which, in turn, leads to “appropriate and valuable” training so that staff can develop their own skills and knowledge, the report said.

Ofsted gave The Oaks top ‘outstanding’ judgments in all areas; quality of education, behaviour and attitudes, personal development, leadership and management, and provision for learners with high needs. 

Chief executive Gordon Tillman praised his staff’s “care and passion”.

“Whilst we don’t do what we do for Ofsted, this recognition from them is brilliant. It is a reflection of the hard work, commitment, care and passion that all of our team gives to develop our young adults in so many different ways. It is our staff that are exceptional.”

‘No doubt’ underfunding is impacting on learners

Senior officials from key agencies in education and training addressed the Association of Employment and Learning Providers’ national conference in London this week, and here are the highlights. 

The impact on further education of under-funding and the recruitment crisis is becoming more evident, a senior Ofsted director has admitted.

Ofsted’s deputy director for further education & skills, Paul Joyce, told delegates that the watchdog was aware that under-funding in the skills sector was having a negative impact on learners.

When questioned if Ofsted was concerned about the funding crisis in education and demoralised workforce, Joyce said there was “no doubt” funding is an issue in the sector and Ofsted inspectors were “seeing that impact” across the spectrum of its activities.

For example, Joyce said that the watchdog was aware of providers struggling to buy consumables, like construction materials, for use in training.

He added that the recruitment and retention crisis in FE was also filtering through to the quality of provision.

“We’re also seeing issues with workforce, with recruitment … The ability of providers to either retain their staff or to recruit new staff in areas like digital and construction,” he said.

He added that inspectors are starting to examine skills bootcamps, and from the first few reports, he said it was “really pleasing to see some good provision”.

Joyce repeated an earlier announcement that, from September, Ofsted will be increasing the inspection notice period it gives to the largest providers – defined as those with a £10 million plus contract value and operate in three or more government office regions – from up to two days to six days.

That means large providers could get a notification call on a Monday for an inspection the following Tuesday, he explained.

Inspectors will also “be encouraged” to provide more detail about the provider and the provision being inspected in their reports on large providers. 

Joyce also revealed during the Q&A that Ofsted is finalising its report into T Levels that “will make an interesting read”. The report is due to be published in the “next few weeks”.

“Inspectors conducted a number of visits primarily to wave one subjects,” he said. “We looked at work placements, the way providers use their capital funding. We looked at the T Level transition programme and just took an early temperature check really on how things are.”

AELP chair demands debate on IfATE ‘role and remit’

The government’s apprenticeships quango’s role in determining apprenticeship funding needs to be revisited, the Association for Education and Learning Providers (AELP) chair has said.

Nichola Hay said there “needs to be a debate on the role and remit of IfATE [the Institute for Apprenticeships and Technical Education] in the future skill system”.

Opening the AELP’s national conference for 2023 this week, Hay said IfATE has had an “ever expanding list” of responsibilities since it rebranded from being the Institute for Apprenticeships in 2019.

“Their expanded remit now encompasses T Levels, level two and level three qualifications along with higher level of technical qualifications,” Hay said.

Instead, IfATE’s role “should be working with employers focusing on content and curriculum”, she added. 

“There is nothing in IfATE’s own mission about its role in funding … is IfATE is best placed to lead on assessment and funding aspects? I think that is an important debate.”

IfATE has a crucial role in apprenticeship funding, as it makes an official recommendation on funding bands to the education secretary. For that, IfATE gets funding evidence from trailblazer groups, groups of employers representing each apprenticeship which get their own evidence on funding needs from training providers.

The comments come after industry representatives have criticised IfATE for not listening to their funding recommendations.  

Last month, Karen Bailey, the co-chair of the HGV, bus and coach standards trailblazer group said that “funding obstinacy” meant an HGV technician apprenticeship had received lower funding than it deserved, which meant it became loss-making and providers pulled out.

But Jennifer Coupland, chief executive of IfATE, said at the AELP conference that providing funding advice to the secretary of state was “one of the originating reasons that IfATE was created”.

Previously, those recommendations were made by the minister of state at the DfE, which Coupland said the then-minister of state, Nick Boles, found “extremely challenging, and obviously he was on the hook for absolutely every detailed decision that was being made”.

“So, part of the reason for IfATE was to have something independent of that process that could take the politics and take the lobbying out of it and look at it more in terms of the full facts of a case. That’s a core part of our remit and I wouldn’t want to give that up.”

Trust still lacking in the independent training sector

The independent training sector is “maturing”, but there isn’t yet enough trust to simplify the funding system, according to a senior ESFA director. 

Andrew Thomas, the ESFA’s director of finance and oversight, spoke about “the real challenges across the sector where a small number of organisations can at times tarnish the reputations of fantastic organisations who are delivering and really putting learners first”. 

Thomas recalled that the agency hears calls from training providers for greater simplification around audit and funding compliance across a growing number of central government and devolved funding streams. 

“We do want to look at where we can make things simpler. But we still need ensure that there is no tension in terms of how we make sure that public funding is used as intended,” Thomas said.

Thomas compared the ITP sector to the academy sector, where he said there was a greater level of trust, thus enabling more simplification.

“The assurance we can give is greatest in school sector and most challenging in the ITP sector,” he said.

Elsewhere in his speech, Thomas outlined how, in the last three years, the ITP sector’s financial position has improved, with 40 per cent of providers now with ‘outstanding’ financial health, up from 30 per cent two years ago. 

A new financial handbook for independent training providers is in the works, with a soft launch planned “towards the end of 2023”. 

Another college exits 14-16 provision as its ‘original mission’ fades

Another further education college has officially exited 14-16 provision this week. 

Hugh Baird College will close its doors to 14-16 students this summer because growth in young student numbers has “led to the provision moving away from its original mission”. 

It follows a growing number of colleges which have deemed the provision is not financially viable – and have closed their direct entry 14-16 provision.

The college, which is based in Bootle, Liverpool, took the decision to suspend its 14-16 provision last year, FE Week understands. The final cohort is in the process of wrapping up their studies this year, and the college will not run any 14-16 provision from September 2023.

The college was officially removed from the Department for Education’s list of colleges intending to enroll 14–16-year-olds on Tuesday. There are now 13 colleges on the list, down from 19 in 2017/19.

A spokesperson for Hugh Baird College said it had told stakeholders last year of its intention to stop its 14-16 provision. 

Hugh Baird’s provision for 14-16-year-old education nearly quadrupled from 2014/15 when its first, 56-strong group began studying, to 2021/22 when it had 203 students on its 14-16 programme. That then slid to 92 students in 2022/23, according to a Freedom of Information request FE Week submitted earlier this year. 

Now, the college will stop the provision entirely from the next academic year following some “significant reflection and evaluation”.

“The original intent of this provision was to offer an alternative to completing year 10/11 in high school for students who wanted to study vocational qualifications alongside core GCSE subjects,” they said.

“Enrolment numbers have increased year-on-year, and the review identified that this growth has led to the provision moving away from its original mission.  

“Having considered a range of options on the way forward, including continuing to run the provision with reduced numbers, we concluded that we would not recruit a new year 10 cohort in September 2022.”

The college declined to elaborate on why it decided to close the programme.

“The college continues to work closely with schools to provide opportunities to Year 10 and 11 pupils to experience further education through its school links programme,” the spokesperson said.

The coalition government launched 14-16 provision back in 2012 as a response to the Wolf Review, with the aim of helping those for whom a vocational route into work was more appropriate.

An FE Week investigation this year revealed that 12,860 students have been taught through direct entry, across 27 general FE and sixth form colleges. 

College funding for 14-16 teaching is the same as 16-to-19-year-old-students, but the younger students get 25 taught hours a week (as at a school) compared to 16 or 17 hours usually offered on 16-plus college courses. 

The need for a separate site also means that 14-16 teaching requires a lot of resources from colleges.

Alan McKenna, deputy director of SEND, an inclusive provision at Leeds City College, said earlier this year that funding is the “number one reason” why colleges have pulled out of 14-16 provision because “until you get to a certain size, I don’t think you can do it at a profit, or even break even”.

Lifetime chairman Geoff Russell ‘leaves the company’

The executive chair of one of England’s largest independent training providers has left his post.

Geoff Russell left Lifetime Training on Monday, after just 15 months as its chairman. He joined last March from the training provider JTL, where he was chairman for more than four years.

Shortly after joining Lifetime, the provider’s then chief executive, Alex Khan, was replaced by Jon Graham, also from JTL.

Geoff Russell

Russell was the chief executive of the Learning and Skills Council and then the Skills Funding Agency, predecessors to the Education and Skills Funding Agency until 2012. 

Jon Graham, chief executive of Lifetime Training, said Russell “has left the company as of 26 June”. 

“We wish to thank Geoff for the contribution he has made to the business since joining in 2022,” he added, with details of his “replacement shared in due course”. 

Lifetime declined to provide a reason for Russell’s departure.

Russell’s departure comes as the provider grapples with cuts of 60 jobs as announced in March, following a “strategic review”.

But it had recruited more apprentices and secured more levy funding than any other provider in England for several years – with its apprentices working at high-profile employers including the NHS, the civil service, McDonalds, Wetherspoons, B&Q and David Lloyd.

The provider also faced an Education and Skills Funding Agency audit that explored possible overclaimed additional learner support funding, which could result in a clawback of over £13 million, according to Lifetime’s latest accounts.

The company recorded a loss of £9.2 million after it posted a £6.9 million profit the year prior. Cash was also down, falling to £4.1 million in comparison to £19.8 million the year prior.

In November, the training provider was sold to Alcentra – one of the provider’s lenders which specialises in credit management, private credit and structured credit strategies, in the midst of the ESFA audit.

Russell declined to comment.

Babington hires ‘turnaround’ specialist as next CEO

One of England’s largest apprenticeship training providers has appointed an “international growth and turnaround” specialist as its next chief executive. 

The board of Babington has announced that Mark Basham, currently a self-employed angel investor and board adviser, will join the provider as chief executive on Monday, July 3. 

The appointment follows the sudden departure of David Marsh, who left the business just over a month ago after five years as chief executive. 

Basham was previously CEO of AXELOS, a company set up by the UK government and Capita, which runs certifications in best practice such as ITIL and PRINCE2. 

On leaving AXELOS in April 2022, he went on to become a self-employed angel investor and co-founder of HIT Global, an IT service management training company.

The self-described “high-impact CEO” said he was “excited to get started.”

“Apprenticeships are a key element of the UK’s economic strategy ensuring the availability of appropriate skills and resource. I am certain they will play an increasingly important role in the talent strategy of all businesses across the UK for decades to come. Babington is well-placed to support this trend and I am excited to get started.”

Joining Basham will be Mike Kinski who will become Babington’s first chairman. 

Kinski is currently a special adviser at Babington and will “provide significant additional expertise to Mark and the executive committee as they seek to build on Babington’s strong reputation in the training and learning sector,” according to a statement.

Babington is currently rated ‘good’ by Ofsted and trains thousands of apprentices and adult learners each year in areas like accountancy, administration, management and employability skills.

The provider is yet to file accounts for 2022, but its financial statements for 2021 show turnover reached £26.1 million in 2021 with a profit after tax of £3.4 million. 

However, Babington’s holding company, Project Sinatra Topco Ltd – now called Babington Managed Services Topco Ltd – showed a loss of £2.5 million in the same year.

Police investigate stolen exam papers after cyber-attack 

Police are investigating a cyber-attack where it is thought a hacker posed as a school to obtain exam papers before selling them online.

Cambridgeshire Police said they are in the “early stages” of investigating a “data breach” involving exam boards Pearson and OCR. The boards had exam papers “extracted from their systems and sold online”, the police said.

Officers are working with the National Crime Agency and the Department for Education on the investigation.

FE Week understands the incident relates to a school’s email system being hacked and then used to request papers from the exam boards – before the exam was taken. It is not known which exams this relates to.

Centres usually receive exam papers weeks in advance. However, there is also a process to request “emergency” papers sent electronically, if there is not enough time to post the papers.

The individual exam boards refused to comment. Instead, they sent a joint statement from their membership organisation, the Joint Council of Qualifications.

A JCQ spokesperson said that “every year, awarding organisations investigate potential breaches of security. When investigations are complete, sanctions, which may be severe, are taken against any individuals found to be involved”. 

Most summer exams series, rumours circulate online about certain papers being leaked. 

But boards told the BBC earlier this year that it was extremely rare for genuine papers to be leaked. Any attempts to obtain confidential material is malpractice. 

Exam boards are required to report to Ofqual when there has been an actual or potential security breach of confidential material. 

Last summer, there were 28 leaks of material, including a Pearson GCSE maths question leaked on social media before the exam. 

Ofqual’s annual report stated the board quickly identified the person involved and carried out “immediate inspections and extra supervision of exams” at the centre. 

AQA’s A-level chemistry paper last year was stolen from a delivery van. Students who had access to the paper were disqualified and the theft was reported to the police. 

On the latest breach, an Ofqual spokesperson said it “requires exam boards to investigate any alleged breaches of security and to take appropriate action.  

“This year, as in every year, Ofqual has received reports from exam boards about alleged breaches of security. We would not comment on any investigations being carried out by boards.”

Prison leaders slammed for ‘slow progress’ on reading education

Prison leaders have been accused of not taking reading education seriously in a damning joint report by education and prison inspectors.

Reading education in prisons is still hampered by “weak curriculum design” and a lack of specialist staff, Ofsted’s chief inspector has warned – in a new report warning reading is “still not given sufficient priority”.

Despite warnings last year of “serious systemic challenges, as well as plenty of poor practice”, HMI Prisons chief inspector, Charlie Taylor said in this year’s follow-up report that “things have not improved at anything like the rate that Ofsted and HMIP would have expected”.

Inspectors found that staff shortages are still a major problem, that the curriculum had not been improved enough and that the prisoners in most need of reading support were least supported to develop good skills.

While she was “pleased” to see nearly all prisons had “acknowledged the importance of reading”, Ofsted chief inspector Amanda Spielman said “there is more work to do to meet the recommendations we made last year” around teacher provision, staff training and assessment.

In total, HMIP and Ofsted assessed 24 prisons for their progress.

‘Not given sufficient priority’

Last year the report warned many staff did not know how to teach reading, and that a lot of the work was left to voluntary organisations or enthusiastic staff members.

In this year’s follow-up report, Spielman warned staff shortages “still limit the quality of reading education in most prisons”.

At 15 of the prisons visited by Ofsted and HMIP, a shortage of qualified English teachers made it more difficult to teach reading.

“Poor teaching” and a lack of access to education means that prisoners often did not practice their reading skills. Very few of the teachers in prisons were trained to teach using systematic synthetic phonics, the report added.

The lack of training meant that some of the teachers assumed if a prisoner could answer a question on a text correctly, that they could read and understand the whole text.

“Because of continuing weaknesses in curriculum design and teaching, there has not yet been a significant improvement in prisoners’ reading skills,” the report said.

Reading, the report found, is “still not given sufficient priority”.

Difficult to navigate ‘basic aspects of life’

Inspectors found that the prisoners in most need of support were the least well supported to develop good reading skills.

Once in reading education, Ofsted and HMIP found most leaders “neither monitored the progress prisoners made nor intervened when prisoners made slow progress”.

While “a few prisons used […] diagnostic assessments of prisoners” to assess their ability on entry to the education steam, most of those projects were relatively new meaning it was too early to know if they worked.

Following last year’s report, prisons were mandated to have a reading strategy. But many of those are “generic” and created by the education provider without input from prison leaders. 

Inspectors said they were less confident prisoners would make progress in those prisons, in comparison to those where the governor had developed the reading programme with the provider.

Prison leaders also do not have an “agreed approach” to written communication or instructions to make prison life easier for those with learning needs. That meant that prisoners who were still learning to read “find it difficult to navigate basic aspects of prison life, such as ordering food and completing canteen sheets”.

Severe impact on prisoners

Inspectors added one new criticism in this report to those laid out last year – that prison leaders had been “slow” to meet the reading needs of prisoners learning English as a second language.

They warned prisons “rarely” provide ESOL classes and that teachers often have “little or no expertise” in ESOL.

The lack of support from prison leaders meant that too many ESOL prisoners were forced to rely on other prisoners for support when working – because they could not understand the work instructions.