Level 3 clear-out: Hundreds of courses get fewer than 10 students

Simplifying post-16 study options by introducing V Levels will involve cutting funding for hundreds of qualifications with hardly any enrolments, data shows.

During a consultation into the new vocational qualifications, officials said having almost 900 level 3 vocational courses available to 16 to 19-year-olds was “confusing”.

But until now it was not known how unpopular some of these courses were.

In response to a freedom of information request, the Department for Education revealed to FE Week that 409 level 3 courses from a total of 872 attracted fewer than 10 students.

A further 321 courses attracted between 10 and 999 students during the 2022-23 academic year.

And just 96 of the 872 attracted between 1,000 and 40,000 enrolments each, which accounted for 85 per cent of the total.

The DfE also listed 46 qualifications that had no students, though 26 were alternative academic qualifications (AAQs) and technical occupation qualifications (TOQs), which had no enrolments because they were approved in the last two years.

AAQs and TOQs will also be defunded when V Levels are rolled out – despite their recent introduction.

Simplify the system

Reacting to the data, college leaders said they were doubtful that students were confused by the existence of 872 level 3 courses because each college only offers a “relatively small number” of qualifications.

And they added that the government’s plan to scrap “hugely popular” level 3 courses was more concerning.

In a consultation launched in October, ministers said they would simplify the system by removing funding for all existing diploma and extended diploma-sized qualifications of 720 guided learning hours and over in T Level subject areas during this year and 2027.

Skills minister Jacqui Smith has said the government’s consultation response, due in the coming weeks, would include a “plan about how we transition to an end state”.

She told FE Week: “We know that the number of post-16 qualifications on offer means lots of the available courses are not being widely taken up by students.

“The structure of the current system and limited comparability between qualifications also contributes to poorer outcomes for students and confusion for learners, parents and employers.

“As we announced in the skills white paper, we are committed to reforming the entire system to improve outcomes for young people, and drive quality and standards in post-16 education.”

The bigger picture

Concerns about the level 3 reforms have focused on a small group of 14 “popular, well-respected” qualifications studied by nearly 70,000 young people each year, which are due to be defunded by 2027 due to a T Level overlap.

St Charles Sixth Form principal Martin Twist told FE Week that the DfE’s apparent concern about the nearly 900 courses available “doesn’t reflect how the system actually operates”.

He said: “Colleges are not offering hundreds of courses to students. In practice, each college runs a relatively small number of vocational programmes with significant enrolments.

“The risk the government ought to be addressing is not how confusing the vocational curriculum is, it is how they will avoid creating a significant gap in provision whilst working to sensibly reform vocational provision.”

James Kewin, deputy chief executive of the Sixth Form Colleges Association which leads the Protect Student Choice campaign, accepted there was a need to “rationalise” the qualifications landscape.

However, he said it was “vital” to maintain funding for popular courses ahead of the launch of V Levels in 2027.

He added: “In practice, the choices that young people make are based on the qualifications offered by colleges and schools in their local area rather than the much bigger list of funded qualifications on the DfE website.”

‘Rich and varied’ options

Qualifications on the DfE’s list range from popular business and criminology courses to more niche certificates for skills such as equine management, food safety and cybersecurity.

WJEC’s applied diploma in criminology had the highest uptake, at 40,000 enrolments, while fewer than nine people signed up to any of the three yoga teaching qualifications available from awarding bodies YMCA, VTCT Skills and Focus Awards.

Awarding organisations told FE Week that some of the qualifications attracting only low enrolments had been designed in response to regional needs or specific industries such as maritime or logistics.

Heather Akehurst, chief executive of Open Awards, said the qualification market’s responsiveness meant the landscape is “rich and varied” but courses can fall out of favour.

She added: “Some qualifications are developed for very specific needs and that will mean they have low numbers but still add value.”

Hope of more cash to re-engage hard-to-reach youth

Cash to help students with additional needs find work could be handed to councils again after ministers suggested extending an employment training pilot programme for another year.

Long-awaited reforms to the SEND system this week revealed the government “intends” to continue the local authority pilot dedicated to helping 16 to 24-year-olds with complex needs but no EHCP into work.

The pilot is a strand of the Department for Education’s ‘Internships Work’ project, which launched in 2022 to improve access to employment for young people with SEND. 

The contract to run the project, worth £7.5 million in total, expires in March. But the SEND reform consultation hailed its “positive outcomes” and spoke of a 12-month extension.

Multiple local authorities had called for the scheme to be embedded into SEND education after exceeding their recruitment targets of young people at risk of becoming NEET.

The programme links young people with high needs with job coaches, structured support and unpaid work placements to transition them into paid employment, or other positive outcomes such as volunteering or further education.

Just under half (47 per cent) of the 240 participating young people found a paid job after completing the programme last year.

Enrolments more than doubled this year to 573, according to delivery organisation the National Development Team for Inclusion (NDTI).

Supported internships for SEND learners aged 16 to 24 with EHCPs had previously prompted concerns after FE Week revealed just one in four participants remained in employment one year after their placement.

NDTI handed out DfE-funded grants worth hundreds of thousands of pounds each to 12 local authorities during the first two years of the pilot, expanding to 16 this year.

The money pays for job coaches, learning support assistants and related provider costs. Several councils added literacy, numeracy and social skills support classes after finding most recruits were NEET before starting the programme.

Jasmine West, post-16 education and skills lead at Barnet Council, said: “These learners can be employable, but a lot have social, emotional, health problems and a lot of anxiety. Many haven’t left their bedrooms for months, even years.”

She added that the pilot filled a gap for young people who did not have a formal disability diagnosis but required help with employability, social and mental health skills.

Barnet Council only got involved in October and has funding until July to recruit 25 people, but West said demand was “already there” to exceed the target.

Colleges face new legal duties through SEND overhaul

Chester West and Chester Council has had 87 starts on programme since October, surpassing its 60-person target. Four in 10 have been placed into paid work, while a fifth have re-engaged with education.

The council launched a gym-based pilot, where qualified personal trainers mentored the interns and delivered employability skills in a gym setting to target disengaged young people. 

“We’ve proven we can get those hard-to-reach people engaging,” said Jennifer Matthews, non-EHCP pilot lead at the council.

“I know we could support 200-plus with an extension. There needs to be something concrete because temporary funding allows for you to plan for that period of time and then all of a sudden you’ve got people left unsupported.”

Somerset Council used its £603,000 grant funding for the past three years to get young people onto existing supported internship programmes.

“There is huge demand for NEET re-engagement work for SEND young people without an EHCP,” a council spokesperson said.

Somerset Council admitted it had low numbers initially – seven in year one – until it switched up its marketing tactics and rolled out digital supported internships, which attracted neurodiverse students. It recruited 12 people the following year and 29 this year.

The DfE was contacted for comment.

Level 2 admin apprenticeship sign off delayed again

The long-awaited level 2 administration assistant apprenticeship has been pushed back again – possibly until August.

FE Week understands the standard has been assigned a funding band of £4,000 and is awaiting final approval from work and pensions secretary Pat McFadden.

The apprenticeship was initially allocated an indicative £6,000 funding band after being signed off by a government route panel last year, with employers behind its design expecting it to be available for delivery from August 2025.

It is understood the revised funding decision and ongoing affordability concerns in the wider apprenticeship system delayed the start date.

Employers told FE Week they were “at a loss to understand why Skills England is not providing any definitive updates or timelines”.

Minister signals importance for young people

An August 2026 launch would come six years after the level 2 business administration apprenticeship framework was closed to new starts in 2020.

It was one of the most popular apprenticeships across the country under the old-style framework system – hitting around 30,000 starts annually, 83 per cent of which were for under-19s.

The absence of a direct replacement at level 2 under the new-style standards system has been a source of frustration for employers and training providers, who argue this apprenticeship would help address the rising number of young people not in education, employment or training (NEET).

The administration assistant standard has been the subject of a lengthy employer-led campaign for approval, including public sector bodies such as councils and the NHS.

A source close to the trailblazer group said: “After over five years of lobbying, we were advised in December that the standard was finally being approved, so the continued delay in publishing this vital standard is incredibly frustrating. 

“With all the rhetoric around NEETS and the decline in young people on apprenticeships, and the fact we know there is huge demand from the over 900 employers who supported the trailblazer group from all sectors, we are at a loss to understand why Skills England is not providing any definitive updates or timelines. 

“Unofficial sources have said August 2026, and if this is the case then this needs to be confirmed so employers can plan and providers are ready to deliver.”

FE Week asked skills minister Jacqui Smith about the apprenticeship’s launch in a recent interview for National Apprenticeship Week.

While she did not confirm a specific date, Smith emphasised that apprenticeships of this kind would play an important role in supporting young people into training.

“I don’t know the exact detail about the timing, but certainly that type of apprenticeship, alongside foundation apprenticeships, alongside thinking about other ways in which we can encourage young people into training, will be a really important way in which we both pivot to young people and we use apprenticeships and skills to address the NEETs issue, which is an enormous priority for Pat and the team,” the minister said.

Budget pressures contribute to delay

Last year’s apprenticeship budget overspent for the first time, and £43 million has been added in-year to this year’s pot, which now stands at £3.118 billion.

Ministers are streamlining the apprenticeship system to cut costs, including by defunding level 7 apprenticeships for people aged over 21, and are working up plans for potential cuts to management apprenticeships.

A level 3 business administration standard has been live since 2017 and is consistently one of the top five most popular apprenticeships with around 12,000 annual starts.

The addition of a level 2 administration assistant apprenticeship is likely to prove popular and therefore expensive, even with a £4,000 funding band.

The Department for Work and Pensions told FE Week that officials would share an update on this apprenticeship “in due course”.

Minister moves to tighten grip on FE teacher training

Tighter scrutiny of FE teacher training to root out poor-quality courses has been put before MPs.

From April, providers of further education initial teacher training (ITT) must register with the government, submit mandatory student data and follow guidance on curriculum and delivery.

Skills minister Jacqui Smith said ITT providers needed more government scrutiny after finding “persistent” poor-quality provision. 

Ofsted previously warned that some FE teacher trainees were being taught outdated concepts that lacked “evidence-based approaches”.

In a letter to the House of Commons education committee, Smith said the quality of teacher training in FE was subject to “much less direct scrutiny from government” compared to equivalent provision for schools. 

The Further Education (initial teacher training) Regulations 2026 have now been presented to MPs, with a date for a vote yet to be set. 

It follows a public consultation and commitments in the post-16 white paper to evidence-based training for budding FE teachers.

Statutory standards

FE teacher trainee figures and course provision are currently unregulated. Smith said the proposed legislation was the first step towards a clear regulatory framework for FE teacher training.

Once Parliament approves the changes, dozens of ITT providers delivering level 5, 6 and 7 courses will have to comply with statutory curriculum guidance and delivery standards.

The curriculum guidance outlines the professional behaviours, subject expertise and student progression that trainee teachers should learn and receive.

Providers should consider the advice “seriously”, and any organisation designing content contrary to the guidance would have to justify the reasons why.

FE employers, such as colleges, that recruit in-house trainees and pre-service FE ITT providers, must also ensure learners reach minimum standards in English, maths and digital skills and teach for at least 250 hours on placements.

Providers will also have to collect and report data on trainee outcomes and employment destinations with the Department for Education within six months of a learner’s completion.

“There have been unquestionably pockets of excellent practice in the FE teacher training sector,” Smith’s letter says.

“But there have also been instances where poor-quality provision has been allowed to persist, to the considerable detriment of both trainee teachers and their potential employers and students in the FE sector.”

The regulations will also require ministers to publish an annual report on FE ITT compliance, plus a list of appropriate courses and providers for students.

Evidence for high-quality teacher training

Officials have spent recent years seeking evidence to root out low-quality providers.

The government signalled incoming legislation in October when it opened a call for evidence of “relevant, high-quality theory and knowledge” to inform early career training for FE teachers.

The evidence was considered by an ITT expert advisory group chaired by Wigan and Leigh College principal Anna Dawe, who went on to recommend the proposed statutory guidance for FE teaching programmes.

Officials also launched a consultation in 2023 seeking to block funding for private teacher training providers that lacked partnerships with higher education providers.

The DfE said there was no evidence they delivered high-quality provision, or that they supplied “significant” numbers of FE teachers to the sector.

The proposal indicated 13 independent training providers would lose around £27 million in fee income and could affect nearly 4,500 students, according to 2022-23 student loans company data.

Meanwhile, ongoing FE teacher recruitment concerns were addressed in a teacher training policy document published alongside the schools white paper this week, which detailed strategies to boost secondary, special school and college teacher numbers by 6,500.

The DfE said it was “exploring” how the future high-potential ITT scheme – currently run by Teach First in schools – could give opportunities to trainees to gain experience in FE colleges.

Stop relying on day release to achieve apprenticeship growth

Apprenticeship growth remains a constant topic of discussion among senior leadership teams, largely because it is not constrained by lag funding and is one of the most effective ways to increase in-year funding.

Yet, in my experience of delivering apprenticeships over many years, true and sustainable growth rarely comes from traditional day-release models in which the apprentice spends one day a week with the provider and the remainder at work.

Instead, it flourishes when providers adopt a well-designed ‘block-release’ approach, of a one or two-week duration.

While day release certainly has its place, it comes with an inherent limitation: geography. Learners can only travel so far for sessions, which restricts the recruitment demographic. Block release overcomes this, but only when it is implemented with intention and precision. Simply re-timetabling classes is not enough.

I first saw the transformative impact of block release many years ago, when I was head of motor vehicle at Bridgwater College. At the time, we delivered a solid day-release programme with around 30 apprentices per year.

The senior team challenged us to grow numbers, so I designed a block release model informed by strong existing practice, especially in main dealer programmes with brands like Ford and Volkswagen.

The design followed a clear blueprint, with absolute consistency on dates once agreed with employers.

It ran for seven weeks a year, equivalent to the 35 days delivered through day release, each beginning at midday Monday and ending midday Friday, thus allowing for travel. We made the time up through evening delivery on Tuesdays and Wednesdays.

We organised structured social activities, like bowling or go-karting, on Thursday evenings to foster group cohesion and give apprentices a positive end-of-week experience.

Employers received progress updates each Friday to set out the on-the-job tasks and learning their apprentices needed to complete before the next block.

This framework was remarkably successful. By my final year at Bridgwater College, the programme had grown to 55 block release groups with around 850 apprentices from across the country and with many diverse backgrounds.

Of course, the challenge posed by block release is always apprentice accommodation and related costs. But what the Bridgwater experience taught me was, if you get the product right, people will travel and pay for quality education.

Employers happily paid more as they could see the difference the training made in their workplace.

Whether you utilise existing student accommodation or create a list of trusted B&Bs, the safeguarding process needs to be the same. We appointed an accommodation officer to oversee this process. The accommodation income alone was circa £600,000 in my final year.

Twenty-five years later, shortly before stepping down as principal from my last college, we were discussing the future of the agricultural engineering apprenticeship programme.

With small numbers split across two campuses 90 minutes apart, delivery was costly and viability repeatedly questioned. Yet the level 3 agricultural engineering standard is generously funded at £27,000 per apprentice, making it a significant opportunity if delivered effectively.

Drawing on the proven model, we consolidated delivery onto one campus and shifted entirely to block release. We adopted the same core structure, but added a new wow factor: a sector-leading agriculture engineering interactive diagnostic lab, delivered through a partnership with Electude.

For around £84,000 investment, the workshops were significantly revamped and Electude provided both software and hardware, enabling apprentices and employers to access learning through an app potentially 24 hours a day. This reduced reliance on class-based teaching time and related costs.

On paper, it was a risky investment. In practice, it was well calculated because when the product and delivery model are right, block release works.

The programme grew from an average of 15 apprenticeship starts a year to 55 the following September, with 64 expected the next year. Financially, that represented an annual income uplift of £360,000 with no additional delivery cost.

If you want to broaden your reach, improve employer engagement, increase income and create a transformational learner experience, I’ve found block release wins every time.

We need a 14-24 participation strategy to tackle NEET crisis

Challenges such as entrenched poverty, growing health needs, labour market instability and a post-16 qualification system in turmoil have contributed to a rise in 16 to 24-year-olds not in education, employment or training to 957,000, according to the latest figures just out.

One of the most significant pressures is the rise in health-related barriers to participation.

More than half of NEET young people report a health condition, and demand for specialist mental-health services has more than doubled since 2020.

Yet access remains uneven, with long CAMHS waiting lists and patchy rollout of mental health support teams across schools and colleges.

Young people with SEND face even greater disadvantage: they are four times more likely to be NEET. Transitions into secondary school can be particularly destabilising, contributing to absence and disengagement. This reflects not a lack of ambition, but a system poorly designed around the needs of vulnerable young people.

Poverty and place-based inequality compound these challenges. High transport costs, limited services in rural and coastal areas and housing insecurity all restrict access to learning.

Opportunity varies starkly across England and for many in rural or more isolated areas, travelling to college or an apprenticeship provider is unaffordable or impractical.

The system is also wrestling with qualification reform. The growing mix of A Levels, T Levels, applied generals, alternative academic qualifications and forthcoming V Levels creates a complex landscape to navigate.

The defunding of some qualifications before alternatives are established risks leaving cohorts without a suitable local option, especially where T Level industry placements cannot be delivered. This is narrowing rather than expanding pathways.

The GCSE English and maths resit policy remains another longstanding barrier which can undermine engagement. While the recent skills white paper outlines future changes, ASCL remains concerned that the reforms fall short of removing this barrier to progression.

Meanwhile, youth unemployment remains higher than overall unemployment, and economic inactivity has surged.

Employers increasingly report that young people lack technical and wider employability skills, partly because structured work experience opportunities have declined.

Apprenticeships, although promising, remain limited: SMEs are far less likely to offer them, reducing opportunities in the very places that need them most.

Another glaring weakness is the lack of coordination at critical transition points. There’s no national mechanism for tracking post-16 attendance, meaning early warning signs of disengagement go unnoticed.

Once a young person leaves a school or college, there’s little capacity to maintain contact. Local authority duties end on the last Friday in June of Year 11 – misaligned with the requirement for young people to remain in education or training until 18. The system effectively loses sight of young people at the moment they are most vulnerable.

Participation partnerships

We’re calling for a national 14-24 participation strategy, supported by local ‘participation and progression partnerships’ with statutory responsibility for transition oversight.

Mandatory transition reviews – modelled on those used for education, health and care plans – would help identify risks earlier. Health and SEND support must be strengthened through the rollout of mental health support teams, statutory maximum waits for children’s mental-health services and integrated SEND mental-health provision within FE settings.

Qualification reform must be stabilised by pausing the defunding of applied generals, expanding level 2 and below provision, and introducing a national directory of post-16 admissions requirements.

We also want to see centralised post-16 attendance tracking that reflects the flexibility of FE timetables, an expanded definition of Children Missing Education (CME) up to age 18, and a statutory re-engagement duty for learners withdrawn under the four-week funding rule.

A youth guarantee offering every 16 to 24-year-old a job, apprenticeship, education place or re-engagement programme without waiting 18 months to qualify, as is the case with the current proposal, would help ensure no young person is left without options.

Improved transport, more accessible apprenticeships and secure accommodation for vulnerable 16 to 19-year-olds would remove some persistent barriers to participation.

The NEET crisis is complex. But with coordinated cross-governmental reforms, early intervention and a stable, accessible post-16 system, it can be reversed.

AI training is of limited use if staff can’t safely use the tech

AI continues to be a fast-developing topic, with new models being rolled out at increasing frequency and its everyday use accelerating at pace. Yet with this comes responsibility for ensuring users know how to engage with AI safely and responsibly, and with meaningful impact.

The government recently announced its plans to provide free AI short courses to all adults across the UK as part of its ambition to upskill 10 million workers by 2030.

The courses are said to be able to give people the relevant skills needed to use simple AI tools effectively in the workplace, and set the standard for what good AI upskilling looks like.

Yet whilst short courses like these are, in principle, excellent ways for the workforce to build a foundational understanding of AI and how to use it, speed should not come at the expense of substance.

AI is rapidly reshaping the needs of employers and many may rely on short courses as a ‘quick fix’ to fill existing digital skills gaps. However, they should not be used as a substitute for the deep, applied skills employers need if AI is to be embedded productively and safely at scale.

FE Week also reported recently that there are growing concerns about the consistency and quality of some of the AI short courses being delivered, thereby raising questions about whether they risk repeating past mistakes of prioritising volume over impact.

If we are serious about building a genuinely AI-ready workforce, the government and employers must recognise that apprenticeships are the central pillar to achieving this ambition.

AI capabilities are not built in isolation from the workforce. We regularly hear from employers and partners that what they need are people who can apply AI tools in their everyday roles, and understand the risks and limitations as the technology evolves.

That not only requires human judgement, but structured, work-based learning which cannot be achieved in short bursts of training which are disconnected from day-to-day practices. This is where apprenticeships have a very clear advantage.

Whether in AI, data or cybersecurity, apprenticeships allow skills to be built in contexts aligned to real business needs and assessed through practical outcomes. Learners can develop technical digital skills alongside their professional judgement, and in far more detail than is available through short courses alone.

Crucially, however, is the fact that apprenticeships provide a scalable route to upskilling the existing workforce rather than only new entrants. Many employees who will use and manage new AI systems are already in the labour market and as such, apprenticeships offer a pathway for sustained development and confidence as they progress throughout their careers.

An important consideration with this, however, is how the growth and skills levy will be used to support digital upskilling. From April, levy funds can be used for shorter module training courses or ‘apprenticeship units’ which will be lifted from existing apprenticeships in critical industries like AI in the first instance.

Such reform presents an opportunity to ensure funding mechanisms actively support long-term capability building, while also enabling the use of targeted, short-term solutions where they add value. Flexibility is crucial, and when used well it can complement – rather than sideline – high-quality, longer-term apprenticeship provision.

National Apprenticeship Week prompted reflection on the future of the system, but policymakers should resist the temptation to frame the way forwards as a choice between speed and quality. The challenge is to do both. Short courses can complement the system, but they cannot replace the role apprenticeships play in building durable, job-ready capability.

If the UK genuinely wants to create an AI-ready workforce that supports productivity, progression and long-term resilience, apprenticeships must be treated not as an optional extra but as critical infrastructure for the country’s skills system.

Getting that balance right will determine whether AI becomes a driver of inclusive growth or another missed opportunity.

‘Fundamentally wrong’: Greater Lincolnshire leaders approve ESOL cuts

Plans to cut funding for English language lessons aimed at migrants have been approved in Greater Lincolnshire – despite fears it will harm community integration.

At a budget meeting on Wednesday, Greater Lincolnshire Combined County Authority agreed to scrap English for speakers of other languages (ESOL) courses from 2027 and develop a literacy programme instead.

The council’s Reform mayor Dame Andrea Jenkyns aims to redirect the £1 million ESOL adult skills fund cash towards the literacy qualification to “help more adults into paid employment”.

Meanwhile, her skills lead, North Lincolnshire council leader Rob Waltham, claimed ESOL classes create “segregation” as learners are separated from other groups due to the “origin of their birth” or “their colour”.

The Tory politician added it was more inclusive “to make sure we don’t segregate people” and ensure public adult education funding is spent “on the right people”.

The funding rules were approved ahead of the combined authority taking control of its £17-19 million adult skills fund budget in September.

Jenkyns, backed by a group of Reform and Conservative local council leaders, also voted to re-introduce a rule that learners must have been resident in the region for three years before they can apply for council-subsidised courses.

The Reform mayor called the decision “a really exciting moment” for the estimated 200,000 residents who lack a level 2 qualification, and claimed leaders from other areas were interested in the development.

She said: “What I’d like to see is, next month, we get the business community, we get FE and HE in the room, we get the private providers and Ofqual as well, and we design an amazing literacy qualification that’s linked to economic outcomes.

“I’d love our county to be that beacon of light for these people, where other counties follow suit, and we’ve already had other counties and combined authorities watching the space and contacting us.”

The funding vote followed a public consultation that attracted 375 responses, with 73 per cent saying they disagreed or strongly disagreed with cuts to ESOL funding.

In 2023-24, about £1 million was spent on delivering the language courses for 1,427 Greater Lincolnshire residents. 

‘Using migrants as a political football’

Four district council leaders opposed the ESOL cut, with North Kesteven District Council leader Richard Wright arguing it was “fundamentally wrong”.

He said ESOL helped women from patriarchal societies, such as Afghanistan, who were “legitimately here”.

Wright, a Conservative, added: “If we want people to integrate into society, if we want to actually have people contribute to GB PLC to pay their taxes, to get employment, they need to be able to speak English.

“So to say that after a year we will stop the ESOL, to me is fundamentally wrong – there’s a case for ESOL, there’s a case for literacy, but one doesn’t replace the other.”

Naomi Tweddle, leader of Labour-run City of Lincoln Council, warned the impacts could be “far more wide reaching than are anticipated”.

And Nick Worth, Tory leader of South Holland District Council, said Jenkyns “clearly hadn’t listened” to the message delivered by the public consultation, but the mayor shot back that the number of responses was “very small”.

University and College Union general secretary Jo Grady said: “This decision to cut ESOL funding is an attack on community cohesion and integration that will cause serious harm across Lincolnshire.

“This cut must be stopped and adult education in Lincolnshire must be fully funded.

“It is yet another example of Reform using migrants as a political football to inflame division and hatred; on the one hand, Nigel Farage complains about hearing foreign languages spoken in public, yet on the other, a Reform mayor is stopping migrants accessing the very courses that will enable them to speak English.”

Chance to step back revealed a hard lesson in student soft skills

As educators, we rarely have time to pause, reflect and truly hone our practice. But when we do get an opportunity, we often find innovative solutions to persistent challenges or gain perspective that takes us in a new direction.

My experience of T Level mentoring with the Education Training Foundation (ETF) provided space to reflect and move beyond the comfort zone in my teaching.

This gave me the confidence to invest further in my practice by applying for the Technical Teaching Fellowship programme, run by ETF and the Royal Commission for the Exhibition of 1851.

When I started my fellowship, I wanted to use my research project to investigate why my first cohort of management T Level learners had such mixed experiences with their industry placement.

Several learners weren’t happy with the placement, and one was unfortunately let go.

When I spoke to employers, they were honest about learners lacking the skills to succeed in the workplace. I wanted to understand the workplace-readiness skills gaps and how we could use digital technologies to address them.

My assumption that the main problem would be technical skills – use of Teams, Excel, Outlook – was soon challenged. It wasn’t these skills, but human skills such as communication, resilience, adaptability and confidence that both learners and employers felt most affected their ability to succeed.

Employers emphasised that while they were able to provide support with most technical skills on the job, it was these soft skills that were harder to teach but were invaluable to learners’ progress from day one.

Holding focus groups across my T Level cohorts, I explored which areas learners needed most support with. Together, we identified core professional habits and behaviours required for workplace success: punctuality, reliability, planning, confidence talking on the phone and conflict resolution (including taking constructive feedback).

The ability and confidence to plan routines, including finding their way to places, was a top concern for many learners. In class we looked at bus and train apps, and downloaded maps to plan routes. We explored being flexible and adaptable, considering alternative routes and transport options for unexpected scenarios.

For other behaviours, I drew on AI tools. To build confidence talking on the phone, I used an AI roleplay simulator to roleplay scenarios where learners could interact live through headsets.

While we trialled a paid tool for roleplay, free tools were also useful. These included the ‘coach function’ within Microsoft PowerPoint, which records learners delivering their presentation and provides feedback on pauses, pitch, and repetition.

Learners found this useful in preparing for the 20-minute presentation required as part of their employer set project.

Importantly, as well as supporting our learners with skills, I worked with employers on how to support learners’ understanding of expectations in the workplace.

This involved breaking down unfamiliar language, asking for clarity on terms such as ‘smart-casual’ dress code and establishing non-negotiables.

I also ensured that employers were equipped with the right information to support individuals. For SEND learners, I created a one-pager outlining their particular support needs in the workplace which we hope to roll out to colleagues.

It’s been fantastic to see my learners growing in confidence for their industry placements after focusing on developing their soft skills.

The next stage of my fellowship project involves sharing my learnings with the wider sector. I’m doing this by creating a digital handbook with tips and ideas for practitioners and through other activities, including organising an in-house conference.

My experience has prompted me to consider sector-wide issues and think about our changing policy landscape, which has also given me valuable perspective and context for my own practice.

I look forward to sharing specific learnings from my research, but my overarching takeaway remains this: grasping any opportunity to step back and reflect, in whatever form this may take, is one of the most valuable things we can do as educators, not just for our learners but for ourselves too.