Latest news from FE Week

Banned: 9 firms join the ‘suspended’ list on the apprenticeships register

Peterborough Skills Limited has become the latest apprenticeships provider to be banned from taking on new starts after being reprimanded by Ofsted.

FE Week analysis shows the east of England-based firm is one of nine providers to have been slapped with suspensions on the register of apprenticeship training providers (RoATP) in the past 12 months, after they were found making ‘insufficient
progress’ in a new provider monitoring visit.

Education and Skills Funding Agency rules mean any provider which receives at least one such rating from an early monitoring visit will be banned from taking on new apprentices until their rating improves, unless there is an “exceptional extenuating circumstance”.

Peterborough Skills Limited made ‘insufficient progress’ for its safeguarding arrangements, with inspectors finding staff did not have “sufficient knowledge” to deal with disclosures or see them through to a “reasonable resolution”.

Leaders and the provider’s board, the report read, have “insufficient oversight” of safeguarding and have not established “a culture of safeguarding apprentices”.

A spokesperson for Peterborough Skills Limited said it “respects the decision” of Ofsted and through the “support of an independent safeguarding consultant we have addressed all the findings and significantly improved our processes”.

“We would like to express that there has been no negative impact to the well-being of our apprentices on record,” they added.

Other providers that have been added to the suspended list were found to be making ‘insufficient progress’ because they are “not ambitious enough” for apprentices.

Failure to take into account prior learning is another common theme that trips up new apprenticeship providers who find themselves on the banned list, as is poor English and maths and off-the-job training.

Many are also criticised for slow progress, with one provider being caught out for having apprentices on programme for 12 months who only submitted one piece of written work.

FE Week analysis of the RoATP reveals a total of 21 providers are currently suspended (see full list below). Nine have been added to the list over the past 12 months, while the remaining 12 were on there prior to the first lockdown.

That is a decrease from the 46 providers banned at the time of this publication’s last stocktake in April 2020, at the very start of the Covid-19 pandemic.

Since then, 25 of the 46 providers have been removed from RoATP altogether.

Ofsted paused its inspection activity at the outbreak of coronavirus in March 2020 and only resumed new provider monitoring visits in March 2021, which may have impacted the pace of suspensions over the course of this year.

RoATP has been closed to new applicants since April 2020, but will open on Monday for its second refresh in two years.

The full list of banned providers is as follows (bold indicates they are new to the list):

[UPDATE: After this article was published evidence was provided to show that Aldridge Education has had its suspension lifted by the ESFA despite still being on the banned list on RoATP. Aldridge Education can therefore start new apprentices again.]

Loans provider slammed for accepting ‘identical’ learner work

A new FE loans provider where tutors accept suspected copy-and-paste assignments from learners has been slammed by Ofsted.

Inspectors warned that a significant amount of written work submitted by different students at London Cactus Limited is “identical”.

Tutors “accept the work at face value, without verifying that learners have completed the work themselves”.

Ofsted also said managers recruit too many learners on to programmes who do not have the necessary level of English to “maximise their chances of succeeding on the programme”.

London Cactus Limited has been delivering FE loans provision since 2017, receiving almost £1 million in Education and Skills Funding Agency allocations to date.

It has also recently started to deliver health and social care apprenticeships, the provision of which was also in scope for Ofsted’s visit. But the provider only has 12 apprentices on its books, with its main provision being adult FE loans to a current cohort of 72 learners on business and care courses.

The watchdog’s new provider monitoring visit report shows three out of four ‘insufficient progress’ judgments. The provider now faces a suspension on apprenticeship starts, but ESFA policy mandates it can continue recruiting adult learners despite the poor judgments.

Inspectors found that the loans learners only attend the course for between three and four hours each week for a total of six months, which is “substantially lower than the recommended total course hours stipulated by the awarding body”.

Tutors were criticised for not identifying how the programme might fit with learners’ longer-term career or personal goals. And in lessons, a high proportion of learners “struggle to grasp more complex concepts and do not demonstrate spoken or written responses at the appropriate level” as they do not hold the required level of English for the course.

As well as accepting identical work, tutors do not make learners aware of the potential for them to achieve above a pass grade, inspectors said.

“Most tutors’ feedback does not guide learners to improve their work and achieve higher marks. Learners are unable to explain how the feedback they receive from tutors helps them improve their work and develop further. All learners so far have only achieved pass grades.”

The provider did however score ‘reasonable progress’ for its safeguarding arrangements.

Ofsted said: “Apprentices and adult learners feel safe in learning and when working. They know whom to contact if they have any safeguarding concerns. Care apprentices are knowledgeable about safeguarding policies they need to adhere to, for example when lone working.”

And while most of its apprenticeship provision was criticised, leaders were praised for recruiting “skilled apprenticeship tutors who are knowledgeable and well qualified”.

London Cactus Limited did not respond to requests for comment.

Winners of £18m bootcamps tender revealed

The providers chosen to deliver the government’s flagship national technical skills bootcamps have been named.

FE Week can reveal 18 organisations, including 11 independent providers – two of which are owned by education giant City & Guilds – two universities, one council and just four colleges, have won funding in the £18 million tender.

Association of Colleges chief executive David Hughes believes the lack of colleges among the bootcamp providers is due to them “being asked to bid for a lot of pots of funding at the moment and this is stretching resources at a very busy time of the year”.

He said colleges “use other funding pots” to “meet the needs of unemployed adults,” which is what bootcamps are intended for.

Winners (see table for list) were told on Wednesday they had been successful, but they have not yet been told the value of their contracts.

FE Week analysis shows that four of the providers have never been visited by Ofsted, while Intertrain – one of those owned by City & Guilds – has yet to receive a full inspection. Gen2 is the other City & Guilds-owned provider.

Ten of the providers have received a ‘good’ rating from Ofsted, while two are rated ‘outstanding’.

The providers will be delivering 12- to 16-week courses to unemployed and employed adults aged 19 and over in sectors such as digital skills, electrotechnical, nuclear and green energy, at a local or national level.

Although the contracts had been intended to start from the end of March, timed for the roll-out of the National Skills Fund, delays have pushed this to June 4 this year.

The tender is currently in a ten-day “standstill” period, in case any of the unsuccessful applicants to the tender wish to challenge the results.

If no organisation submits a challenge, contracts will be awarded on May 22.

The tender was published in January alongside another lot, also worth £18 million, for digital skills bootcamps in the nine geographical regions of England.

This procurement is still ongoing and the Education and Skills Funding Agency has not disclosed when its results will be shared or announced.

Both lots will last for one year, with the possibility of a one-year extension.

The Department for Education anticipates that at least 75 per cent of all bootcamp trainees will “move into a new job or role within six months of completing training”.

The bootcamps were announced by prime minister Boris Johnson in a speech at Exeter College last September.

He said the bootcamps were a response to the “huge number” of people who are “going to have to change jobs – to change skills – and at the moment, if you’re over 23, the state provides virtually no free training to help you”.

This year’s Skills for Jobs white paper pledged the government to run bootcamps as “a flexible way to gain high-quality skills that are relevant to employers”.

Before this tender came two waves of pilot bootcamps launched last year with £8 million of funding in areas including Derbyshire-Nottinghamshire, the south west and Leeds.

These were inspired by programmes run in Greater Manchester, and the West Midlands Combined Authority’s ‘Beat the Bot’ scheme.

Hughes said he would like to see the bootcamp model “evaluated as soon as possible because if it is effective, then the approach could become part of the mainstream, funded through the adult education budget”.

Welsh online-only apprenticeship provider censured by Ofsted

A Wales-based provider that trains apprentices in England exclusively online has been rapped by Ofsted.

Cognitia Consulting, headquartered in south Wales, scored two ‘insufficient progress’ ratings in a new provider monitoring visit report published on Monday.

Since 2018, the independent provider has delivered the safety, health and environmental technician apprenticeship and is one of the “few providers in the country” to offer the level 3 standard.

Lack of employer contact ‘hinders apprentices’ progress’

Inspectors criticised the lack of communication between Cognitia, its 26 apprentices and employers which its website boasts have included Virgin Media, logistics company Menzies Aviation and local councils.

“With very few exceptions,” the report reads, “employers are not closely involved in managers’ planning and teaching of the apprenticeship. This hinders apprentices’ progress.

“One employer commented that he had had no contact with Cognitia staff since the apprentice started.”

Apprentices in their second year on programme have to contact their trainer once they need training, rather than receiving scheduled tuition. These learners were also not set targets or deadlines for completing their portfolio evidence, so “most are behind in submitting work and do not know when their end-point assessment will take place”.

Although Cognitia’s training has been done entirely online since before Covid-19, apprentices could not access online resources for two and a half months recently as the provider was switching online resource systems.

Training was further disrupted when a member of teaching staff was furloughed.

The provider is also currently without a functional skills training partner which has slowed apprentices’ progress, with half of the learners needing the assessment and qualifications in English, maths or IT to complete their apprenticeships.

‘High proportion’ of apprentices withdrew from their qualification

Ofsted has in the past expressed scepticism about online or remote apprenticeships provision, with chief inspector Amanda Spielman telling FE Week’s Annual Apprenticeship Conference last month they are the “second-best option” to face-to-face training.

Even before the pandemic, the watchdog raised concerns about certain providers’ “weak” remote provision, with others facing criticism for “slow” implementation of quality assurance arrangements to improve the standard of their online training.

Cognitia’s Ofsted report also criticises the low quality of the provider’s training, to which its leaders admitted, telling inspectors: “The initial cohorts of apprentices experienced enrolment practices and training that did not meet the apprentices’ or employers’ needs and, as a consequence, a high proportion withdrew from their qualification.”

Despite fewer learners leaving later cohorts, the watchdog decided it “it is too early to tell if such a reduction is sustainable”.

Its curriculum was also “not being implemented logically or in ways that take full account of apprentices’ prior skills, knowledge and experience”.

Provider admits it ‘still needed to improve’

Cognitia did make ‘reasonable progress’ in terms of its safeguarding arrangements, with Ofsted finding apprentices feel safe and staff are clear about how to report issues to the designated safeguarding lead.

But under Education and Skills Funding Agency rules, an ‘insufficient progress’ rating usually means a provider will be suspended from taking on new apprenticeship starts.

Cognitia’s apprenticeship programme manager Tom Edwards said that following some internal changes, “we were already working to strengthen our offering prior to this visit.

“However, we accept the findings of the report and acknowledge that whilst we have made great strides as a learning provider, we still needed to improve some elements of our scheme delivery.”

He raised how it had been a “turbulent year for both trainers and training providers alike”, and that they have “learned much from working with Ofsted and from reflecting on our own internal operations”.

Cognitia now has new training staff and processes in place, Edwards said, and the inspectorate “has recognised we are already making improvements, providing improved support for apprentices learning.

“We appreciate the findings of Ofsted’s monitoring report and are working closely with them to ensure we meet and surpass these standards in our full inspection later this year.”

Eight specialist colleges honoured in Natspec awards 2021

A college which recruited a robot to help students with autism, and a project to ease learners’ return to classrooms have been recognised at this year’s Natspec awards.

Eight awards were handed out to the specialist further education sector at a virtual ceremony this afternoon, for categories such as student voice, pathways into employment, and home learning.

Chair of the awards’ judging panel and retired Ofsted inspector Nigel Evans called it a “privilege” to play a part, with the standard of submissions being “very high and demonstrating the innovation, expertise, and creativity within the specialist FE sector.

“It was a challenging task for the judges to single out individual winners in each category.”

The panel, he said, was “delighted” to see how many of the submissions were aimed at students with severe or profound disabilities.

‘Genuinely innovative’ approach recognised

One of the winners, of the innovative use of technology award, was Bridge College in Manchester for introducing a “QT Humanoid Social Robot” into the classroom.

The robot is designed to help improve the communication skills, engagement, and mental wellbeing of learners with autism spectrum disorder.

Category judge Rohan Slaughter, a lecturer in assistive technology at the University of Dundee, called the use of the robot “genuinely innovative and is clearly effective in both the project elements described”.

The wellbeing and mental health award has been awarded to community interest company Eat That Frog’s community wellbeing programme.

The online course used simple modules on various wellbeing aspects, tailored for the learner, and judge Liz Maudslay, the Association of Colleges’ SEND policy manager, said she “really liked the range of activities”.

“The enthusiasm with which staff and students entered into the activities was very evident.

“I was also impressed with the very real and meaningful links that were made with the community, especially the way in which the project recognised that one of the key aspects of improved mental health is doing things with and for others – something that often doesn’t happen with SEND students, who are so often ‘done to’.”

College’s coronavirus recovery programme sees success

The curriculum innovation award went to the ‘RESET, RECOVER, RECONNECT!’ programme run by Orchard Hill College in London and Surrey.

This programme involved a “recovery curriculum”, so students could transition back into education; as well as tackling anxieties and worries before moving onto students’ learning objectives.

Evans, who judged this category, said it “successfully helps students return to classroom-based learning after extended periods of absence.

“In particular it responded to students returning to college following the disruption caused by Covid-19”.

He highlighted how the project had placed great importance in rebuilding routines, managing friendships, and getting used to being a student again.

And how the project could be adapted for other situations, he added, such as students returning to college after a long absence or joining a course other student had already started.

Ambitious College, based in London, received the home learning award for what judge and former Department for Education official Helen Brooks called a “tailored programme for each student” including “Zones of Regulation” to help regulate students’ mood, “bright and clear instructions” for tasks such as making tortilla wraps from home, and occupational therapy television.

The full list of Natspec award winners is as follows:

Innovative use of technology – Bridge College
Pathways into employment – LEAP College
Student voice − Sense College
Wellbeing and mental health − Eat That Frog
Inter-disciplinary working − Portland College
Partnership working − Linkage College
Curriculum innovation − Orchard Hill College
Home learning − Ambitious College

Spielman set for two-year extension as Ofsted chief inspector

Amanda Spielman is set to stay on as Ofsted chief inspector for an extra two years, FE Week‘s sister title FE Week understands.

While the extension to the role is believed to have been agreed by government, it still has to be officially signed off by the Privy Council, the queen’s formal body of advisers.

Should it get approval, Spielman would become the longest serving Her Majesty’s Chief Inspector, at seven years – with Sir Chris Woodhead previously leading the watchdog for six years during the 1990s.

The HMCI began her five-year term in January 2017 and was originally due to hang up her hat at the end of this year.

Amanda Spielman

But, should she leave at the end of this year, the education inspection framework (EIF) which she introduced and helped mastermind would only have been in place for less than two terms because of Covid.

Covid disruption to Ofsted

Ofsted introduced the EIF in September 2019 but just six months later was forced to suspend all routine inspections when the Covid-19 pandemic took hold in March the following year.

FE Week understands Spielman is eager to extend her reign in order to ensure the changes she introduced have an opportunity to become fully implemented within the sector.

The new framework saw the inspectorate place more focus on curriculum and less emphasis on exams results and hard data.

How is a HMCI usually appointed?

The HMCI is appointed by the Queen for a term of five years, however there are a number of steps candidates must complete beforehand.

Nicky Morgan in 2016

First they must receive the green light from the education secretary, who will recommend them as the “preferred candidate.”

Agreement is then required from the parliamentary education committee who will meet with the candidate before deciding whether to proceed.

Finally agreement is sought from the Privy Council, the queen’s formal body of advisers. An appointment cannot be confirmed until an order is laid by the Privy Council.

Spielman received a recommendation from former education secretary Nicky Morgan in June 2016, before taking the helm the following January.

Post-qualification admissions: Ofqual says university reforms risk ‘unacceptable’ results delays

Ofqual has warned exam results could be delayed and students miss out on places if the government relies on slashing marking time to deliver a radical overhaul of university admissions.

The regulator said post-qualification admissions reforms would rely on results for level 3 courses, including AS and A-levels, being released up to three weeks sooner than usual.

Education secretary Gavin Williamson has said the PQA model would see universities base offers on actual results, ending the reliance on predicted grades which is “letting down” bright disadvantaged pupils.

Research from UCL’s Institute of Education showed almost a quarter of high-ability applicants from lower-income households had their results under-predicted between 2013 and 2015.

But Ofqual has now warned that cutting marking time alone to deliver the reforms would “introduce delivery risks that are simply too great and would be unacceptable”.

It says current marking quality cannot be “compromised” by the reduced time for both individual examiners and exam boards carrying out quality assurance.

A shorter marking window will also require more examiners, but Ofqual says it “could not be certain that there would be sufficient examiner capacity.” Recruitment is already sometimes “challenging” in some subjects.

This could see some results delivered late, “disadvantaging those whose results are delayed” in their bid to secure places.

The reforms could also erode the current “contingency time,” which factors in risks like particular subject marking being slower than expected or technology outages.

Ofqual accepts a “limited reduction in marking time could be explored,” but says it “cannot bear all the weight” and changes must come across the system.

It proposes bringing exam start dates forward by a week, starting AS and A Level exams earlier relative to qualifications like GCSEs, and scrapping the one-week gap between issuing results to UCAS and to students.

Introducing a fixed results date could also help, according to the regulator.

Overall Ofqual argues in its response to the DfE’s consultation that “a combination” of such adjustments would be needed to deliver PQA successfully.

It also proposes a pilot of any changes first to boost confidence and “identify unforeseen and unintended consequences”.

The DfE has said its preferred route is “to compress the exam timetable, the marking period and the requirement for UCAS to receive results data well in advance of results day”.

Two models have been proposed, with one delaying only offers until after results and a second delaying both applications and offers.

The consultation on reforms began in January and ends today.

The Queen’s Speech is welcome – but passing legislation is only the first step

Following the Queen’s Speech, there are a number of issues to keep an eye on when the Skills Bill arrives, writes Aveek Bhattacharya

In one sense, not much has changed in terms of government FE and adult education policy as a result of the Queen’s speech.

Last July, in a speech to the Social Market Foundation, education secretary Gavin Williamson promised a “comprehensive plan to change the fundamentals of England’s further education landscape”.

Then in September, the prime minister announced a lifelong loan entitlement, offering every student four years’ financial support on equivalent terms to the university student loan system by 2025.

And in January, the government published its Skills for Jobs white paper which set out a raft of proposals. These included reforms to higher technical education to encourage greater provision and take up of level 4 and 5 courses, and Local Skills Improvement Plans to be drawn up by employers, FE colleges and other providers and local stakeholders.

This week’s announcement of a new Skills and Post-16 Education Bill to be introduced in this parliament doesn’t tell us any more about those measures.

But it is significant – and welcome – nonetheless because it tells us that education and skills will be a legislative priority for the coming year.

For all the government’s fine ambitions on lifelong learning and vocational education, it wasn’t a given that it would make it onto this year’s parliamentary to-do list.

And it is no small thing that the government chose to focus on the Skills Bill in its briefings prior to the Queen’s Speech.

If you have any doubts, just ask the people still waiting for a plan for adult social care.

Adult and further education’s moment in the political spotlight is long overdue.

Previous  SMF research has shown that funding for adult education (excluding apprenticeships) has nearly halved since 2009-10 whilst participation rates have suffered, falling by 49 per cent since 2004. 

It is estimated that £1.3 billion is required to reverse funding cuts since 2009-10. 

The devil, as ever, will be in the details.

January’s white paper is full of laudable ambitions: ending disparities between HE and FE, simplifying funding and making it more stable and predictable, creating more modular and flexible courses.

However, we are yet to see the specifics of how these are to be achieved. For those, we must wait a few more days until the draft Bill is published.

There are a number of issues to keep an eye on when we do know more.

Equally important is providing the necessary resources to return to or even exceed previous funding levels

First, what provisions is the government making for learners in the intervening four years until the Lifelong Loan Entitlement is fully up and running?

Structural change takes time, but as we attempt to rebuild economically from the pandemic, expanding opportunities for retraining can hardly wait for the Whitehall machine to spark into life.

Second, how effective are the measures in combining flexibility for learners and stability for providers?

Will all students and courses be able to benefit from modular, evening or home learning, or will some be prioritised?

We need to know whether the government can offer more financial security and reduce complexity in a way that allows and encourages institutions to invest in new types of courses.

Third, will the government produce collaboration or conflict between universities and colleges?

Our interviews with sector leaders highlighted a brewing “turf war” between the two over who should deliver the new higher technical qualifications that the government wants to see provided.

Given the interest learners have in a system with strong connections between universities and colleges that permits easy movement and sharing of knowledge and resources between the two, stoking tensions could have terrible consequences.

Passing legislation is only the first part of fulfilling the government’s ambitions on FE and adult education.

Equally – and perhaps more – important is providing the necessary resources to return to or even exceed previous funding levels.

On that front, we will have to wait a few more months until the spending review to get a full sense of the government’s intentions. But for now, it is a very promising start.

ESFA to launch another European Social Fund tender

A fresh European Social Fund tender worth £17 million is in the works and is expected to launch next month.

The Education and Skills Funding Agency today revealed plans for the procurement which would be open to eight local enterprise partnership (LEP) areas that have gaps in provision.

It is, however, subject to funding being secured from the European Social Fund “managing authority” – the European Commission.

The ESFA completed a European Social Funding procurement in January 2019, where a total of £309 million of contracts for use up to 31 July 2021 were won by 49 training providers.

Contracts were then extended to March 2023 supported by additional funding of £137 million.

In its weekly update, the ESFA said today there are eight LEP areas of the country where learning provision was not extended or existing provision will finish significantly ahead of March 2023.

The new procurement is intended to “ensure that gaps in provision are filled and learners supported”.

Training providers who are successful in the bidding process will “have the opportunity to provide a flexible support and respond to Covid-19 recovery for learners most affected by the pandemic (NEETs, unemployed and low skilled workers in employment),” the ESFA added.

Officials will be hoping to avoid the controversy caused by the ESF procurement in 2019.

The ESFA delayed issuing contracts several times, after multiple providers claimed that the government broke tender rules, namely by excluding the “track record” section when marking bids, while the ESFA has admitted to “errors”, such as naming Serco Regional Services Limited as a winner instead of Serco Limited.

Providers were also aggrieved to find out that Learndirect’s new owner had secured contracts worth more than £20 million, in conjunction with his other company Dimensions Training Solutions.

Further questions were asked about the tender in March, after FE Week discovered an “unprecedented” amount of tie-breaks in the procurement.

One aggrieved provider even threatened legal action against the ESFA, but decided to drop this because of the likely cost and a fear of repercussions from the agency.

For the new £17 million tender, the agency anticipates that an invitation to tender will be made in mid-June 2021 and the contracts are expected to commence in mid-October this year.

The proposed eight LEP areas include:

Worcestershire LEP

York North Yorkshire & East Riding LEP (More Developed & Transition Areas)

London LEP – South

London LEP – North & East

Stoke-on-Trent & Staffordshire LEP

South East LEP

South East Midlands LEP

North East LEP

Solent LEP