Four more apprenticeship providers have been banned from taking on new starts after facing criticism from Ofsted – bringing the total number barred up to 16.

The latest update to the register of apprenticeship training providers, on Friday, shows the four new providers which will be facing the penalty after being deemed as making ‘insufficient progress’ during early monitoring visits from the education watchdog.

This means the Education and Skills Funding Agency has temporarily barred all 16 providers who have made poor headway in at least one area in reports that have been published up until October 11.

Cumbria-based NC Training has been banned after it was found to be making ‘insufficient progress’ in every category.

Inspectors warned that leaders and managers “are not complying with the levy-funded apprenticeship requirements” and criticised quality improvement measures, “ineffective” governance, slow progress of apprentices and safeguarding measures which “lack rigour”.

NC Training started delivering levy-funded apprenticeships in July 2017, but also held eight subcontracts worth £1.6 million last year.

Lancashire’s Ensis Solutions has also been banned after being found to be ‘insufficient’ in one category – the progress of leaders and managers in ensuing apprentices benefit from high-quality training that leads to positive outcomes.

The report said leaders and managers had made “many recent improvements” to the quality of apprenticeships, but found that “too many weaknesses remain” and progress is “still not rapid enough”.

Both GTG Training and Kashmir Youth Project have been temporarily banned after receiving two ‘insufficient progress’ ratings.

Inspectors said that leaders at GTG Training, based in Wolverhampton, had “failed to recognise key weaknesses in the provision”, failed to make sure that trainers plan learning and assessment “sufficiently well” and did not have an “accurate view” of the progress of apprentices.

And Rochdale’s Kashmir Youth Project faced criticism for not ensuring “compliance with apprenticeship principles and requirements”, not acting quickly enough to eliminate weaknesses and not ensuring that apprentices receive high-quality training.

The banning of these four providers is the third group to be announced, after six providers were banned in September and followed by another six earlier this month.

Since October 11, four more reports have been published which reveal ‘insufficient’ progress being made by providers, but they are not yet on the ESFA’s banned list.

Guidance published by the ESFA in August confirmed that any provider making ‘insufficient progress’ would be barred from taking on new apprentices, either directly or through subcontracting arrangements.

These restrictions will continue until the provider receives a full inspection and been awarded at least a grade three for its apprenticeship provision. Full inspections should take place within a year of the monitoring visit.

The ESFA can overrule this guidance, but only if it “identifies an exceptional extenuating circumstance”.

Ofsted has been given £5.4 million in government funding as it prepares to carry out early monitoring visits of every new apprenticeship provider, which could number as many as 1,200.

 

The 10-per-cent fee that small businesses must pay when they take on apprentices will be halved, the chancellor has announced.

Philip Hammond (pictured) told the Commons today that SMEs must now only contribute 5 per cent to the training, as part of a “£695 million package to support apprenticeships”.

The Treasury originally told FE Week the change would come into effect from April 2019, but has since backtracked on this and said no fixed date has been decided on yet.

It comes after the skills minister Anne Milton told the Association of Employment and Learning Providers conference in June that issues with the fee have been “noted”, but there would be no announcement on a rule change anytime soon.

I can announce that for smaller firms taking on apprentices we will halve the amount they have to contribute

Announcing the change in his Budget speech today, Mr Hammond said: “As well as backing businesses to invest and grow, we will also make sure British workers are equipped with the skills they need to thrive and prosper.

“We’ve introduced a new system of T-level vocational training, introduced the first £100 million into the new national retraining scheme and through the apprenticeship levy we are delivering three million new high quality apprenticeships in this parliament.

“That system is paid for by employers and it has to work for employers.

“Today, in addition to the flexibilities I announced earlier this month, I can announce that for smaller firms taking on apprentices we will halve the amount they have to contribute from 10 per cent to 5 per cent.

“In total this is a £695 million package to support apprenticeships.”

It is expected that the change to a 5 per cent contribution will only apply to new starters when the change comes into effect.

It is, however, not yet known if the contribution will also apply to levy-paying employers when their levy pot is empty.

The Treasury told FE Week these details would be decided on in early 2019.

The AELP has been heavily campaigning to remove the employer contribution rule as it believes it puts SMEs off apprenticeships, and is the reason why starts have fallen so much since the introduction of the levy.

Its chief executive, Mark Dawe, is ecstatic with today’s announcement.

‘This is a major and positive shift which AELP has been pushing hard for since before the levy was introduced and it should enable providers to work with smaller businesses to start getting back to offering apprenticeships to young people and local communities,” he said.

“We are grateful to Anne Milton and Robert Halfon for their significant efforts in making this happen.”

Shadow skills minister Gordon Marsden welcomed the change but labelled it as a “minor improvement”.

“This responds to the strong lobbying there has been from the sector, and in particular the AELP,” he said.

It’s a minor improvement but it doesn’t address some of the key issues for small businesses

“It’s a minor improvement but it doesn’t address some of the key issues for small businesses with back-office admin or the failure of government to incentivise small businesses by creative use and support of the apprenticeship levy.”

The change follows Mr Hammond’s announcement at the Conservative Party Conference earlier this month that the annual apprenticeship levy transfer facility will rise from 10 to 25 per cent from April 2019.

He said he will also consult with businesses about further changes to the levy from 2020, following the slow take up and employer criticisms.

The apprenticeship levy is paid by employers with an annual payroll of £3 million or more, who can then spend their contributions on apprenticeship training.

Smaller employers can also access the funds generated through the levy, although they have had to pay 10-per-cent towards the cost of the training ever since its introduction.

There was no mandatory charge before May last year, simply an assumed contribution for apprentices aged 19 and over.

Since last May, only 16- to 18-year-olds at employers with fewer than 50 staff are fully funded and therefore free to train.

The national minimum wage for apprentices will rise again in April, from £3.70 to £3.90 per hour, the chancellor announced in his budget statement today.

The 20 pence extra is a 5.4 per cent rise and follows last year’s increase from £3.50, after Philip Hammond accepted recommendations from the independent Low Pay Commission.

The jump to £3.90 is larger by proportion than all other minimum wage groups.

For 18- to 20-year-olds, the increase is from £5.90 per hour to £6.15, while 16- to 17-year-olds will see their minimum wage go up from £4.20 per hour to £4.35.

And for 21- to 24-year-olds, it is going up from £7.38 per hour to £7.70.

Mr Hammond also announced further changes to the apprenticeship levy today, and will now require small businesses to pay just 5 per cent towards the training of a new starter.

This was part of a £695 million package to support apprenticeships, after the government previously said the annual apprenticeship levy transfer facility will rise from 10 to 25 per cent.

Up to £5 million is meanwhile going to the Institute for Apprenticeships and National Apprenticeship Service in 2019-20, to “identify gaps in the training provider market and increase the number of employer-designed apprenticeship standards available to employers”.

Today’s Budget reiterated that £100 million has been allocated to the first phase of the National Retraining Scheme.

It also detailed £20 million worth of new “skills pilots”.

This will include a £3 million scheme to help “employers in Greater Manchester and surrounding areas to address local digital skills gaps through short training courses”, and a £10 million pilot again in Greater Manchester, working with the Federation of Small Businesses, to “test what forms of government support are most effective in increasing training levels for the self-employed”.

Lastly, a £7 million match funding pilot “alongside employers to provide on-the-job training to young people not currently in employment, education or training in Greater Manchester, and to move them into sustainable career paths with employers”.

The government will also provide £38 million of capital funding to support implementation of the first three T-levels in 2020 across 52 providers, as announced earlier this month.

The Greater London Authority has become the first devolved area to launch a tender for its adult education budget.

Its procurement, worth an initial £130 million over four years, went live on Saturday and will run for two months until December 21.

London’s indicative total AEB is £311 million per year, although the final amount being delegated will only be confirmed by Department for Education in early 2019.

The chunk that is not going out to tender will be dished out to colleges and other institutions that currently receive adult education funding via a grant from the Education and Skills Funding Agency.

This value could go up to £200m over four years, subject to the final AEB allocation

“This contract notice relates to the procurement by the GLA of adult education and training services, expected to result in the award of multiple contracts for services, amounting to an estimated total value of approximately £130 million,” the authority’s tender notice says.

However, this value “could go up to £200 million over four years”, subject to the final AEB allocation to GLA confirmed by the DfE.

“Successful providers will enter into individual contracts to deliver a range of education and training services to both in-work and out of work London residents aged 19 or above, to help them gain qualifications, progress into further education and ultimately access and sustain employment,” the notice continued.

“The procured AEB funding will be used as match to some of London’s European Social Fund allocation.

“All AEB provision procured through this ITT will, therefore need to be compliant with the ESF regulations.”

The contracts will be split into two lots: adult education provision to out-of-work Londoners, which is expected to “constitute approximately 75 per cent of the total procurement value”, and adult education provision for in-work Londoners, which will be worth around 25 per cent of the total.

For each of the two lots, successful providers will be “expected to offer education and training services to equip Londoners with the skills and knowledge they need to gain qualifications, progress into further education” and either access work, or “achieve career progression”.

Applicants will be able to bid for “one or both lots and if awarded funding to deliver training services to both priority groups, this is envisaged to be under a single contract”.

The GLA is one of seven areas that will gain control of its AEB from 2019/20, through devolution deals.

Both Tees Valley and the Liverpool City Region combined authorities told FE Week earlier this month they would be launching their procurement processes by the end of October, but their tenders are so far yet to surface.

Cambridgeshire and Peterborough Combined Authority didn’t say when it would be going out to tender, but did say it was “currently finalising its procurement plan”, and the West Midlands Combined Authority will launch its procurement process “early in the new year”.

The Greater Manchester Combined Authority will also launch its AEB tender in the new year, while the West of England Combined Authority said it was still finalising its approach.

Earlier this year, the GLA revealed that it planned to move away from paying providers to deliver qualifications, to paying for wider outcomes such as progression into work.

It is expecting providers to collect destinations data “more completely”, and is considering introducing an “outcomes development fund” to provide extra resources for providers to help them develop new data collection systems.

FE Week reported last month that unlimited management fees in subcontracting are set to end under the GLA’s plans for devolution – as it looks to introduce a 20 per cent cap.

This newspaper also revealed earlier this year that the GLA is having to recruit a huge team of new bureaucrats to hand out the budget to London’s training providers from 2019, with most of their wages paid every year by top-slicing £3 million from the AEB.

It has been a mixed week for independent learning providers, after four were found lacking in Ofsted inspections – one of which fell from ‘outstanding’ to ‘requires improvement’.

However, it was more positive news for four other ITPs and a general FE college, which were found to be making good headway in their own monitoring visits.

Rotherham-based Develop-U’s early monitoring visit of its new apprenticeship provision was found to be poor in every category during a worrying visit from inspectors on September 19.

The provider, which has been a subcontractor and on a commercial basis since 2005, is currently training 51 levy-funded apprentices.

Inspectors said recruitment is left to employers, meaning that leaders and managers “are unsure about the suitability of apprentices on some programmes, including a minority of apprentices who behave in ways that are unprofessional and inappropriate”.

“Disruptive behaviour impedes the progress and prospects of these apprentices,” inspectors warned. “Managers blame the apprentices for this slow progress; however, apprentices are not sufficiently motivated and engaged by the teaching they receive.”

The report said apprentices “do not benefit from accurate information, advice and guidance”, and “repeatedly” fail English and maths examinations.

Safeguarding was also a concern at the provider, and the report said that, during the visit “inspectors became aware of an at-risk apprentice about whom leaders were not aware”.

So far, all apprenticeship providers found to be making ‘insufficient progress’ in at least one area up until the end of September have been barred from taking on new starts until their next full inspection. The Education and Skills Funding Agency will now have to decide whether to also ban Develop-U.

It was a fall from grace for the Summerhouse Equestrian and Training Centre, which received its grade three rating after an inspection on September 18. The Gloucestershire-based provider had been rated ‘outstanding’ at its last inspection in September 2009.

This time inspectors warned that leaders had struggled to manage the growth of the company, monitor the quality of teaching or understand the strengths and weaknesses of their subcontractors’ provision, and said both quality and outcomes had “declined”.

The report said “too many” apprentices with subcontractors either do not achieve their qualifications or take too long to do so, and “not enough of teaching is of a good enough standard”.

However, Summerhouse received ‘good’ ratings for its adult learning programmes and the personal development, behaviour and welfare of learners, and Ofsted said the provider managed its own apprenticeships well and provided effective career guidance.

Derbyshire’s Lifelong Opportunities was also given a grade three rating after an inspection on September 18. The learning provider was purchased by two directors in January this year, and inspectors found that “directors have taken sensible actions to bring about improvement, but these actions have not year had the desired impact”.

Tower College of Further and Higher Education London, based in Lewisham, was found to be making ‘insufficient progress’ in a monitoring visit carried out after it was rated ‘requires improvement’ in February.

The report said leaders had “not been successful enough in bringing about improvements” or critical enough to understand what they need to do to improve. There are no plans to standardise the quality of lesson observations, and tutors do not ensure that all learners are making good progress.

There was better news in monitoring visits for other training providers, including London’s Recalvi Enterprise and VQ Solutions which were both found to be making ‘significant progress’ in two categories they were assessed on.

Recalvi’s leaders and managers have “made excellent use of the knowledge and skills they acquired during their time as highly effective subcontractors” to create a “successful” apprenticeship programme providing “good-quality teaching and learning”. 

VQ Solutions, which was monitored after being deemed ‘requires improvement’ after an inspection in December 2017, has made “significant progress” after investing in a management information system to keep up-to-date with the progress of apprentices and ensuring apprentices understand the risks of radicalisation and extremism. 

Warrington and Vale Royal College, Qualitrain and the NVQ Training Centre received ‘reasonable progress’ assessments in monitoring visits. 

GFE Colleges	Inspected	Published	Grade
Warrington and Vale Royal College	02/10/2018	21/10/2018	M

 

Independent Learning Providers	Inspected	Published	Grade	Previous grade
Tower College of Further and Higher Eduation London Limited	03/10/2018	24/10/2018	M
Lifelong Opportunities Ltd	18/09/2018	21/10/2018	3	N/A
The Recalvi Enterprise Ltd	19/09/2018	21/10/2018	M
Qualitrain Limited	26/09/2018	24/10/2018	M
The NVQ Training Centre Limited	03/10/2018	26/10/2018	M
Summerhouse Equestrian and Training Centre LLP	18/09/2018	21/10/2018	3	1
Develop-U	19/09/2018	24/10/2018	M
VQ Solutions Ltd	27/09/2018	24/10/2018	M

 

 

The government has approved around £330 million to cover the cost of implementing post-area review changes so far.

The figure, which amounts to 45 per cent of the £726 million on offer, was revealed in the latest Education and Skills Funding Agency progress report on the restructuring facility, which closed last month.

Although it is less than half of what is on offer, the final figure is expected to increase as last minute applications are signed off.

Up to 21 colleges have been approved to receive compensatory VAT funding

But it is likely that hundreds of millions from the fund will go unused.

Today’s announcement said that 76 applications have been received. A total of 30 of them were made from 31 sixth form colleges “expressing plans to convert to academy status”, but the “majority have not been allocated any funding to support this conversion”.

The ESFA received 46 applications to support restructuring within the college sector, but only 23 “have been approved to date”.

“From the restructuring facility, up to 21 colleges have been approved to receive compensatory VAT funding if the liability arises and funding has been provided for transition grants,” today’s update said.

It added: “The total allocation of restructuring facility funding is approximately £330 million. Total spend so far is approximately £226 million.”

Case summaries of providers that agreed restructuring funding prior to December 31, 2017, were also published today. You can find out who these are here.  Today’s announcement doesn’t however give details of which colleges have since received cash nor how much.

The restructuring facility, administered by the ESFA’s transaction unit, was designed to help colleges implement area review changes but has increasingly being used to support colleges in dire financial straits.

The application deadline was September 28 – although colleges will have until March next year to spend the cash.

In an updated guidance document for applying to the restructuring facility, the ESFA said last month that in order to ensure the “objectives of the programme can be best realised by March 2019 it is important that we prioritise funding to support those colleges and proposals that provide the greatest contribution to the restructuring facility objectives”.

“We are unlikely to be able to support all requests for funding,” it added.

“This might be because: the nature and type of funding required cannot be spent by March 2019; or the deal would need to be structured in a way that falls outside of the scope of available resources; or the proposal does not offer sufficient value for money.”

FE Week has previously reported on a number of colleges in dire straits that have received multimillion-pound handouts from the fund.

We are unlikely to be able to support all requests for funding

These include Hull College, which reportedly received £54 million from the fund earlier this year.

And include Lambeth College, which was expecting £25 million to pay off its exceptional financial support and bank loans, according to its 2016/17 accounts.

Despite these example, skills minister Anne Milton denied that the cash is being used as a bailout fund.

“This funding is not about propping up failing colleges,” she told FE Week in April. “Funding from the restructuring facility is only available after a rigorous assessment to help implement changes which will result in sustainable, effective institutions.”

The last update about the restructuring facility was released in April and showed that at that time over £300 million had been approved for 19 “significant” applications.

When the restructuring facility was first announced in 2016, the then-skills minister Nick Boles told colleges they would be “basically on your own” once the fund had been used up, without the “same level of ad hoc support” they had previously had access to.

Employer satisfaction levels have fallen across the FE sector this year, but private providers are still outperforming colleges.

The latest government research, based on the Education and Skills Funding Agency’s 2017/18 employer satisfaction survey, shows a small decline in satisfaction with every type of provider.

The survey of almost 55,000 employers revealed that 87.8 per cent were satisfied with ITPs, while 84.4 per cent expressed the same satisfaction about general FE colleges.

The scores, based on the median rating for the 170 general FE colleges and 327 private providers with sufficient employer satisfaction feedback to be counted in the FE Choices data, are both lower than last year’s, suggesting that overall satisfaction has declined.

Last year, 88.1 per cent were satisfied with ITPs, and 84.6 per cent with colleges.

Hugh Baird College in Liverpool topped the rankings for FE colleges, with an employer satisfaction level of 99.2 per cent. The lowest included satisfaction rate for an FE College was for Newbury College, at just 40.5 per cent.

In comparison, 15 private providers received satisfaction ratings of 100 per cent from employers.

The proportion of employers either “likely” or “extremely likely” to recommend their training provider to others has also seen a small drop, from 86 per cent last year to 85 per cent this year.

Fewer employers are highly satisfied. Nine in 10 employers were satisfied with the overall quality of the training (91 per cent) and with their training provider (90 per cent), giving a score of at least six out of 10. However, levels of satisfaction on both of these measures has declined by two percentage points each since last year, and the proportion of employers giving a score of at least eight out of 10 has dropped by three and four per cent respectively.

Another measure to see a decline was employers’ assessment of their ability to influence training, with 85 per cent giving a rating of at least six out of 10 for the measure – three per cent fewer than last year.

Small organisations with less than 10 employees had lower levels of satisfaction than larger ones, while those who were only delivering adult apprenticeships tended to be more satisfied with the quality of the training compared to those who were only delivering apprenticeships to 16-18-year-olds.

The highest satisfaction levels for the quality of training were reserved for employers who delivered apprenticeships in engineering, manufacturing and technologies, but those with apprentices in agriculture, horticulture and animal care were the least satisfied.

Employers were most satisfied with the professionalism of staff delivering the training, with 81 per cent giving the highest rating of between eight and 10. They were least satisfied with the clarity of communication from the training provider throughout the training process, with 72 per cent giving a rating of eight out of 10.

 

 

New research on apprenticeships by industry characteristics has revealed which sector is the most popular, what is preferred by each gender and where in the country apprenticeship starts are lowest.

The Department for Education has compiled statistics focusing on the five academic years between 2012/13 and 2016/17, and published them today.

Here are five things that we learnt.

1. Health and social work dominates

The data shows that health and social work is clearly the most popular sector for apprentices, making up 27 per cent (121,680) of all starts in 2016/17, up from 23 per cent (104,170) in 2012/13. It was also the most popular for higher apprenticeships, making up 43 per cent of all higher apprenticeship starts in 2016/17.

The manufacturing and construction sectors also saw slight increases in apprenticeship starts over the five years, but the biggest drops were seen in wholesale and retail trade, accommodation and catering and financial services.

 

2. Fewest people are beginning apprenticeships in the north east

The north east had the smallest number (29,770) of apprenticeships in 2016/17, making up just seven per cent of starts. But interestingly, the north west had the highest proportion, with 16 per cent (70,220) of all apprenticeship starts coming from that region.

Across all regions, health and social work was the most popular sector for apprentices, and starts in wholesale and retail trade declined.

 

3. Women choose social work, men choose construction

The data also shows that traditional ideas of gender roles are still holding strong among apprenticeships. In 2016/17, 88 per cent of all starts in the construction sector were by men, and construction, manufacturing and wholesale and retail trade between them accounted for 40 per cent of all male apprenticeship starts.

In comparison, 85 per cent of all starts in the health and social work sector were women, which accounted for 43 per cent of all female starts.

Since 2012/13, the number of female apprenticeship starts have dropped from 244,380 to 238,290, but men have increased from 205,880 to 211,530.

 

4. Large employers make up the majority of starts

Although large employers (those with 250 or more employees) made up just nine per cent of all employers with apprenticeship starts in 2016-17, 46 per cent of all apprenticeship starts were at large employers. This is a decrease of three per cent from 2012/13.

Small employers (less than 50 employees) took on 37 per cent of apprenticeship starts, with medium sized employers (50-249 employees) the least likely to have an apprentice, taking on just 17 per cent.

5. Differences by age

Heath and social work is more likely to be dominated by older apprentices, with 66 per cent of its starts being from those aged 25 and over in 2016-17.

The youngest apprentices, under 19s, made up over half (54 per cent) of those in the ‘other services’ sector, while 42 per cent of starts in public administration and defence were from apprentices aged between 19 and 24.