Let’s talk about SAKS: Provider scores top Ofsted marks

A hairdressing training provider has retained its ‘outstanding’ rating from Ofsted after a 15-year inspection hiatus.

SAKS (Education) Limited, which has 434 learners studying various hairdressing and barbering apprenticeships at level 2 and 3, was awarded a grade one in every area of its
October inspection.

The report, published on Tuesday, commends educators as “open, friendly and welcoming,” and for “celebrating apprentices’ strengths and supporting them to be resilient in the face of challenges they face,” including Covid-19.

Founded in 1999, SAKS was last inspected in 2006 by the Adult Learning Inspectorate (ALI) – which was absorbed by Ofsted in 2007.

Grade one education providers are being inspected this term for the first time since 2010, after an exemption was removed last year.

Inspectors compliment employer involvement, educators, and governance

Ofsted said SAKS’ educators and leaders work “very effectively and closely” with employers to plan the curriculum, which ensures apprentices develop skills they need and in the right order.

If apprentices do not develop the skills they need rapidly enough, teaching plans are adjusted with employers to help learners catch up.

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“Highly experienced” teaching staff keep up to date thanks to frequent training provided by leaders, by updating their product knowledge and by gaining other qualifications.

The workforce is supported “exceptionally well,” with leaders managing staff with compassion and ensuring they are not overloaded with work or have unmanageable caseloads.

Apprentices report feeling safe and that they know how to recognise risks and report concerns. Social media groups have weekly ‘hot topic’ discussions among apprentices, which focus on everyday issues such as the recent spate of drink-spiking incidents.

Inspectors also highlighted the provider’s “highly effective” governance, led by SAKS Education chair and former Ofsted and AIL inspector Phil Hatton.

“Board members share the ambition and vision of leaders to provide high-quality apprenticeships” and “regularly” challenge and support leaders to ensure “continuous improvement”.

Ofsted grade ‘a real credit to our apprentices and educators,’ boss says

SAKS currently delivers from academies based in Darlington and Maidstone as well in employers’ workplaces.

Tina Ockerby, managing director of the Darlington-based independent provider, called the grade one “a real credit to our apprentices and educators – and of course the salons across the UK who support their learners so wholeheartedly”.

She added that the provider knew it had to make a “huge effort” when coronavirus struck in order not to lose apprentices during lockdown, and a remote learning survey of apprentices gave SAKS a rating of 4.5 out of 5.

Phil Hatton called the provider “the best I have ever seen for self-assessment, quality improvement, professional development of staff, support for apprentices, safeguarding and the focus that all have on developing practical skills.

“I am proud to be associated with them and what they do so well.”

Pictured top (left to right): Sukye Bass, academy hairdressing educator; Eve Lofthouse, hairdressing at Number 4; Tina Ockerby, managing director, Saks Apprenticeships, Conner Heaney, Saks Middlesbrough

Moulton rises from the ashes: College climbs out of ‘inadequate’

The staff of a land-based college received an early Christmas present this week after bouncing from double Ofsted ‘inadequate’ results to ‘good’.

Moulton College has announced plans to restart apprenticeships and aims to score an ‘outstanding’ rating at its next inspection after receiving the grade two on Monday.

The Northamptonshire college, which was ‘outstanding’ in 2008, was slapped with a grade four in 2018 and again in 2019.

It was also placed into financial intervention following a report by then-FE Commissioner Richard Atkins in April 2018.

Corrie Harris, Moulton’s principal, credited this week’s result to her “amazing team”: “They have massively pulled together, and they’ve got a huge can-do attitude.”

The current FE Commissioner, Shelagh Legrave, commended the college on Twitter, posting: “Many congratulations to Moulton College on achieving good from Ofsted. A great achievement which Corrie Harris, governors and staff should be rightly proud of.”

The grade four reports, which included findings such as Moulton’s equine studies and sport teachers paying “insufficient attention to health and safety practice”, were “horrible” for staff, Harris said.

“I can’t begin to tell you how difficult it is. They feel like it’s a slur and that they’re not good enough.”

When she announced the grade two to about 200 staff, she saw “grown men crying because it’s not just a relief, they get their pride back”.

Some staff had been at the college for 20 years and always knew ”that with the right leadership and support” they could get back to results like the 2008 ‘outstanding’ rating, she said.

College strove to improve CPD and curriculum structure

Harris says the improvement on the grade four began before she joined in July 2019.

She credited it to having the right culture, introduced through new procedures and much wider use of staff training.

Both the 2018 and 2019 reports called on the college to improve teacher training.

The latest report notes how leaders “have developed suitable plans to help staff improve their teaching skills”, including training for new lecturers and opportunities for professional development.

Harris put this down to having “great coaches, a great director of teaching and learning, and a great quality director all led by the vice principal”.

As well as doing “lots” of internal CPD, the college brought in a former Ofsted inspector to train staff.

Teacher turnover has gone from 50 per cent when Harris started to just 9 per cent.

The college has also restructured its curriculum, which inspectors said contributed to an improvement in the quality of education.

Staff also now use labour market intelligence and a vector tool, which plots where all students are going to identify gaps in the labour market.

Harris said the process is so good, “we’ve now shared it with other colleges”.

However, Ofsted days attendance still needs to improve, “Leaders and managers have not yet ensured that all learners attend their classes at consistently high rates.”

Harris hit back at what she thought was the watchdog “clutching at straws a little bit”, as attendance was at 90 per cent.

‘Foot firmly on the pedal’ towards Ofsted grade one

Inspectors told her that with “a couple of little tweaks” the college would have been given an ‘outstanding’ for the leadership and management theme.

Asked whether aiming for grade one at its next inspection was realistic, when others had
lost that grade under the new inspection framework, Harris called it a matter of “foot firmly on the pedal”.

The grade four meant the college had to stop providing apprenticeships, which she said was a “bugbear” as there were “pockets” of “fantastic” provision in areas such as civil engineering.

But with a grade two, Moulton is looking to restart apprenticeships in construction – “because there’s a huge need” – and land-based sectors – “because nobody else can do them” in the county.

Harris expects her college to come out of intervention this year and for it to generate a small financial surplus in 2021-22, after a £6.5 million deficit in 2019-20.

Shrewsbury Colleges Group is currently the only grade four college in England.

New DfE skills board: scanty minutes lead to ‘closed shop’ accusations

The Department for Education has been accused of turning its skills and productivity board into a “closed shop” after publishing fewer than two pages of minutes for each of their meetings.

Details from seven meetings of the group of experts, stretching from December 2020 to September 2021, were recently and quietly published by the DfE.

But each set of minutes runs for just a couple of pages each, with most of the first page taken up with a list of who had attended the meetings.

Agenda items are covered in as little as two lines of text.

Minutes from a meeting in August revealed a discussion was held on how the skills system promotes productivity in areas that are underperforming economically, but simply states: “Board members provided updates on the four research proposals agreed under question 3. All leads shared high-level research plans with the secretariat.”

A member of the board, who was previously sworn to secrecy about the board’s work, admitted the minutes are “very brief” but insisted their work will help improve the design and planning of FE provision.

A meeting from this January, the only one attended by an education secretary, revealed the following about a discussion between then-minister Gavin Williamson and board members: “The secretary of state for education shared his priorities for skills reform and expressed his enthusiasm for the board’s work. Board members engaged in Q&A with the secretary of state.”

‘DfE’s work ought to be open to scrutiny, not a closed shop’

After being shown the minutes by FE Week, chair of the Commons education select committee Robert Halfon demanded the board “publish more detailed minutes” as the public “should be able to access proper records of the advice and evidence that is being passed on to ministers and informing their decisions.

“Education for adults will be absolutely fundamental to driving our economy and enabling people throughout our country to live fulfilling lives,” he said.

“Therefore, the department’s work in this sector ought to be open to scrutiny, not a closed shop.”

The board was commissioned by Williamson in October 2020, with six top researchers led by a chair from industry to provide independent advice on how courses and qualifications should align to the skills employers need following Covid-19.

So far it has had two chairs: Stephen van Rooyen from Sky, who left after a year in post due to “family reasons”, and was replaced in August by Siemens’ Angela Noon.

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Van Rooyen and Noon

FE Week reported in October how, a year on from the board being set up, it had yet to publish any minutes.

The DfE previously came under fire for how sluggishly it published board minutes: a drop of seven sets of minutes in August 2020 were the first to be released since February 2018.

A report published last month by the cross-party Lords Youth Unemployment Committee called on the department to make public the skills board’s findings and annually publish data on skills gaps.

Speaking about this latest release, committee chair and Liberal Democrat peer Lord Shipley called it “very surprising that minutes of meetings are so incomplete”.

A DfE spokesperson said: “The published minutes reflect the issues being discussed by the board, and all products from the board’s work will be published in the spring.”

‘We need to stop fixating about qualifications,’ says board member

Board member and Oxford University emeritus professor in education Ewart Keep told FE Week a “fundamental problem” with the board is its name, which he argues implies they are a policy body that makes “huge decisions and what not,” rather than a research body.

“Most of what we discuss is actually really rather minute technical stuff.”

Having read the minutes, Keep said they are “very brief” but he certified there was nothing missing.

One of the board’s key findings so far, he said, was that the country has a “reasonably good understanding” of its stock of qualifications, but not of what skills are in the labour market.

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Ewart Keep

This is because people may attain a qualification and then go on to complete more, uncertified training during their careers.

As such, Keep believes, “we need to stop fixating about qualifications,” which cannot be “the sole analytical frame” for working out skills shortages.

Through the board, he had also found soft skills, such as communication and team and project management, are in “short supply… More and more employers are asking for more of them at a higher level, so ultimately, it’s important those skills are embedded in both qualifications and teaching.”

Asked how the board’s work will impact on the sector, he answered that the “quality of labour market information, which will help course planning and course design, will improve”.

This will be through “finely grained indicators” on future skills demand, which will inform student numbers, what sectors are most in need, and what each qualification will be required to do.

Top university places up 28% after record A-level results

The number of places offered by top universities has soared by almost a third in two years, after A-level results hit a record high.

The increase at the most competitive universities comes after two years of teacher-assessed grades sparked grade inflation.

Data from the Universities and Colleges Admissions Service (UCAS) shows 103,010 young people secured places at “higher tariff” universities – which have stricter academic entrance criteria – at the end of the 2021 admissions cycle.

This is yet more evidence that the value of HE has never been so treasured

It marks an 11 per cent increase on the 92,650 accepted in 2020, and a 28 per cent rise on the 80,380 accepted before the pandemic in 2019.

The increase over the past year significantly exceeds the 3 per cent rise in the size of the 18-year-old population.

UCAS said its new figures revealed the most detailed insight yet into the impact of awarding grades based on teachers’ assessments after Covid forced exam cancellations.

It noted the number of applicants who had achieved three A* or equivalent grades at A-level, at 19,595, had almost doubled on 2020 levels and almost quadrupled on 2019 levels.

University ‘flexibility’ praised

Clare Marchant, the service’s chief executive, said thousands more students were benefiting as their “hard work throughout the pandemic has been rightly recognised” by teacher assessments.

The “flexibility shown by universities and colleges” had also boosted numbers, particularly at the most competitive institutions, she added.

Many other high-achieving students were also choosing to reapply in the current admissions cycle.

Marchant has previously highlighted the “squeeze on available places”, particularly for competitive courses, amid increased demand and continued growth in the number of 18-year-olds.

Some Oxbridge colleges slashed offer numbers by as much as 15 per cent to avoid an admissions bulge this year.

Nick Hillman, director of the Higher Education Policy Institute, said it was “yet more evidence that the huge value of higher education has never been so treasured as it has been during the pandemic”.

But he said universities needed to be careful that they did not expand so fast that their student experience suffered.

Story by Tom Belger

A class of their own: The school that enrolled one T Level student

A school handed £1.2 million for a new six-classroom, purpose-built block to teach the government’s flagship T Levels has recruited just one student, FE Week can reveal.

Salesian School, in Surrey, began delivering the education and childcare route this September after a one-year deferral that was blamed on Covid-19. It planned to recruit 15 learners.

But the school struggled to sell the technical course to students who opted to stick with “qualifications that they know”, such as A-levels, because universities and employers “better understand” them.

The school, which completed its new T Level block last summer, is now delivering one-to-one tuition to just one learner as a result.

The government has committed £183 million in T Level capital funding for providers for buildings and equipment to help deliver the new qualifications.

Painsley Catholic College, in Staffordshire, has built a £1 million hub intended for exclusive digital T Level use, including “state-of-the-art learning pods”.

It aimed to recruit eight students this year – but only two signed up. Both providers said some rooms were now temporarily being used for other courses.

Rules on the grant funding require providers to deliver T Levels for two decades. The DfE can reclaim funding if courses cease, or if funding is used for other purposes.

Salesian executive headteacher James Kibble said: “We believe that T Levels offer a real opportunity, so decided that the best way for us to overcome the perceived barriers was to start to deliver them.”

While he said it was a “positive addition” to student options, he admitted students “feel they know very little” about them.

On the sole pupil being recruited, he added: “This is not viable for any more than a short period of time, but the potential longer-term benefits of offering this qualification make this is a strategic investment.”

Adam Reynolds, computer science head and T Levels lead at Painsley, said it was doing “everything we can” to promote courses. But he added: “There needs to be a massive drive from government to raise awareness.”

Government has already run an initial £3 million marketing campaign. Education secretary Nadhim Zahawi has more recently vowed to make T Levels “as famous as A-levels” by the next election.

But Reynolds warned many pupils do not want to put “all their eggs in one basket”. T Levels are the equivalent of three A-levels, in one subject.

Not being able to study science or maths alongside digital courses was a “nightmare” as students “instantly get switched off”, Reynolds added. Leaving one-third of each course for other subjects would make them “more appealing”.

Kibble agreed most students wanted to study T Levels alongside other qualifications. “It’s a pity it has to be all or nothing.”

Ofqual chief regulator Jo Saxton also said last month she would prefer T Levels to be slimmed down so students can study another qualification alongside it.

Tom Richmond, a former Department for Education special adviser turned director of think-tank EDSK, said tiny cohort sizes in some institutions were “almost an inevitability”.

“It was perfectly sensible for the DfE to push capital investment towards T Level providers, given the focus on meeting employer needs, but it was always going to be difficult to convince learners and parents to take a chance on an untried and untested qualification,” he told FE Week.

A DfE spokesperson promised to work with providers that have not hit their student target numbers to “ensure successful long-term success” of T Levels.

T Levels: 9 in 10 providers miss enrolment targets

Nine in ten T Level providers missed their recruitment targets this year, with digital and the new health and science routes proving most difficult to sell to students.

An FE Week investigation has also found colleges deferring their delivery due to a complete lack of student appetite and employers refusing to offer 315-hour industry placements.

In some cases, students opted for alternative BTECs during their T Level enrolment due to the placements shortage and because the applied general qualifications provide a “broader based experience”.

In one school, just one T Level student was enrolled (click here for full story).

The findings come as ministers continue to water down T Level policy. In recent months they have ruled that a chunk of the mandatory industry placement can be carried out remotely for the first two waves, offered employers £1,000 cash incentives to take on students, and removed the English and maths exit requirement for the qualifications.

It also comes in the midst of the government’s level 3 reforms, which controversially involve defunding many of the alternative BTECs that overlap with T Levels.

Experts say FE Week’s new findings were “entirely predictable” but warn that any further relaxing of policy to combat recruitment problems would risk weakening the government’s own justification for T Level reform.

The Department for Education insisted that T Levels are “off to a great start” in the face of the challenges presented by Covid-19 and continued to blame the pandemic for the placements shortage.

‘Compulsory placements could end up causing significant issues’

The first ever T Levels – described by ministers as the “gold standard” in technical education, to sit alongside their academic equivalent A-levels – launched in 2020 in three sectors: construction, digital and education and childcare. Around 1,300 students enrolled on them last year.

Health and science was added as an option in 2021.

In the first analysis of wave two recruitment, FE Week asked each of the 105 colleges, providers and schools listed to teach the qualifications in 2021/22 how many learners they managed to recruit against their targets.

Sixty-six were able to provide breakdowns. Between them, they set an overall target of recruiting 5,360 students but enrolled 3,783 (70 per cent).

The government claws back funding from providers if they fail to hit 40 per cent of their total target numbers.

Of the 66 that provided figures to FE Week, nine providers were below the 40 per cent threshold.

Just seven hit or exceeded their enrolment target. A total of 59 failed to hit their recruitment goals.

Colleges, providers and schools found construction the easiest subject to hit their targets – 862 enrolled against an aim of 1,031 (84 per cent). Education and childcare attracted 1,049 learners against a target of 1,289 (81 per cent).

Digital again proved tough to sell to students – 875 students were recruited compared to the 1,343 planned (65 per cent).

But it was health and science where providers struggled most, as 1,058 students were taken on against a target on 1,817 (58 per cent).

Three colleges that planned to deliver this new route had no students sign up to them.

One of them, Harlow College, said the biggest barrier was the mandatory industry placement. Science laboratories, for example, are “very difficult” to secure due to the age of the learners and the skill level required to be “safe and effective” within this environment, according to assistant principal Becky Jones.

NCFE, the awarding body that designed the health and science route, said the new qualification “needs to be given time to properly embed into post-16 education”.

But Tom Richmond, a former DfE special adviser and now director of think-tank EDSK, pointed out that the DfE’s own research in 2018 showed that securing T Level work placements for unqualified students would be “inappropriate or legally impossible in some safety-critical sectors”.

The same research also found that many employers had already reached “saturation point” in terms of having enough time for supervising and overseeing young learners.

FE Week’s new findings “demonstrate why the laudable ambition of compulsory placements could end up causing significant issues for the T Level programme,” Richmond said.

Multiple colleges told FE Week that student confidence in taking T Levels was significantly reduced where universities are not listing them on their websites as valid entry qualifications.

Leaders also said the specialist nature of the T Levels means that it is “progression limiting” for students.

There will be 11 T Level routes when they are fully rolled out in 2023, of which there are 23 technical qualifications to choose from.

Priestley College, in Warrington, which is delivering the education and childcare, digital and health and science T Levels, missed its overall enrolment target by 69 per cent. A spokesperson said the occupational specialisms in T Levels are “too narrow for students who want to keep their options open about their future career”.

Heart of Worcestershire College had planned to deliver the education and childcare and digital routes this year but deferred until 2022 due to a lack of demand. A “small number” of late applicants did come in but they decided to move to an alternative BTEC pathway instead.

A spokesperson for the college said, given the pandemic, it was “understandable as to why so many students were reticent on choosing such specific pathways, as those covered by T Levels, and therefore chose to progress via other vocational and advanced level options”.  

Jones added that other existing vocational and technical qualifications offer a “broader-based experience that allows students to decide over two years the more specialist direction they wish to take either through employment, university or an apprenticeship”.

Numerous colleges told FE Week that the pandemic limited access to school-leavers who are “still some way off having a good understanding” of the qualifications despite a £3 million national marketing campaign launched by the government in 2019.

A spokesperson from City College Norwich, which managed to hit 62 per cent of its planned enrolments across the four available routes, agreed that more needed to be done to raise the understanding of T Levels.

“We believe there is still more work to do with schools, young people, and their parents and carers, to help them understand T Levels, in particular that the occupational specialisms do not ‘limit’ future progression opportunities for apprenticeships, work or higher level study.”

‘A world-class technical education approach requires sticking rather than chopping and changing’

An FE Week investigation last year found that digital was the most difficult T Level route to sell to students. 

Our analysis of the second wave shows there were six colleges that planned to deliver digital in 2021 but failed to recruit any students.

Leaders said there was an issue with young people’s understanding of the careers available through a digital T Level, as well as a shortage of employers stepping up to offer industry placements.

The DfE claimed the majority of wave one and two students have secured their industry placements, but admitted there have been “some challenges” in securing them “as a result of Covid-19”.

“That is why we have introduced further temporary policy flexibilities,” a spokesperson said.

But Richmond warned the more the DfE relaxes the rules around the nature and form of work placements, the more they “weaken the justification for their own T Level reforms”.

Education secretary Nadhim Zahawi told FE Week last month he had seen evidence that there would be sufficient numbers of employers and placements available when T Levels are at full scale. The DfE has so far refused to share the evidence.

Jon Yates, who was a special adviser to then-education secretary Damian Hinds when he was developing T Level policy, said it was “surprising and very welcome” that ministers and colleges had stuck to the T Levels rollout in the face of the pandemic.

“Our young people deserve a world-class technical education approach and that requires sticking rather than chopping and changing,” he added.

The DfE said it will publish “high-level numbers” of T Level enrolments for all providers in their T Level action plan “very shortly”.

Revealed: Winners of the £34m HGV bootcamps tender

The Department for Education has selected 21 colleges and independent providers to deliver new lorry driver bootcamps, including eight which are yet to receive a full Ofsted inspection. 

A further three providers of the 16-week courses are rated ‘requires improvement,’ nine have a grade two and the final one, Weston College, holds an ‘outstanding’ grade.

Education secretary Nadhim Zahawi said heavy goods vehicle drivers are “vital to keeping this country moving”, so it was “brilliant to see the first people head towards new, well-paid careers in the industry”. 

The bootcamps, originally announced in September after retailers and businesses were hit by distribution issues, are intended to train 11,000 people to become drivers or gain additional qualifications. 

The first bootcamp graduates are expected as early as March 2022, though documents for the tender of these courses revealed new drivers can take up until November to finish their training. 

Bootcamps will ‘boost’ the logistics sector

Learners can acquire a range of HGV driving licences through the bootcamps, while existing drivers can achieve additional qualifications, which can allow them to transport dangerous goods such as fuel.

The DfE has also announced the Driver and Vehicle Standards Agency is expanding capacity to carry out 500 more HGV driving tests a week. 

Transport secretary Grant Shapps said the government has now introduced 32 actions to get more HGV drivers on the road and it was “good to see that these measures are clearly working, with the haulage industry reporting a significant increase in tests carried out and licenses issued. 

“Now these training camps will provide a further boost for the sector as we work together towards its recovery.” 

More than 2,000 people have expressed an interest in the bootcamps through the National Career Service and hundreds more have done so through Jobcentre and a helpline, the DfE has claimed. 

The programme is being backed with £34 million, a 240 per cent increase on the £10 million announced for the scheme in September. 

Anyone aged 19 or over who is employed, self-employed, has become unemployed in the past year, or is returning to work after a break can apply for a bootcamp. 

Learners need a full UK driving licence and the DfE has warned some providers will have additional eligibility criteria. 

New courses accompanied by AEB flexibilities

This is the latest in a wave of skills bootcamps which the DfE started piloting back in autumn 2020, ahead of its full roll-out earlier this year. 

A research report published in October revealed the government was in the dark about how many students from the first bootcamps secured a job or received a pay rise. 

Data released by the DfE today on outcomes for 2,210 adults who finished a bootcamp between September 2020 and March 2021 shows 54 per cent went on to a new or better job. However, the data also shows at least one in five participants dropped out during the programme. 

In addition to the HGV driver bootcamps, the DfE has introduced flexibilities for five driver courses funded by the adult education budget. 

An edit to the 2021-22 AEB funding rules released on Wednesday confirmed the DfE will fund, at a first attempt, the HGV licence as part of a programme of training, a mandatory medical examination costing £61 per learner, as well as, or instead of, an upgrade to a student’s licence, meaning they can drive heavier vehicles. 

FE Week has asked the DfE how much funding each provider has been allocated to run the bootcamps, but the department declined to release this information. 

The full list of providers

First look at skills bootcamp outcomes

The government’s flagship skills bootcamps failed to deliver improved employment outcomes to nearly half if its first cohort of learners, new figures reveal.

Outcome measures for the first wave of bootcamps released by the Department for Education today also show that at least one in five participants dropped out during the 16 week programme.

Of those that did complete, 54 per cent achieved a new or better job.

Outcomes have been reported by providers and cover the period September 2020 to March 2021.

As with a previous evaluation of the bootcamp programme, these new figures are also problematic. The Department admits that some providers “only submitted data for participants that completed a bootcamp”.

It’s therefore likely that the total number of participants on skills bootcamps is higher than the 2,800 reported, while the reported number of those that completed, 2,210 appears to be more reliable.

Skills bootcamps were announced in September 2020 and are a key pillar of the government’s national skills fund. They are also set to benefit from the Chancellor’s spending review boost to skills spending.

Today’s figures cover wave one of the bootcamps which were delivered by 48 providers, made of independent training providers, further education colleges, local enterprise partnerships, combined authorities and universities. 

Of the 2,210 participants that completed their bootcamp, 520 progressed to a new job, 410 gained increased responsibility in their current job, 170 gained new self-employment opportunities and 100 gained a new role with their existing employer.

Outcomes from wave 1 skills bootcamps completed between September 2020 and March 2021

Today’s figures did not break down bootcamp participation and outcomes by sector or provider. The programmes run for up to 16 weeks in priority sectors; construction, digital, green skills, rail and engineering and manufacturing. 

Simon Ashworth, director of policy at the Association of Employment and Learning Providers, said bootcamps “have fantastic potential” and attributed low employment outcomes to the way the data has been recorded.

“It’s important to recognise that this is still a new programme”, Ashworth told FE Week adding that “at this early stage there are positives, with just under 80 per cent of participants completing the programme”.

“Although job outcomes are lower than expected, it is likely that some positive outcomes have been missed due to the way data has been recorded. More accurate performance measures must be put in place before we cast judgement on the scheme’s overall merit.”

The DfE told FE Week they are working with providers on improving data returns, including linking payments to bootcamp providers more closely with outcomes.

Skills bootcamps are not subject to Ofsted inspections, however it was announced in September that inspectors will conduct a “thematic survey” on the quality of education and curriculum of skills bootcamps. 

The DfE said at the time that they could fall within scope for full inspections “if and when” they become a regular programme with regular funding.

The DfE has been approached for comment.

Ian Bauckham made permanent chair of Ofqual

Academy trust boss Ian Bauckham has been appointed as Ofqual’s permanent chair, the exams regulator has announced.

Bauckham, chief executive of the Tenax Schools Trust, has been the organisation’s interim chair for the past year, succeeding Roger Taylor who stepped down last December.

He will begin a three-year term as its permanent chair from next month.

Education secretary Nadhim Zahawi said Bauckham’s “extensive experience” of the education and qualifications system “means he is the ideal person to guide Ofqual through the critical work ahead”.