An FE Commissioner report published today praised a council’s response to a grade four from Ofsted, after the result “reinvigorated” their resolve to improve adult learning with “new and enthusiastic” staff.

North Lincolnshire Council was referred to commissioner intervention after it was rated ‘inadequate’ in almost every area of a full inspection in June last year when it had 1,250 learners.

Its provision includes courses for English for Speakers of Other Languages at pre-entry level, and from entry-level to level 3 for qualifications in such subjects as mathematics, ICT, and business administration.

Commissioner Richard Atkins has reported the inspection result “reinvigorated the council’s resolve to redouble their efforts to ensure adult and community learning was at least good”.

People across the council’s service have “a renewed sense of purpose” due to a staff restructure where senior leaders made “significant changes”, such as introducing lead tutors with core responsibilities for areas like teaching and assessment, data, mathematics and English.

This restructure was managed “effectively”, the commissioner’s team found, with “shrewd” appointments at the managerial, tutor and support levels providing much needed clarity around roles and responsibilities.

But Atkins recommended the council must ensure these new staff receive sufficient support to help them grow into their managerial roles through tailored coaching and mentoring, which ought to be introduced by September.

Governance has also undergone a shake-up, after it was reported the council’s elected members and leaders were “not effective enough in monitoring the performance of the service and holding leaders and managers to account” before the Ofsted inspection.

A new governing board for the council’s adult education and community learning service has been put together, under the leadership of the “well-qualified” head of access and inclusion at the council and made up of governors with “a wide and rich skill set and significant relevant experience”.

Board members have been investigating leaders’ and managers’ knowledge, understanding and rigour, while their key performance indicators and risk measures proved to the commissioner they are dedicated to overseeing a curriculum which serves local needs well.

After Ofsted reported “too many” of the courses were just for recreational purposes only, provision was “completely overhauled” and local schools, employers such as British Steel, teachers and other staff were involved in designing the current course offer.

The council, the commissioner’s report reads, now makes much better use of labour market information and data to continually review the curriculum offer.

He wrote: “Courses are now wholly organised around the needs of the local residents, especially those living in the most deprived areas and who would otherwise not be in education.”

Former minister for the FE market Theodore Agnew wrote to the council earlier this month, after the report, and called the action they have taken following the inspection “encouraging”, while warning there is still “capacity for improvement”.

Especially in terms of the “overly optimistic” self-assessment reports, which are “insufficiently critical” about performance.

The commissioner found although achievement data improved by 4.5 per cent between 2017/18 and 2018/19, it is still well below national achievement rate levels.

Tracking and monitoring of all learners is yet to be embedded and the council has been given until the commissioner’s stocktake visit in November to do this.

As is the case with the council’s progress in accurately identifying key weaknesses in the self-assessment report, also due in November.

Since the full inspection, Ofsted has returned to the council and found it was making ‘reasonable progress’ in every area of a monitoring visit.

The council has been contacted for comment.

A Blackburn-based catholic sixth form college is no longer “sustainable” due to falling student numbers, the FE commissioner has claimed.

St Mary’s College, which is the smallest sixth form college in England, received two visits from Richard Atkins’ team in 2019 and has now been placed in “supervised status”.

It was first warned four years ago of its deteriorating financial position and urged at that time to find a merger partner or academise. It has survived on its own since then, but its ability to continue doing so appears to have come to a head in the past few months.

The college is now operating under extreme financial pressure

Plans were previously developed to create a formal federation between Liverpool Hope University and Cheadle and Marple Sixth Form College but this “did not address the financial weaknesses at St Mary’s directly”, today’s report said.

The FE Commissioner has now concluded the college could not continue as a stand-alone entity beyond the current year and “urgently requires” a restructure, with a merger the most likely solution.

St Mary’s College was declared to be at “serious risk of financial failure” while a “weak” balance sheet was said to provide “no resilience against unforeseen events and raises questions as to future solvency”.

Atkins’ report reported that it was clear the college is “now operating under extreme financial pressure”, which it said was the result of years of falling student numbers.

ESFA 16 to 19 student allocation numbers show a steady decline over the last three academic years: in 2017/18, there were 892 recorded, which decreased to 818 in the following year and 703 this year – a 21 per cent drop.

Against a capacity of 1,250, there was only 653 students on roll at the time of the FE commissioner’s visit in November.

But comments by these learners regarding teaching, learning and support were positive and they unanimously believed they would achieve their desired outcomes and destinations, according to the FE commissioner. 

The Blackburn-based college “provides good academic experience and outcomes to students, many of whom are very local to the college and reluctant to travel”, today’s report said.

Ofsted had declared it was a ‘good’ provider after a full inspection in April.

While St Mary’s College currently forecasts that the number of students will rise in 2020/21, the report cautioned that the degree of optimism must be balanced against inaccurate historic growth predictions.

The FE Commissioner found that the provider has only been able to operate because of income received from its preschool nurseries and higher education provision but that these could not be relied upon, with funding from the ESFA “insufficient” to sustain its mainstream level 3 programme.

In addition, the sixth form college’s governance was reported to be “in a transition” and criticised for being “not strong enough” in its current form to support structural change, despite calling governors “well qualified, purposeful and united in their wish to drive the college forward”.

Vice principal Elissa Best has taken on the responsibilities of interim principal while Mark Conboy was appointed the new chair of governors.

In a letter published alongside today’s report, former Department for Education minister Lord Agnew said it was “clear that previous efforts to secure the college’s financial position since being placed in intervention have failed”.

“The college is currently operating under extreme financial duress and is unsustainable without immediate exploration of possible structural solutions,” he added.

Agnew was particularly “concerned” by the FE Commissioner team’s observation that the college’s current governance arrangements are “unsuited to supporting structural change”, and “strongly advised” the college now works with a National Leader of Governance to “urgently address” these “deficiencies”.

Previous efforts to secure the college’s financial position have failed

FE Week understands it is St Mary’s status as a fully inclusive Catholic college which is proving problematic when it comes to mergers and academisation.

The college confirmed a structure and prospects appraisal, taking place from February to April, “will consider a range of options”.

A spokesperson for St Mary’s College told FE Week: “The challenging financial situation faced by St Mary’s College has been well documented; the college remains a ‘going concern’ and continues to provide good quality education for many learners.

“Work with the ESFA and FE Commissioners team continues to explore long term, sustainable solutions for the college, with all staff continuing, as always, to focus on the delivery of quality educational provision for the local communities that we serve.”

They declined to provide an update on this or comment on a potential merger.

In the latest financial accounts for 2018/19, the provider recorded a £347,264 deficit, an increase from £249,781 in 2017/18.

The statement also noted that Barclays bank, through which the college has £2.88 million worth of loans outstanding, continues to be supportive despite breaches in covenants and a reservation of rights letter.

Funding rates for some apprenticeship standards could be cut by almost half under new proposals being put forward by the Institute for Apprenticeships and Technical Education.

A consultation on plans for a “more transparent” system for setting apprenticeship funding rates for standards, based on “independent evidence”, was launched today.

But the institute also published an impact assessment detailing how significant rate reductions could result and made it clear the new method “strengthens value for money, by supporting employers to pay the appropriate costs for training and enabling more employers to access funding”.

Officials have proposed three models: ‘core’ method which includes five categories (see below), core with sector subject weighting, and core with employer input. The values used in the models are based work undertaken by the IFF Research, a research agency, on behalf of the IfATE.

The impact assessment was carried out to test each model on nine existing standards last year.

FE Week analysis shows that eight of the nine standards would see their funding rate drop under all three of the proposed models.

Rates dropped by an average of 30 per cent using the ‘core’ method.

And when the core with subject weighting, or the core with employer input models were applied, the average rate across the 9 standards fell by 18 per cent and 2 per cent respectively.

For three of the tested standards, their funding rates dropped by more than 40 per cent using the ‘core’ model.

Association of Employment and Learning Providers chief policy officer Simon Ashworth said: “We welcome the greater transparency but nonetheless it’s worrying that the interim impact analysis modelling points to a significant downward trend in funding.

“If this were representative of the final outcome, the implications for high quality delivery could be bad. Therefore AELP will be studying this very closely.”

The institute has said that there is “no intention” to reset current funding bands using the final new model in the short-term.

It would be for use on “wholly new or fundamentally changed apprenticeship standards rather than to review the existing stock of standards”. But where a request for a standard to be reviewed or revised is submitted, “we anticipate that a variation of the model would be used”.

A spokesperson for the Institute for Apprenticeships and Technical Education (IfATE) said: “The purpose of this consultation is to make sure funding recommendations are evidence-based and transparent.

“We want the decision making process to be clearer to employers, providers, awarding organisations and everyone else involved with delivering apprenticeships.

“It is a positive step to help address previous concerns about funding band decisions and we welcome as much constructive input as possible.”

The sector has until 6 April to respond to the consultation.

 

Core model

The IFF’s research found that eligible costs of apprenticeship training and assessment could be divided into five categories: teaching, consumables, formative assessment, end-point assessment (EPA), and administration (and eligible overheads).

The institute’s proposed approach is to “set a value for each of these five categories” and the maximum funding band would be “the sum of the five values” (see table).

The pricing of consumables would range from £100 to £400 and be advised by individual trailblazer groups for each standard, while EPA would be based on a quote provided by the end-point assessment organisation.

For teaching, formative assessment and administration, the IFF research suggested that these costs tend to increase as duration increases. So, the values for these three categories will be generated by multiplying a monthly rate by the planned duration (in months) of the apprenticeship.

The costs for these three categories have been set at £130 per month for teaching, £30 for formative assessment, and £30 for administration.

Where an apprenticeship requires the achievement of one or more mandatory qualifications, the IfATE has said £300 can be added (only once per apprenticeship) to the formative assessment value.

The institute says this “predictable and simple” core model would enable it to make transparent recommendations in a consistent way and achieve greater value for money.

However, officials noted that in some cases there may be other factors which lead to differences in costs and the core model “might not be able to capture those differences”.

To address this, it has set out set out a further two options “for capturing differences in delivery costs for different types of apprenticeship”.

 

Core with sector subject weighting

For this option, Sector Subject Area (SSA) in ‘programme cost weightings’ (PCW) would be applied to teaching costs, as this category had the “greatest variation” between standards in the IFF’s research.

This weighting is already used for publicly funded adult education and is also used provide uplifts for subjects identified by the Office for Students as “high cost” teaching areas in higher education.

One of five rates, ranging from £130 to £220 per month, would be applied to each of the IfATE’s 15 apprenticeship routes.

The IfATE states that the benefits of this option are a “completely automated and transparent process” which “better reflects the variation between costs than the core model”.

The option would also “significantly decrease the burden on trailblazer groups providing indicative training cost data”.

However, the institute added, this weighting “wouldn’t be sufficiently flexible to respond to costs which are unusual for a sector”, so some funding bands could still come out higher or lower than the current band.

 

Core with employer input

The IFF’s research found that, on average, contact time with apprentices was split approximately 90 per cent in group teaching and 10 per cent in one-to-one settings. It also found that when apprentices were taught in groups, the average class size was 12. The £130 per calendar month rate, in the core model, is based on these averages.

If a trailblazer group considers that, for their apprenticeship standard, this value would be “insufficient” and teaching would need to be delivered differently to this ratio, and they could provide evidence to support this, then then their teaching costs value would increase.

And similarly, if employers consider that consumables for their apprenticeship standard are typically unusually high for their route, their cost could increase as long as sufficient evidence is supplied and signed off by the IfATE.

The trailblazer group would need to provide an itemised list of consumables required per apprentice and their cost as the evidence.

 

A National College surviving on government bailouts has been placed in supervised status after the FE Commissioner found it is now facing possible insolvency.

The commissioner’s report into the National College for Advanced Transport and Infrastructure (NCATI) has been published this morning, as has a Financial Health Notice to Improve for the college, after it was placed into formal intervention in December 2019.

Commissioner Richard Atkins said NCATI’s board has been advised on how to operate while facing a “potential insolvency” and “radical change is urgently required”.

He added that “without a commitment of 12 months of continued emergency funding the board will not be able to sign off on their 2018/19 financial statements as a going concern”.

This was exactly the same situation as when the then-National College for High Speed Rail (which later became NCATI) needed £4.55 million from the DfE to sign off its 2017/18 accounts.

It was found 72 per cent of the college’s income was spent on its 12 senior management roles, what the report calls “an exceptionally high overhead cost to carry”.

As of December, the college had 216 apprentices and 94 other full-time students – even though the 2019/20 budget was based on 761 apprentices and 263 full-time learners.

The shortfall is blamed on “the uncertainty around the future of HS2,” the high-speed rail line linking London with the midlands and the north and has led to the two campuses, in Birmingham and Doncaster, being “significantly under-utilised”.

Fifty non-teaching staff work at NCATI, “a very high level of resource for a college with such low levels of delivery activity,” the report says; but the college leaders argued they must be ready in case there was an upturn in HS2’s fortunes. The project was given the go-ahead by the prime minister this month.

In a letter attached to the commissioner’s findings, Department for Education minister Michelle Donelan (pictured) said she fully supported the commissioner’s recommendation to place NCATI into supervised college status “in light of the severity of the college’s financial situation”.

The commissioner is also undertaking a structure and prospects appraisal with the college, and the financial health notice to improve stipulates staff will have to invite ESFA to attend governing body and any other appropriate meetings.

The commissioner’s report was put out the same morning as a grade four Ofsted report about NCATI, which it had tried to prevent the publication of through the High Court – a legal challenge it dropped after FE Week broke the story.

This legal action incurred “significant” legal costs, the commissioner’s report said, and given the college is receiving emergency funding, this is “clearly a very difficult and sensitive issue”.

The college’s chief executive Clair Mowbray is currently on “sick leave”, and commercial finance director Martin Owen is acting chief executive. The college refused to say when Mowbray went on leave.

A DfE spokesperson said they are “working closely with the college and the commissioner to ensure students can continue their training and deliver a long-term sustainable solution so the transport and infrastructure sector can access the skilled workforce they need for the future”.

And a spokesperson for NCATI said: “We are also committed to working in partnership with the FE Commissioner on sustainable future options through a Structure, Prospects and Appraisal (SPA) process to secure the best outcomes for learners and apprentices studying at the NCATI.”

Momentum is building behind FE Week’s rally of support for holding the WorldSkills competition in the UK, after a leading employer membership organisation threw its weight behind the movement.

The Confederation of British Industry, which has over 700 member companies ranging from Shell to Greggs, has joined the #BackABid campaign, with chief policy officer Matthew Fell saying hosting WorldSkills “would unite the country in a race to the top on skills”.

#BackABid is gathering sector support for a bid to make the UK the host of the 2027 WorldSkills competition, where young people from around the globe will compete in vocation-based challenges.

China is due to host the next WorldSkills competition in 2021, while France has already been confirmed as the host of the 2023 tournament.

The full range of #BackABid supporters will be showcased to education secretary Gavin Williamson in early March, after which it is hoped he will commission a feasibility study on the return the country would get on its investment in the competition and how it aligns with public policy and skills policy objectives.

Williamson has told FE Week he is “looking forward to hearing the extent of the support for this from the sector”.

Big names which have already expressed their support include shadow FE minister Emma Hardy, who said the competition was “a wonderful opportunity for young people to highlight their skills and talents on the world stage”.

Association of Colleges president Steve Frampton said it would be “fantastic” to bring WorldSkills back to the UK, after it was last held here in London in 2011.

TV presenter and long-time supporter of the FE sector Steph McGovern called it a “brilliant way” to close the skills gap by showing people “the best of what is out there”.

Association of Employment and Learning Providers chief executive Mark Dawe has said it is the “right time” to bring the competition back to the UK.

And the chief executive of the Institute of Apprenticeships and Technical Education Jennifer Coupland said her organisation backs the bid, calling the possibility of hosting “incredibly exciting”.

#BackABid started when WorldSkills UK chief executive Neil Bentley-Gockmann announced last month his organisation was “interested in exploring” a bid to hold the WorldSkills competition.

But, he added, they would need to hear from the sector if there was broad support for one.

This triggered FE Week to launch its #BackABid campaign to find out whether colleges, providers and politicians would be in favour of hosting WorldSkills later this decade.

And we still need to hear the support from the sector, so if you wish to add your voice to the chorus of sector leaders backing a bid, visit FEWeek.co.uk/BackABid or comment on social media using #BackABid.

The grade four Ofsted report a National College went to the High Court to suppress has been published this morning.

FE Week broke the news earlier this month that the HS2 College, renamed as the National College for Advanced Transport and Infrastructure (NCATI), had been found ‘inadequate’ by inspectors in November and had filed for a judicial review to stop the result from seeing the light of day.

Following our reporting, the college dropped its court case and the watchdog has now made the report public.

It reveals “managers and staff do not act quickly enough to protect apprentices from harassment,” nor do they provide apprentices with the help, protection and support that they need.

In one incident, trainers and managers “failed to recognise or take effective action” to curb the harmful impact harassment was having on an apprentice.

“Staff did not prioritise the welfare and safeguarding needs of the apprentice over the needs of others in the class,” the report reads, while also stating the college’s safeguarding arrangements are “not effective”.

During a recent safeguarding incident, trainers and managers failed to recognise or take effective action to address the harmful impact of harassment being experienced by an apprentice while attending the college. Staff did not prioritise the welfare and safeguarding needs of the apprentice over the needs of others in the class.”

“Too many” of the apprentices, of which the college had 167 at the time of inspection, experience a “disjointed and insufficiently ordered curriculum”.

Apprentices in practical engineering roles like locomotive maintenance and repair, are not trained in engineering skills such as hand-fitting and machining, which they need in the workplace.

Instead, “employers often provide this training themselves to fill this skills gap.”

Inspectors found NCATI’s technical trainers are not “sufficiently adept” at planning and delivering challenging learning which enables the apprentices to develop their skills.

“On technical-based apprenticeship courses, too many apprentices experience a disjointed and insufficiently ordered curriculum”

“Apprentices in practical engineering roles, such as locomotive maintenance and repair, do not receive training in engineering skills such as hand-fitting and machining that they need in the workplace. Employers often provide this training themselves to fill this skills gap”

“Technical trainers are not sufficiently adept at planning and delivering challenging learning that enables apprentices to make assured progress in their skills development.”

The Ofsted report also lists the name of five subcontractors that deliver training on behalf of NCATI, such as the Leeds College of Building.

However, Ofsted fail to make any direct reference at all to quality of their training.

As statement from the NCATI board says: “We have made a lot of progress in our 2 years, with much to be proud of, despite significant challenges in our environment.

“We regard the Ofsted process and provisional grade as flawed, with serious implications for our ability to operate. As a last resort we took legal action in the interest of our learners and industry.

“We are working with the FE Commissioner (FEC) and others and are optimistic of securing a long term sustainable future for our provision, without disruption to our current learners. This has allowed us to drop the legal action.”

The government has published an FE Commissioner report into NCATI this morning.

More to follow…

Staff and students from four colleges brushed shoulders with royalty today as they picked up their Queen’s Anniversary Prizes in a special ceremony at Buckingham Palace.

London South East Colleges, Dudley College of Technology, Tyne Coast College and Belfast Metropolitan College were among 22 education providers to receive the accolade from the Prince of Wales and Duchess of Cornwall.

The awards are dedicated to outstanding higher and further education providers, which are recommended by the prime minister and approved by the Queen.

Today’s reception followed a glittering celebratory dinner at Guildhall in London last night.

FE Week was in attendance this morning, where 19-year-old Beth Jones, a level 3 mechanical engineering student from Dudley College, said she was “absolutely overwhelmed” and “lost for words” after meeting Prince Charles.

She stated she spoke to the royal about her course and long-standing passion for the subject.

Lowell Williams, who retired as chief executive of Dudley last month, said the prince “showed genuine interest” in the learners’ studies.

Dudley was awarded the prize for “contributing to the economy of the region” in the West Midlands.

Williams told FE Week he was pleased to be in attendance alongside higher education providers such as Oxford University, as further education has a “very important role to play” and was being recognised with “other key components of the skills sector”.

Another winner, London South East Colleges, was chosen in recognition of their technical and vocational education offer, including its “pioneering” strategic engagement programme within the construction industry.

Level 2 plumbing student Melissa Cummins, 19, said she was told by the Duchess of Cornwall that the royal had never met a woman plumber before and called being at the palace a “once in a lifetime experience”.

Jodie Binstead, 20, a quantity surveyor, added that the Duchess had said to the students that it was “great to have women in the industry”. 

Errol Ince, vice principal for STEM at LSEC, told FE Week: “I feel very privileged to collect this award.

“It is excellent recognition for the work that we do.”

He described the ceremony as a memory he would have for the rest of his life.

Tyne Coast College, created from a merger of South Tyneside College and Tyne Metropolitan College, was honoured for creating digital modelling and advanced training for the planning of new port facilities and for the safe management of ship movements.

Principal John Roach, who was also celebrating his 60th birthday at the palace, said being awarded the accolade was “absolutely fantastic” and meeting the royals was “a real buzz”.

The only other college to win an award outside of England was Belfast Metropolitan College.

A total of 275 prizes have been awarded to 49 further education colleges and 98 universities since the awards were created in 1993. They are granted every two years.

The 22 award-winning UK further and higher education institutions were recognised in 2018-2020 for “ground-breaking work and pioneering research” in a range of disciplines including science, engineering, education, the humanities, the environment and medicine.

Entries to the scheme are invited in any subject area and are subject to assessment in a process managed by the Royal Anniversary Trust, an independent charity.

Read next week’s edition for more from the palace.

Featured image: LSEC principal Sam Parrett and vice principal Errol Ince collecting their award from the Prince of Wales and Duchess of Cornwall