Huge T Level employer cash incentive underspend revealed

Just £500,000 of a £7 million budget earmarked to entice employers to take on early T Level students for industry placements was spent.

An evaluation report of the “employer support fund” pilot, which offered businesses £750 to cover their tangible placement costs in four regions in England between 2019 and 2021, found the grants supported 843 placements against a target of 32,466.

Just 8 per cent of the total budget was used.

The incentives were upped to £1,000 per placement for the 2021/22 academic year as they were rolled out across the country, and ministers have indicated they could be extended to future years amid calls for support from employer representative bodies.

But today’s findings, which do not examine take up of the bigger incentives in 2021/22, could discourage ministers from extending the grants.

Officials in the Department for Education and sector leaders have been concerned with convincing businesses to host students for the mandatory 315-hour, or 45-day, placements for T Levels – a flagship new qualification designed to be the technical equivalent to A-levels.

The T Level employer incentives were introduced to help overcome this concern. The pilot was rolled out in the South West and West Midlands in 2019/20 to help businesses prepare for the first T Level students in 2020. It was extended in 2020/21 to the East of England and Yorkshire and Humber.

Researchers noted that the majority of the programme delivery was during a period of social distancing requirements brought about by Covid-19, adding that it is “difficult to fully understand how the programme would work in an environment when these restrictions were not in place”.

However, even accounting for the impact of the pandemic, the targets set for placements and spend “seemed to have overestimated employer need”, the report said.

It added: “In practice, providers felt that most of the employers they engage do not regard cost as a barrier to providing placements and therefore did not have a need for the grant.”

Researchers found examples of T Level providers being “hesitant” to use the £750 grants because of the “risk that some of the funding could be claimed back, and also because of a lack of awareness of how the programme could be used”.

As expected, it was mostly smaller businesses that made use of the incentives. The report said over half of the employers were micro businesses (those with fewer than 10 staff) and a further quarter were small businesses (between 10 and 49 staff).

The funding limit of £750 per placement was “broadly suitable”. Researchers found the only time the placements exceeded £750 was when it was used to purchase expensive IT equipment such as laptops and even in these cases, employers were “generally willing to cover the additional costs, particularly as they mostly kept the equipment afterwards”.

Most employers found the funding “helpful in alleviating resource barriers to providing placements and in ensuring they could provide a meaningful learning experience for learners”, and a few also felt that it helped employer staff “justify providing placements to senior managers”.

But some stated they would have provided placements had they not received the funding.

The impact assessment of the programme did not find conclusive proof that the programme had increased the number of placements provided by providers, the report concluded.

It resonates with research from earlier this year that found just 7 per cent of employers who were not interested in offering T Level industry placements would change their mind with the offer of a £1,000 incentive payment.

Traineeships flop… AGAIN: Starts target missed by two thirds in 2021/22

The government missed its target of 43,000 traineeships by almost two thirds last year, new data has revealed.

Just 15,500 starts were recorded in 2021/22 – 36 per cent of the goal.

The figures, published by the Department for Education this morning, show that uptake on the pre-employment programme has even begun to decline despite huge investment from the Treasury.

The number of starts achieved last year was 11 per cent down on the 17,400 recorded in 2020/21.

Across both years then-chancellor Rishi Sunak pumped an additional £237 million into traineeships. This was made up of £111 million to “triple” the number of starts in 2020/21 – a target that was missed by half – and an extra £126 million in 2021/22.

Officials offered employers a £1,000 incentive in both years for each trainee they took on, and also ran a procurement to expand the traineeship provider market in an effort to ramp up starts.

Earlier this year FE Week revealed that more than half – £65 million – of the 2020/21 traineeships budget had to be handed back to the Treasury. A bigger underspend is now expected for 2021/22.

Introduced as a flagship pre-employability programme in 2013, traineeships are eligible for 16 to 24-year-olds and training providers are funded by the Education and Skills Funding Agency to deliver pre-employment training and arrange unpaid work placements from six weeks to one year, although most last for less than six months.

But traineeship starts have been on a rapid decline, from a high of 24,100 in 2015/16 down to just 12,100 in 2019/20.

Ministers saw traineeships as a good route to help get young people back into training and work after the Covid-19 pandemic and decided to back the programme with more funding.

Officials have made numerous pleas with traineeship providers to rapidly boost their recruitment over the past two years.

But providers have often warned that the lack of learner incentive means that traineeships are currently limited to those willing and able to take on a placement without getting paid.

Others have other government programmes that do offer payment, like Kickstart and apprenticeships, displaced traineeships.

Association of Employment and Learning Providers chief executive Jane Hickie said: “It’s important to recognise that the additional financial support for traineeships was provided against a backdrop of an expected surge in pandemic related unemployment, which thankfully was not bad as expected. There is no doubt though that Kickstart – with its financial incentive for the young person – made traineeships considerably less attractive for the individual. 

“Whilst demand for traineeships from employers remains strong, the lack of financial support for trainees themselves remains critical – AELP believe that the traineeship underspend should be used to support individual through a training allowance on what is still a very effective programme.”

Today’s data shows that of the 17,400 traineeships started in the 2020/21 academic year, three quarters completed their programme and a fifth moved onto an apprenticeship.

Four priorities to tackle green industry’s diversity problem

With the COP27 climate summit finishing last Friday and the new Prime Minister’s first economic statement reaffirming the UK’s commitment to tackling climate change, this is the perfect time for us all to consider role in building a greener future. Unfortunately, the environmental sector’s diversity is currently one of the worst in the economy. If this doesn’t change, many of the young people who could play a leading role in tackling the climate crisis will be shut out of opportunities in the green sector.

Many parts of the nature sector have a rapidly ageing workforce, with almost half of parks staff aged over 50, so young people are desperately needed. And young people from ethnic minorities, those who are disabled and those from low-income backgrounds are all under-represented in these roles at the moment. Just 4.8 per cent of environment professionals identify as Black, Asian or minority ethnic, compared with 12.6 per cent across all professions. Meanwhile, 57 per cent of disabled people feel excluded from being able to reduce their environmental impact and disabled people are less likely to be employed than non-disabled people.

And our own research shows that young people from low-income backgrounds sometimes feel that green jobs aren’t for them or don’t know where to find them. Requirements for higher education qualifications can put people without degrees off from pursuing careers in the nature sector.

Positively, green employers are increasingly recognising the problem and taking steps to tackle it. But this isn’t a problem industry can solve alone, and further education and skills settings can play a crucial role in helping the sector diversify its workforce. Doing so will benefit learners as well as the planet and deliver on the ambitions of the department for education’s sustainability and climate change strategy.

Groundwork’s Growing Green Careers report set out four priorities and the further education and skills sector can play its part in each of them:

Making every job green

Achieving net zero will require changes across every sector, so knowledge about environmental issues is relevant to every learner no matter what course they are enrolled on. The further education sector should think of sustainability as the fourth functional skill, as essential as literacy, numeracy and digital. Green skills and knowledge should be embedded in the curriculum, operations and through carbon literacy qualifications for staff and learners.

Accessible pathways into entry-level green roles

Through high-quality careers advice, further education settings can share opportunities like the New to Nature programme with their learners, through which young people aged 18 to 25 are given new, full-time, temporary work placements in nature and landscape organisations across the UK.

Organisations like Groundwork are working to expand opportunities like this through a Youth Environmental Service. On a local level, colleges can work with green employers to create green apprenticeships.  

Increasing diversity in green careers

The learners who engage in further education are often exactly those who are under-represented in the environmental sector. Through their curriculum and careers advice, colleges can break down stereotypes and help people to grow their careers in green jobs.

It’s vital that we inspire and show that jobs in the environmental sector are both worthwhile and achievable, ending the misconception that green jobs are only reserved for a particular demographic.

Helping places to thrive

Colleges and other further education settings can show local leadership when it comes to sustainable practices. Working with local green employers to grow the skills base in their area could have a huge impact on combatting the current skills shortages across the environmental sector and ‘levelling up’ local places.

If the further education and environmental sectors work together on each of these priorities, we will forge a greener and more prosperous future for individuals, communities, and the planet. Let’s not miss the opportunity.

Net zero: Small steps with apprentices drive big changes

Green Skills? Low Carbon? Sustainability? Net zero?

We all know how we can make a positive impact on the environment, don’t we? I mean, when was the last time you printed out an email!? That’s another tree saved. Small steps can have a big impact on reducing our overall carbon footprint.

But of course, there are big changes to make, with big stakes at play. With ever increasing focus on the green agenda and the need to fix the planet for us and future generations, supporting our learners into sustainable jobs is high on our agenda.

Working across different boroughs in London and Kent, the Forward Trust Employment Services team is supporting participants returning to the job market, and one of our core activities is to help individuals to really understand what green skills are, and how they too can be involved and not feel left behind in this growing sector.

And through our work with some amazing employers and local authorities, we are looking at greener employment options for participants and developing a growing offer of good jobs with good progression as well as real solutions for sustainability.

But what does this really mean?

Personal responsibility

The first small step towards engagement with sustainability is always a personal one, so as part of their employability learning and readiness for job application and interview, we’re encouraging participants to reflect on what they can do to lower their own carbon footprint. Tutors use online tools with participants to measure their carbon impact and how they could potentially reduce this.

It’s a great discussion piece, but it also gets some positive thinking going around the current cost-of-living crisis. Any quick win to save energy and money is also a quick win for the environment.

We also encourage and support all our participants to make a green pledge while they are in the classroom. Getting them to commit to doing that ‘one thing’ to make a difference has seen them take the lead on a number of initiatives, including:

  • Reducing their need for single-use plastics, from water bottles to plastic-wrapped fruit
  • Reducing their dependence on fast fashion by recycling clothing and using online platforms to sell their unwanted items
  • Reducing water consumption at home and at work throughout the year (and not just to avoid a summer hosepipe ban)

Unsurprisingly perhaps, turning down the thermostat has never been such a hot topic of conversation (if you’ll excuse the pun).

The big picture

Having ‘green’ conversations with our participants has really increased awareness. It has also opened up opportunities they perhaps previously might not have been so aware of, or indeed have thought were not for them.

Working with different employers, we are preparing participants to better understand how sustainability is impacting job offer across different sectors, while promoting better progression opportunities and choice. These include diverse opportunities in sectors such as environmental charities, construction and the built environment, in-house environmental activities, production of renewable energy, and recycling, waste, wastewater and water quantity management.

And given the sustainability sector’s lack of diversity, we know that anything we can do to raise awareness, lift aspirations and include the marginalised members of our communities to join the sustainability movement can only be a good thing.

At the Forward Trust, we have developed flexible working arrangements with hybrid working patterns that work for the teams and the participants we support, and we encourage others to do the same. These can reduce carbon footprint, while making work more accessible to often-excluded groups.

Engaging with employers who are open to embracing the sustainability agenda broadens the scope and offer of job opportunities available to our participants. It’s a win-win situation: better employers, better jobs, with better opportunities having a positive impact on the environment and the lives of those we support.

These are small steps towards driving a an agenda of global importance. But the great thing about small steps is: they leave smaller footprints.

Net zero: level 2 qualifications are crucial to green skills

With the calls of climate emergency sounding loudly from COP27, government and citizens need to act urgently if we are to meet the UK’s net zero commitments. 

However, the transition to net zero will only be possible with a skilled “green” UK workforce to build, operate and maintain the necessary assets for energy, retrofit and carbon capture, as well as related infrastructure in the logistics, utilities and transportation industries. While the UK has strong engineering, science and technology skills to support the drive to net zero, it lacks enough people, particularly within the operational workforce and mainly at level 2, to build, operate and maintain “green” physical environmental assets.

There is also confusion about what is meant by “green skills” and what these mean at a practical level for technical and vocational education.

To resolve these key issues, there is an urgent need for collaboration between employers, training providers, awarding organisations, manufacturers, trade unions and all the industry bodies such as CITB and ECITB on a co-ordinated five to ten-year programme to meet our commitments.

Collaboration on green skills is happening on a local level through green skill bootcamps, for example, where employers, training providers and awarding organisations work together, funded and guided by government policy. 

Exeter College’s green construction skills bootcamps are a case in point, designed in collaboration with local building and house construction businesses, and supported by local authorities, charities and training providers across the south west. Funded by the Department for Education’s national skills fund, the bootcamps offer hands-on training for domestic retrofit, resulting in a NOCN level 2 award in domestic retrofit.

Most retraining will not be as large courses like apprenticeships and T levels

Central government needs to own the governance of the skills system and work in collaboration with the devolved governments and local combined authorities to set the framework, enabling awarding organisations to build training programmes for local provider delivery. 

The green jobs taskforce made a start, outlining the challenge in its 2021 report, but there is little evidence of any urgency in next steps or in wider collaboration to build a green skills framework for career pathways. Yet within each industry there are strong links, and these could be quickly integrated with the taskforce to create industry-appropriate frameworks.

Our new paper Greening the UK’s Skills, in conjunction with the British Association of Construction Heads (BACH), outlines the challenges we face and sets out the range of adapted and new skills the UK’s economy will urgently need over the next five to ten years if we are to be successful in reaching net zero.

We must, as a priority, invest in our tutors and assessors to deliver greening training. This will not be large courses like apprenticeships and T levels, but will be short modules of training, add-ons that could be funded through the levy or the adult education budget (AEB). The big opportunity is using these “greening” modules to upskill the 32.8m people in the workforce.

Some colleges may find this logistically difficult. The challenge for FE leaders is how to start delivering “greening” provision in 2023/24.

Welcoming the publication of the report, IfATE’s chief operating officer Robert Nitsch said:  “There can be no doubt that there is a need to re-orientate to green across the economy and that skills are an essential part of this.” He said that IfATE was “absolutely committed to ensuring that its apprenticeships and technical qualifications fully embrace sustainability priorities and is getting on with this work as a matter of urgency” and emphasised that everyone had a part in resolving what is a sizeable challenge.

The great risk facing the planet is climate change. If we are to successfully tackle this life-threatening challenge we must collaborate across government departments, industry and education to develop and build our green skills within the operational workforce, including – crucially – at level 2.

What’s stopping college campuses from going green?

To understand what is preventing further and higher education institutions from becoming green campuses, we gathered opinions from more than 130 FE and HE representatives and 1,000 16- to 19-year-olds planning on applying to college or university. We also spoke to universities and colleges at different stages of their green journey. 

Our research revealed that 2 in 5 (42%) FE and HE institutions are not confident or do not know whether they will meet the government’s goal of a 78 per cent reduction in emissions by 2035 compared to 1990 levels. 

That so many institutions predict falling short is worrying. They face issues in common and understanding these is key to supporting them. For 77%, finance is the primary barrier, while 42% struggle to deliver renewable energy campus-wide and almost a third (31 per cent) blame a resistance to change within the institution.

The technology doesn’t come cheap, and with college funding notoriously constrained over the past decade, FE needs to look at alternative capital options. Most public sector government incentives are aimed at social housing and local authorities but government support is available. There are also sustainable lending options and strategic advice from banks, including private placement funding, the public sector decarbonisation scheme grant and the green heat network fund.

These funding options may change if the ONS, as is widely expected, reclassifies colleges as public sector bodies. This will result in additional budgeting and consent requirements, complicating matters. Colleges will likely need to compete for funds with other parts of the public sector, making it even more important to develop a clear and compelling case for green investment.

There are very few carbon neutral or net-zero campuses

In our latest report, Building a Green Campus – what’s stopping institutions?, we explore further options for colleges including case studies of institutions that have delivered part of their green strategy using these devices. 

Deadlines loom but there are few easy-to-find examples of carbon neutral or net-zero campuses. Indeed, there isn’t even a standardised definition of a green campus. 

However we have developed a definition, and given the significant undertaking to achieve this status we have proposed a badge for ‘emerging green campuses’ in acknowledgement of those who are en route .

This formal recognition matters. Indeed, 79% of prospective students want institutions to have clear strategies for tackling climate change. But there’s a mismatch in priorities; less than half (48 per cent) of institutions think factoring climate change into decision making is important to prospective students. 

Our research also shows that solutions lie in cross-institutional activities such as leadership and management, teaching and learning, research and innovation, and services and facilities. In short, co-ordinating and implementing green campuses requires a common, cohesive goal for the whole institution. 

One campus making good progress on its net-zero journey is Gloucestershire College: in 2022, it converted its Gloucester and Cheltenham campuses to fully renewable energy. The campuses host 4,500 solar panels from which it plans to sell excess energy back to the grid. With battery storage also on campus, the college is able to purchase cheap power to hold in reserve when daylight hours are shorter or during peak times. The project is expected to have paid for itself in about six years. 

Sustainability targets cannot be achieved overnight. Transparency and collaboration within and between institutions and partners such as lenders, lawyers and consultants could be the key to unlocking the sector’s potential for green campuses.

But to make a real difference, sustainability cannot simply be delegated to estates or sustainability managers. It must run through every aspect of strategy, and its appeal to young people can be just the incentive to put it there.

Decreasing level 2 opportunities compromises levelling up

At a recent roundtable discussion hosted by the Association of Employment and Learning Providers (AELP) in partnership with Qube Learning, my co-panellists and I discussed how decreasing opportunities for level 2 candidates in further education will compromise the levelling up agenda and force some learning providers to close due to funding shortages and poor policy making.

The discussion, chaired by AELP’s director of policy, Simon Ashworth and including employer representatives from the healthcare and retail sectors, highlighted the extent to which funding cuts, functional skills grade requirements and lack of flexibility will also impact on staff retention.

That the government has remained committed to boosting apprenticeship achievement rates to 67 per cent by 2025 is to be welcomed. However, the cut in level 2 opportunities is a serious setback and will totally undermine this goal.

The withdrawal of this funding is undoubtedly an increasing concern: many employers rely heavily on the apprenticeship levy, so any reductions or removal would place participating businesses and the apprenticeships they offer in jeopardy.

The continuing squeeze on funding and the government’s view of level 2 provision need further attention to ensure learners and employers are offered the right choice of programmes. While we are not against devolution, higher level or degree apprenticeships, there must be a clear pathway to allow all learners to progress in their education and career and to access these routes.

Qube Learning has used single units funded through the adult education budget to allow employers to meet their priorities and help get people into work, with very high achievement rates. However, last summer many of these units were no longer funded impacting on delivery for the initial two months of this contract year.

Many school leavers now lack the skills for a level 3 apprenticeship

Everyone on the panel agreed wholeheartedly that many school leavers are now leaving secondary education with lower-level qualifications and lacking the skills needed to be accepted on a level 3 apprenticeship. This highlights even further the need for level 2 placements, without which a vital pathway to career progression can be closed.

Maths in particular has become a real challenge, because it is not currently being tailored to the apprentice roles which candidates are applying for. This means that if some employers remove level 2 apprentices altogether, then many school leavers will be locked out of careers that they could have excelled in.

Meanwhile, the current economic climate means employers are understandably even more preoccupied with costs and budgets. This means it is all the more imperative that we are able to meet candidates where they are and progress them from there.

But even among those who are able to start at level 3, doing so without the basic skills covered at level 2 only creates a greater risk of dropping out. So not only are employers essentially being forced to reduce (or even totally remove) level 2 apprenticeships because funding has either been withdrawn or is too opaque to access, but the policy is bound to increase risk-averse decisions about who is accepted at level 3.

Non-regulated provision and single-unit funding gave providers the opportunity to agree the types of people, skills and knowledge they needed with employers, and we saw a greater return on achievement as a result. 

So the problem is not solely lack of provision at level 2, but the policy around it. For example, reductions to funding bands have a knock-on effect for other issues such as end-point assessment charges. Where funding bands have been reduced, some providers have gone out of business.

Last week’s autumn statement had precious little to offer the further education and skills sector, but levelling up remains a priority. A transformation of jobs and skills is evidently a central aspiration for Rishi Sunak and Jeremy Hunt.

To deliver that promise, this new government must seriously reconsider the lack of funding and provision for level 2 apprenticeships and streamline the policy surrounding them.

This isn’t just a question of avoiding damage to their own political vision and agenda. More importantly, it’s an urgent matter of insulating young learners from the life-limiting damage of becoming NEET and of protecting the economy from more damage from skills shortages and unemployment.

Autumn statement: pro-growth must mean pro-further education

As the cost-of-living crisis has gathered pace, affecting homes and businesses alike, all eyes have been on government for support and solutions. Yet the commitment to a further £2.3 billion for schools in 2023 and 2024 was one of only a few bright spots to come out of the autumn statement.

Schools are the crucial foundations of essential, academic, practical and lifelong learning; they provide the socialisation, civic responsibility and world knowledge every child needs. They build an infrastructure of knowledge, skills and behaviour, so that when a learner is preparing for their next steps, they have had the best start possible. Our schools do amazing work and have been under-funded for many years.

I fully concur with Mr Hunt: ‘pro-education is pro-growth’. The best teaching, learning and experiences are essential to ensuring that we have a workforce ready and able to take on the roles of the future, taking us out of recession and ushering in a return to economic growth.

But with no mention of skills or colleges in the announcements, how will we ensure young people and adults have the highest quality technical and vocational training to drive productivity to that end?

Further education has benefitted from significant capital funding projects in the past few years – over £400 million’s worth – to ensure that fit-for-purpose buildings and modern learning facilities, in line with industry standards, are in place to deliver the newly introduced government T level qualifications, higher technical qualifications and apprenticeships. But while essential, a focus on buildings, resources and equipment simply isn’t enough.

Funding rates for 16- to 18-year-olds are 11 per cent lower than they were in 2010 and adult funding is half what it was ten years ago. Yet the costs of delivering have increased, and with inflation now clearing 11 per cent these will continue to soar. Bus trips, subsistence, materials, technology, resources – everything has gone up.

Delivery of economic growth comes at a cost and that cost is increasing

According to Julian Gravatt of the Association of Colleges, between 2015 and 2025 spending on schools will have grown by 51 per cent, higher education student outlays by 71 per cent, yet further education by 25 per cent. Over the same period inflation will have risen by 45 per cent.

Teesside, which my college group serves, is home to Europe’s largest brownfield site, ‘Teesworks’. A freeport with inward investors lining up and some breaking ground now, Teesworks is lined up to become a cradle for the UK’s renewable energy industries and technologies.

There are plans for the site to bring thousands of skilled jobs and regeneration to the area – precisely the ‘levelling up’ and opportunities for social mobility we all wish for. So it’s vital, alongside this incredible repurposing of heritage industries, that skills and the successful colleges and providers which provide them are included in government investment plans.

I do not want to take anything away from the schools who so deserve the increase in funding that they have been allocated. And I am extremely grateful for the financial investment my college group has received in recent years from the government. But I would call upon the chancellor to reflect on the funding of further education.

It would be encouraging to see education discussed as a whole in such announcements, with a closer focus on the various learning provisions that make up our education system, and inclusion of further education as a separate entity.

Further education works with industry to build curriculum to deliver knowledge and skills aligned to the jobs of the future. We work with employers to ensure learners have access to the best work experience and industry placements to support them in developing the attitudes and behaviours of the workplace. And we work with other providers to ensure that the local offer is inclusive and fit for the demands of the local community.

Colleges, sixth forms and training providers collaborate to support the delivery of economic growth – but this comes at a cost, and that cost is increasing.

Pro-education is indeed pro-growth, but we must be pro-entire-education, ensuring there is a sustainable strategy for post-16 education through and beyond this recession.

Keegan boasts old FE funding boost in message to education sector

Gillian Keegan has rehashed the government’s previous skills investment pledges after FE was ignored in the chancellor’s education funding boost last week.

The education secretary wrote to the whole education sector today and claimed that Jeremy Hunt’s autumn statement “underlined the government’s commitment to education as he seeks to restore stability to the economy”.

Despite the autumn statement not mentioning the word “colleges” once, Keegan said it was “great to hear him [Hunt] acknowledge the massive contribution our heads, teachers and classroom assistants make to our national life and his statement reinforces our mission to drive up standards and give every child or learner an excellent education”.

The autumn statement announced that schools will receive £2 billion in extra funding in each of the next two years, which is the “biggest injection of funding ever”, allows schools to return to at least 2010 levels in real terms, and is “what the sector said it needed”.

The only announcement for FE was the appointment of Sir Michael Barber as a new adviser to the government on skills.

Keegan offered no explanation as to why FE and skills received no additional funding like schools.

Instead, she reminded the sector today: “We are already investing an additional £3.8 billion in skills in England over this Parliament, including high-quality technical education for 16 to 19-year-olds and boosting opportunities for adults to upskill.”

She added that the nation currently has 1,255,000 vacancies, so “we need to upskill, train and retrain to ensure business needs are met and more people realise their potential”, adding that reforms including T Levels, higher technical qualifications, skills bootcamps and degree apprenticeships are all being rolled out to this effect.

Keegan said the lifelong loan entitlement, set to be introduced from 2025, will also “mark a profound shift in the way students of all ages can obtain funding for further and higher education”.

She concluded: “I would like to echo the chancellor’s comments and thank all of you, across the education sectors, for your tremendous efforts. His comments underline our belief that education is an engine of growth and social change.”

Read Keegan’s message to the sector in full here.