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Williamson defends independent provider Covid-19 testing ‘madness’

The education secretary has defended the controversial delay in distributing Covid-19 testing kits to independent training providers.

In an interview with FE Week, Gavin Williamson insisted that the providers have “not been left out”.

He said they can tap into the current local community testing regime until the supplies are made available to them through a “demand-led model” being developed by the Department for Education.

But he failed to explain why this process will not be up and running until the end of March – weeks after learners return to onsite teaching.

Williamson’s comments have been met with more anger from “livid” private providers, with one saying they tried to order 1,000 testing kits through an emergency line recommended by DfE but were allocated just ten.

The testing delay, described by the Association of Employment and Learning Providers as “madness”, has proven particularly controversial as colleges are receiving the kits ahead of a return to face-to-face training on March 8.

Guidance from the Department for Education states that it “expects” every 16-to-19 student will “attend their FE provider in person and will undertake the majority of their planned hours on site” from that date.

Private providers have warned that reopening without access to testing constitutes a “significant risk” and some fear they will now have to delay course starts as a result.

The DfE is yet to provide an explanation for why its “bespoke solution” for independent providers to order the kits is not yet available, or how it will work.

Asked who was to blame for this oversight, Williamson told FE Week: “As you can imagine, the range of independent training providers is extensive, and this is why we’re rolling out testing much more broadly.

“All independent training providers are able to benefit through the community testing regime, so they’ve not been left out. They’re actually able to tap into that resource straight away.”

He continued: “What we’re doing is we’re massively expanding our testing regime and taking off some of the burdens of those independent training providers, but they already have access to testing through community, local authority testing schemes and we really would encourage them to do that. But as part of our big expansion, they’re going to be included in what we’re doing as well.”

Jon Graham, chief executive of training provider JTL, described the situation as “such a shameful and immoral thing”. His provider trains around 8,000 learners, mostly in plumbing, electrical and engineering apprenticeships across 12 different sites in England.

JTL previously received a text from the Department of Health and Social Care saying JTL was eligible for free Covid-19 test kits, but when the provider tried to order 1,000 last week, they were only offered ten.

“Why is it that a college over the road gets all their 16-to-18-year-olds in safely with testing but for thousands of our learners I’ve got to choose ten of them to get a test?” Graham said.

“Apprentices are also moving around different sites and offices. If you are an electrician or plumber, you’re going into people’s homes and they could be vulnerable people and you might be asymptomatic – I’ve not been able to test them.”

As Williamson said, private providers are encouraged in the DfE’s operational guidance for reopening to use local asymptomatic testing sites until their kits arrive in April.

But as FE Week reported last week, not every local authority has one, and most are not easily accessible by public transport for students.

In the absence of testing, the DfE says providers can help ensure the safety of students and staff and minimise the risk of outbreaks by implementing their recommended “system of controls”.

This includes ensuring face coverings are worn as well as other personal protective equipment where appropriate, promoting the “catch it, bin it, kill it” approach, keeping occupied spaces well ventilated and maintaining social distancing.

Skills bootcamps ‘counter-intuitive’ to long-term FE simplification, top civil servant admits

Pilot schemes, such as skills bootcamps, are “counter-intuitive” to the Department for Education’s long-term goal of simplifying the FE system, Keith Smith has admitted.

The director for post-16 strategy at the DfE and mastermind behind the FE white paper conceded that introducing programmes with brand-new funding rules and methodologies do add further complexity to an already complicated system.

But he explained that schemes like this needed to be ramped up quickly to help the country’s recovery from Covid-19 and asked the sector: “Please don’t take anything that happens in the short-term as any sort of indication of where the future intent will be.”

Skills bootcamps are currently being piloted and are set for a £43 million national launch later this year. They are part of the prime minister’s “lifetime skills guarantee” and plan to get people quickly back into jobs following the pandemic.

They offer learners aged 19 and over the chance to take a 12-to-16-week level 3 or higher course with a guaranteed job interview at the end.

But as previously reported by FE Week, the new courses involve a totally new funding formula, with providers receiving 30 per cent to start the learner, 60 per cent for achievement and then ten per cent for eligible progression.

Providers also do not record learners through the individualised learner record and there are currently no plans for Ofsted to inspect the provision.

This is despite the DfE pledging in its FE white paper to “reform our funding and accountability system” of which “simplification and streamlining of funding” would be central.

Following this week’s Budget, Association of Colleges chief executive David Hughes said the job schemes that have been created or scaled-up to aid the country’s Covid-19 recovery, such as Kickstart, bootcamps and traineeships, need to be “aligned and funding simplified”.

“The programmes currently do not work well together, are confusing to employers and will not work effectively for many unemployed people,” he added.

“The key thing now is to join up jobs and skills initiatives to allow as many people as possible to benefit from them quickly.”

Quizzed during an FE Week webcast on the white paper this week about why the government appeared to start from scratch when designing bootcamps, Smith agreed they could cause more confusion for the sector.

He said: “Yeah, I can see that. There is always a balance in the short term about getting money into the system in a way that is being provided for. In this case, government is really keen to test it [bootcamps].

“I completely accept the challenge that some of this is going to feel a bit counter-intuitive in the short term, that we’re perhaps doing things that potentially aren’t necessarily always in keeping with the longer term.

“All I would say is that I completely recognise that. Those listening today will understand there is a lot of complexity here we need to sort out. So please don’t take anything that happens in the short term as any sort of indication of where the future intent will be.”

He added that the white paper’s promised funding and accountability consultation “really will be the place that we start to mock all this up”.

The consultation is expected to launch later this year.

Intervention regime WILL include college failure to comply with local skills improvement plans

New legislation will enable the education secretary to intervene where colleges refuse to deliver courses decided through local skills improvement plans, the FE white paper’s architect has confirmed.

But the extent of the powers is still being determined by ministers and there is currently no timeline for when the formal regulations will come into force.

Keith Smith, the director for post-16 strategy at the Department for Education, clarified the intent behind the legislation put forward in the white paper during an FE Week webcast on Tuesday.

Central to the reforms are new local skills improvement plans, which will be “led” by employers and “shape technical skills provision so that it meets local labour market skills needs”.

As part of this, “new accountability structures to underpin” the plans will be introduced, including legislation “to put the employer leadership on a statutory footing”.

“New powers” that allow the education secretary to intervene “where local providers are consistently unable to deliver the skills priorities for that area” will also be introduced.

There has been confusion about what this new power would mean in practice since the white paper was published in January, and whether it meant that the DfE’s intervention regime would in the future include college failure to comply with the local skills plans.

Smith confirmed this was the case during this week’s webcast.

“This will be for ministers to set out, which they haven’t yet done, but the intent will be to have a bit of the FE Bill about how we get employers involved in shaping the system. The other part will be about what do the secretary of state’s powers look like where the system is perhaps not working effectively as he or she would like,” he said.

FE Week editor Nick Linford, who chaired the webcast, pressed Smith to be clear that this legislation would give the education secretary more power to intervene where a college or training provider isn’t delivering the courses as laid out in the skills plan.

Smith confirmed there will be a “shift in the ability for the secretary of state to intervene where he or she doesn’t feel that the system is effective”.

“The legislative agenda is a really critical part of the strategy, but I should just caveat all this to say government has not yet laid its formal regulations in the House of Commons and so this is very much for ministers to determine to what extent what sort of articles they want to lay within the Bill,” he added.

College autonomy in deciding what courses they run has been a hot topic in recent years.

At the Association of Colleges conference in 2018, Ofsted chief inspector Amanda Spielman controversially argued that some colleges choose to run courses for financial gain, such as in performing arts, despite the lack of opportunity for progression.

local skills improvement plans — READ MORE: Ofsted boss still ‘not happy’ with colleges ‘flooding’ economy with arts and media students

This, she said, is giving students “false hope” by putting them on courses where there are slim job prospects. Spielman repeated this concern in the watchdog’s 2020 annual report last January.

There have since been a number of reports from the likes of the AoC and former adviser to the skills minister and founder of the think tank EDSK Tom Richmond that suggest colleges should lose some autonomy.

And in November, Education and Skills Funding Agency director Matthew Atkinson told MPs he would “definitely like more power” to intervene in the running of colleges.

The local skills improvement plans mooted in the white paper are set to be piloted this year.

GCSE and A-level grades 2021: ‘I will back you all the way’, Williamson says to teachers

The education secretary has pledged to back teachers “all the way” in their efforts to award GCSE and A-level grades this summer, and accepted he will share the responsibility if there is a backlash on results days.

In an exclusive interview with FE Week’s sister title FE Week, Gavin Williamson said the government was putting its “confidence and faith in teacher judgment” and said a “robust appeals structure” would help deal with potential “challenges” with the system.

Exams have been cancelled this year following the decision to partially close schools and colleges in January. The government last week confirmed its plans to base grades on teacher assessments, prompting fears teachers could be left to shoulder the blame if there is another upset this year.

The government was forced into a last-minute U-turn last year on its decision to award grades based on centre assessments adjusted by computer algorithm.

Ministers have ruled out using an algorithm this summer, but there are concerns that relying on teacher assessment will lead to disparities between schools, colleges and grade inflation.

Williamson said the government was “absolutely supporting teachers” and pointed to plans to publish guidance to help with grading and for exam boards to provide additional support.

“It’s why we’ll be putting both the internal quality assurance and external quality assurance [in place] and absolutely backing teachers all the way on this,” he said.

“We want to make sure this works and, of course, everyone has a responsibility for the structures that have been put in place and, of course, myself included in that.”

However, the education secretary said the government would take a “very serious view” of malpractice. Exam boards are to look for this when they conduct the external quality assurance process, including via checks that will be triggered where schools and colleges have previously received sanctions for malpractice.

“People do have to have responsibility for what they’re putting forward and that’s why we’ve put those checks and balances in place,” he said.

“We’d expect everyone to adhere to the high professional standards that we always see within the teaching profession. But where there are things that aren’t quite right we will absolutely take action in order to be able to deal with that.”

Schools and colleges are due to reopen more widely from next week, with providers allowed to phase the return to facilitate requirements for mass testing.

However, the decision to bring all students back in the same week has prompted fears of a return to the situation seen last autumn, when schools and colleges were regularly forced to send large groups of students home because of a confirmed Covid case.

Williamson said he accepted that there “will be children and there will be teachers who will have to isolate, but that’s exactly as you would expect as we are still dealing with a pandemic”.

But he said the number of children having to isolate “fell dramatically over the first four weeks of full return in September, and we’d hope to keep a similar sort of level of practice there”.

Williamson said the country had made a “difficult sacrifice to not bring other parts of the country back before schools and colleges” in order to “safeguard education”.

“Anyone who understands what’s best for a child recognises that actually they learn best and they are in the best possible position to succeed by getting them back into the classroom.

“That’s where our focus has been and we’ve taken a decision not to bring anything else back other than children into the classroom because we’ve always said it’s our national priority to get children back into class.”

A flexible and supportive approach to reforming EQA

The timeline has been extended for the external quality assurance (EQA) transition because apprentice assessment providers are under huge amounts of pressure due to Covid-19, writes Rob Nitsch

We have decided to give more time for the EQA for apprenticeship end-point assessment organisations (EPAOs) to transfer from the Institute-provided service to Ofqual.

This recognises the impact that Covid-19 and the latest national lockdown have had on EPAOs.

They are under a huge amount of pressure and we think it’s important to listen to their concerns and show flexibility where we can – in this instance by extending the deadlines and ensuring that the right support is provided and that there is time to take it. We are also committed, with Ofqual and the Education and Skills Funding Agency (ESFA), to ensuring that apprentices are not prevented from sitting assessments as this takes place.

So why is all this necessary?

The Institute announced the intention to move to a simplified way of doing EQA last August. The changes will see EQA delivered just by Ofqual or, for integrated degree apprenticeships, the Office for Students (OfS).

The Institute will stop delivering EQA directly but will retain oversight of the system, in line with our statutory responsibility, through our framework.

It means EQA of around 260 apprenticeships need to transfer from the Institute’s service to Ofqual, and EPAOs must become Ofqual-recognised.

Ofqual recognition is, quite rightly, a rigorous process. Some EPAOs have achieved this already, but we appreciate that for others it’s been a struggle, in no small part due to the pandemic.

The Institute and Ofqual took this on board and updated the timeline. Likewise, Ofqual has stepped up with support arrangements.

EPAOs who are currently overseen through the Institute’s EQA service now have until July 1 to submit a formal application. The final deadline for when the process must be completed has been extended from July to December 16, 2021.

If an EPAO does not apply by July 1, or is not granted Ofqual recognition by December, they will be removed from the ESFA’s register.

We strongly recommend that all EPAOs who intend to apply, begin the process as soon as possible. Progressing the transition of EPAOs is an imperative and, as soon as we are able to transfer an apprenticeship from the Institute’s service, EQA billing will cease for that apprenticeship.

We are also reviewing arrangements for those apprenticeships where the EQA is provided by organisations other than Ofqual, OfS and the Institute.

There is no underlying agenda here to skew the market. We would like to see as many EPAOs as possible achieve Ofqual recognition and transfer, including all the smaller specialists who have such great expertise and are valued so much by employers.

We know that many EPAOs are already engaged with Ofqual, but if you haven’t yet, you can register on the Ofqual portal, where you will be assigned to one of the team to support you with your application. You can also contact the Institute at IFA@education.gov.uk using the subject line ‘EQA transition query’.

More information can be found in the transition section of the Institute’s website or through Ofqual channels. Ofqual has produced helpful additional resources to support applicants, such as videos, case studies and guidance.

We will continue to transfer apprenticeship by apprenticeship. In each case this will only take place once all EPAOs on an apprenticeship have achieved recognition, or missed one of the two critical deadlines.

The Institute is also working with the OfS to improve quality assurance for the higher education sector. Assessment for apprenticeships with integrated degrees must be closely aligned to how it works for all other levels.

Added to this, we are setting up a new group of professional and employer-led organisations – called the Employer Directory – that Ofqual and OfS will draw on to ensure that contemporary and relevant industry expertise underpins their EQA work.

I firmly believe that pushing ahead to a simpler and more effective EQA system, which keeps employers at the heart of protecting quality, is the right thing to do, in spite of the pandemic. A flexible and supportive approach will get us to this better place for everyone.

Colleges and training providers in line for £35m slice of the Turing Scheme

Around a third of the funding pot set aside for the Turing Scheme will go to further education providers, FE Week can reveal.

£105 million in total has been promised to pay for 35,000 placements for the UK’s new international student exchange programme, which is set to get underway in September.

In an interview with FE Week, Ecorys, the co-delivery partner with the British Council for the Turing Scheme, revealed that £35 million will go to further education, £60 million will go to universities and £10 million to schools.

This roughly equates to about 10,000 further education placements, 20,000 higher education placements and 5,000 school placements.

The scheme, named after scientist Alan Turing, was unveiled in December as the replacement to the UK’s participation in Erasmus+ following Brexit.

It will allow students to study and work abroad on placements ranging from between two weeks and 12 months.

Bids for a slice of the funding are set to launch this month and the Department for Education plans to issue funding decisions in July.

A new Turing Scheme programme guide was published on Wednesday and provides detail of how the funding will work.

For FE providers, they will get £315 per participant in “organisational support” for the first 100 participants, and £180 for groups bigger than that.

In terms of travel costs, they will receive a fixed amount depending how far away the destination is. For sending learners anywhere between 100 to 499 km away it’s £165 – while visiting Tanzania, for instance, at 11,000 km, would qualify for £905.

Learners will also get £135 each to access language resources if they are going away to a non-English speaking country for more than 19 days.

READ MORE: Turing Scheme to open for bids next month

Thereafter, daily funds will depend on whether the learner and accompanying staff member is in a group 1, 2 or 3 destination country, which is ranked according to local living costs.

Learners in group 1 countries get £109 a day for two weeks, and £76 a day after that. Those in group 2 countries get £94 a day then £66 a day, and those in group 3 countries get £80 a day and £56 a day after that.

Meanwhile, FE providers need to identify the “anticipated points of expenditure” when they will require the funds. They will be paid 80 per cent of costs at these points, with the final 20 per cent once a special report is completed showing all went to plan.

FE providers will also need to undergo “financial capacity checks” before their application is accepted.

Read more about the upcoming Turing Scheme and how it may differ from Erasmus+ in tomorrow’s edition of FE Week.

ESFA announces new subcontracting cap

The volume of subcontracted training will be capped at 25 per cent for providers from next year – but plans for a further phased reduction beyond this amount have been binned.

However, providers will be allowed to submit a request to be exempt from the cap.

Further details about reforms to FE subcontracting were published today by the Education and Skills Funding Agency following its consultation outcome published in June.

Many of the measures have stayed the same, but there are some important clarifications.

The most significant for providers will be the ESFA’s decision to introduce a straight 25 per cent cap on subcontracted provision from 2022/23.

The agency’s consultation had proposed that the cap should be further reduced to 17.5 per cent in the following year and then to 10 per cent the year after.

But most respondents disagreed with the proposal and the agency then set off to further evaluate the “right threshold”.

Today’s updated guidance said: “By 2022 to 2023, we do not expect any provider (excluding local authorities and European Social Fund provision) to be subcontracting 25 per cent or more of their provision unless they have written permission from us to do so.”

There is no further detail about which providers would qualify to be exempt from the cap.

The ESFA previously asked all providers to produce a plan during the 2020 autumn term setting out how they will achieve a reduction in their volume of subcontracted activity over the next three academic years

For providers who are currently subcontracting 25 per cent or more of their provision, the ESFA said it will conduct a “targeted exercise, writing to providers to request a copy of their reduction plan (if we do not receive an exemption case) to inform the progress that providers have made in their plans for a reduction across the three years”.

Another key change announced today is that the adult education budget has been removed from the agency’s proposal for prior approval for whole programme subcontracting.

The ESFA’s consultation had proposed to introduce “stricter controls on the circumstances in which the whole of a learner’s programme could be subcontracted, and providers will be required to obtain agreement from the ESFA before doing so”.

This rule will now only be introduced for students whose whole programme of 16 to 19 provision is subcontracted from 2021/22.

The agency said it concluded that introducing “such a requirement for AEB programmes above a specified length is not practical and we will not be proceeding with this”.

We are not prohibiting or banning all subcontracting

ESFA chief executive Eileen Milner embarked on a major review of subcontracting in 2019, expressing concerns about the “continued rise” in cases of fraud linked to subcontracting arrangements managed by agency.

The ESFA has since announced a series of measures it will take to “significantly” reduce subcontracting in FE over the next three years.

In publishing the additional detail about the measures today, the agency made clear they are not “prohibiting or banning” all subcontracting.

“Where it is done well, for the right reasons, and properly overseen, it can enhance the learner experience and add value,” they added.

Association of Employment and Learning Providers chief policy officer Simon Ashworth welcomed today’s changes.

“The adult education budget not being included in the whole programme subcontracting proposal is a common sense approach,” he said.

“Jointly delivering qualifications and joint delivery of training programmes are two very different beasts, and the exclusion should be welcomed.

“On the cap, we’ve moved away from the blunt and arbitrary phased reduction over three years as first muted, which is a positive change. The ESFA is now proposing a threshold of 25 per cent, but it will helpfully allow providers to submit for an exemption.”

When best-in-class tech meets best-in-class accreditation

Irrespective of the scale of the educational institution, there’s always a case for improving efficiencies and delivering more effective learning infrastructure. To thrive in the next normal, the parameters of innovation will need to be reimagined for educational institutions across the board. Thankfully, they can lean on the experts to help fine-tune and enhance their digital transformation efforts, while keeping an open mind in terms of where this pursuit of innovation can take their programmes.

Out of necessity, the steady march towards digital-led educational solutions has now become an unrelenting race, as dated programs and the associated inefficiencies are forcing educational institutions to innovate at pace. Luckily, advances in EdTech have crystalised at a most opportune time, presenting major opportunities for enhanced learning experiences that are accessible 24/7, easily deployable, and customisable. The latest innovations are enabling quicker connections, more flexible routines, higher levels of learner independence and more effective remote training.

In this author’s opinion, and based on prevailing sentiments of key stakeholders in the education space, legacy solutions aren’t up to the task. Forewarning: it’s time for an unvarnished assessment of current offerings. We’ve seen the ‘Traditional Brands’ fall behind due to poor learner experience, poor support systems and antiquated technology – resting on laurels, out-paced and out-thought, and now, out-delivered.

Charting this new path forward

Face-to-face training has been the norm for many years, and while this environment will endure post-pandemic, it will undoubtedly be bolstered by robust digital infrastructure and more scalable online learning solutions. A large percentage of today’s workforce were born in the digital age, which means they’re more focused on user engagement, and less concerned with upholding the status quo of legacy brands. Simply put, sub-par solutions will not resonate with today’s digital-savvy learner.

NOCN’s strategic five-year partnership with Olive Group is geared towards making breakthrough innovation accessible to large swathes of learners across the UK and globally, with a best-in-class virtual learning platform. The signature initiative of this partnership is the vLearn platform – a customisable, easy-to-use Virtual Learning Environment built to empower tutors and learners by utilising cutting-edge technology.

The first phase of NOCN’s partnership with Olive Group, announced in December of last year, was designed to provide market-leading virtual support materials tailored for apprentices across some of the most popular Apprenticeship Standards in the UK. It used to be enough to hold a trades certificate to get out on site, but today, that simply won’t suffice. What’s required is modern qualifications, a smart Jobcard and access to digital platforms, and at NOCN Group, you can get all of this under one roof. At NOCN Group we offer all levels of qualifications, all levels of bespoke accreditation and all levels of apprenticeships.

Following a very successful phase one, we are extending the reach of vLearn ten-fold. For phase two, the platform will be rolled out to the wider NOCN Group as the first part of a 5-year project to deliver unrivalled digital support to customers, boosting the delivery of qualifications, virtual classroom and one-to-many online exam proctoring. This means vLearn will be available to all NOCN Group Training Centres, the first clients onboard is one of the U.K Leading Education Providers, Newcastle College Group and NHS Trust.

With vLearn, NOCN and Olive Group are focused on providing clients with the technology to dramatically pivot from the mediocrity of outdated delivery models. We’re also equipped to scale our partner organisations with emerging technologies and high-end interactive digital content. An Enhanced Learning Experience (ELX) is no longer a ‘nice to have,’ it is intrinsically linked to the success of any Training Organisation in today’s market.

The scale and breadth of Olive Group’s network and unrivalled technological prowess will play a central role in maximising the potential impact of vLearn. Together, we will work to extend the reach of tutor support for qualifications and bespoke accreditation, assessment materials and mock examination content, as well as 100’s of ready-to-go digital-learning courses. Our strategic partnership with Olive Group represents a confluence of market-leading technology with specialists in accreditation – all in the name of improving the accessibility of innovative EdTech solutions. We also recognise the pertinent need for this type of solution and pent-up market demand, and we are proud to work alongside Olive Group in charting a new path forward for learners.

NOCN’s expansive catalogue of course material includes STEM, business admin, construction and financial services, meaning the scope of our work with Olive Group will be substantial. NOCN’s Skills for Life and employability qualifications are providing much needed support to learners who want to advance their career prospects and pursue new opportunities during this period of flux – a vision Olive Group is firmly aligned with. Given our group’s clear synergies, we are excited to immediately start delivering tangible benefits to learners across the educational spectrum.

Innovative new tools, if leveraged correctly, can transform the manner in which learners engage with their curricula, and each other, while accommodating unprecedented levels of collaboration and seamless assessment. Automation, Machine Learning, Artificial Intelligence, ChatBots – these are the new strands of focus for digitally equipped educational institutions.

vLearn: A timely solution

The timing of this partnership is also noteworthy, particularly after a year of on-off remote learning, during which some of the inherent challenges have been thrust into focus. The wider system is calling out for a purpose-built solution that addresses the prevalent challenges, while alleviating the tech burden on education providers and their students. vLearn has all-inclusive features including Virtual Classroom, Learning Management System (LMS), Content Curation, Assessments, Data/MI, as well as a modern user interface and intuitive content curation framework to ensure content is being presented to learners in the most effective way possible.

Think about it for a second – how do people consume content or experiences in the digital world today? Does that tally with the ‘traditional’ EdTech solutions? Not only does it not tally, the chasm between expectation and reality is wide. With vLearn, we wanted to design a purpose-built learning experience that is familiar to the digital natives, the swipers, scrollers, and touch screen aficionados. If you look at platforms like Spotify, Netflix, Amazon, Tiktok, and YouTube there is a framework that caters to these consumers. It’s about time they had an educational equivalent.

With vLearn, students and tutors can interact seamlessly with interactive whiteboards and screensharing, project work can be initiated in breakout rooms, and assessments can be carried out securely and efficiently. vLearn can be easily deployed by educational institutions with expansive curricula, or enterprises with bespoke training material. Businesses can also leverage vLearn to onboard new staff with training modules, deliver existing courses online, or develop new material for the upskilling of current staff.

Having trained more than two million people across the world with digital learning content in 27 languages, Olive Group is well positioned to drive innovative solutions forward, and we’re proud to be working alongside the Olive team on this shared mission. By taking the best of accreditation, and combining that with the best of digital, tutors and learners can thrive in a hybrid model of education delivery in 2021 and beyond.

Re-defining the EdTech landscape

For innovation to truly catch on, it needs to be informed by evolving consumer trends. Unlike some of our competitors, NOCN Group and Olive Group have our fingers on the pulse of what prospective learners are looking for, and we are guided by their perspective. Accommodating changing tastes involves abandoning the siloed thinking that has, for too long, placed a glass ceiling over EdTech innovation.

vLearn makes that experience as intuitive as possible, such as, easy onboarding, two-way tutor and learner instant communication, and state of the art, bite-size digital learning material. In today’s boundless content landscape, material needs to be direct, succinct, and concise. In other words, get to the point. Additionally, vLearn can easily interface with existing platforms such as ‘MS Teams’ to create and access the Virtual Learning Environment efficiently. vLearn creates an intuitive, personalised enhanced learning experience, and you don’t need to be ultra-proficient with tech to make the transition.

If your educational institute has aspirations to pursue international partnerships, we have you covered as well. At NOCN Group, we work with centres in 30 different countries across the globe.

As the global community continues to grapple with the many challenges brought on by the pandemic, the case for extending the accessibility of education has never been stronger. While there is light at the end of the tunnel with regards to the vaccine rollout, the crisis has put an immense strain on the educational pursuits of learners across every realm of study. This extends to workers engaging in upskilling courses, professionals pursuing reskilling programs, college students getting to grips with online curricula, or school goers learning over video calls.

There is a very real and present opportunity for institutions to pursue innovative EdTech solutions with vigour, and to take an active role in shaping the future educational landscape. This new landscape will be redefined by automated processes, dynamic deployments of Artificial Intelligence and Machine Learning, and a more seamless, user-centric experience. We look forward to disrupting mediocrity with Enhanced Learner Experiences – For Business, For Learning, For Life.

Contact your NOCN Group Business Development Manager at business-enquiries@nocn.org.uk to become a part of the vLearn experience.

Budget 2021: What the chancellor announced for FE and skills

Chancellor Rishi Sunak delivered his spring budget today and confirmed a number of new investments for the FE and skills sector.

They include a doubling of apprentice incentive payments for employers, a further boost to traineeships and a new “Help to Grow” scheme for small businesses to upskill.

FE Week has the key points:

Cash incentives for employers to hire new apprentices doubled

Apprenticeship financial incentives were first introduced by Sunak in August and currently offer firms £2,000 to take on apprentices aged 16 to 24, while those that employ new apprentices aged 25 and over are paid £1,500.

The chancellor said today that the bonuses, set to end this month, will be extended for a further six months to September.

And any employers who hire a new apprentice between 1 April 2021 and 30 September 2021 will receive £3,000 per new hire, regardless of the apprentice’s age.

This is on top of the £1,000 payment already provided for new apprentices aged 16 to 18 and those under 25 with an Education, Health and Care Plan, meaning that some employers could receive £4,000 in total.

£126m for traineeships

Sunak said the government will provide an additional £126 million in England for “high quality” work placements and training for 16- to 24-year-olds in the 2021/22 academic year.

This is hoped to attract a further 40,000 traineeship starts next year. Employers who provide trainees with work experience will continue to be funded at a rate of £1,000 per trainee.

It builds on the £111 million the chancellor set aside in 2020/21 to triple the number of traineeships.

‘Portable’ apprenticeships set to be launched

The government will introduce a £7 million fund from July 2021 to “help employers in England set up and expand portable apprenticeships”.

The budget document says this will enable people who need to work across multiple projects with different employers, such as in the TV and film industries, to “benefit from the high quality long-term training that an apprenticeship provides”.

Employers will be “invited to bring forward proposals here, and in particular the Creative Industries Council will be asked to do so in recognition of the potential benefits of this new approach for the creative sector”.

Trailed last Friday, the Treasury called this scheme “flexi-job” apprenticeships. The first of these are expected to start in January 2022.

‘Help to Grow’ scheme for SMEs to upskill

The budget document says the government will offer a new UK-wide management programme to upskill 30,000 small and medium-sized enterprises over three years.

It states: “Developed in partnership with industry, the programme will combine a national curriculum delivered through business schools with practical case studies and mentoring from experienced business professionals.

“Over 12 weeks, and 90 per cent subsidised by government, this programme will equip SMEs with the tools to grow their businesses and thrive.”

The budget’s costing document shows the government has set aside £60 million for this scheme in 2021-22 and then £75 million for 2022-23.

It is unclear at this stage what government department will be responsible for this scheme.