Knife crime in colleges has more than doubled in recent years, new figures suggest, which has prompted leaders to introduce metal detectors and enforce bag searches.

The data obtained by FE Week from 22 of the 39 police forces in England reveal that almost 400 offences with the bladed objects have been recorded in colleges since 2015.

There were 39 in 2015, a figure that rose to 64 and then 71 in the following two years respectively. Offences in colleges peaked at 120 in 2018, but declined to 104 last year.

Knife crime more generally has been steadily on the rise since records began in 2011, according to the Office for National Statistics. However, the ONS cautions that “data can be affected by changes in recording practices, policing activity and victims’ willingness to report crime”.

While each police force has different methods of recording the data, the offences included possession, assault, threats or use of violence, grievous bodily harm, wounding, harassment, rape, robbery, criminal damage and affray.

“Carrying weapons doesn’t make students safe, it puts them more at risk”

However, full national figures for college offences are likely to be much higher than this because the London Metropolitan Police, which records the highest knife crime rates across the whole country annually, refused to release data in response to FE Week’s Freedom of Information request.

The findings come a month after two students were stabbed near a college in Cheshire and another teenager was attacked by the entrance to a college in Northampton.

College bosses across the country have reacted to the growing problem by investing thousands of pounds in new equipment, but some have warned they are often restricted by a lack of funding.

Newcastle and Stafford Colleges Group (NSCG) searched and screened a total of 514 students across their two sites in September 2019 and January 2020, using handheld metal detector wands and random selection generators.

The group spent almost £3,300 on the equipment and training, of which £1,000 was awarded by Newcastle Borough Council.

Lesley Morrey, director of student engagement and partnerships at NSCG, said there were no “areas of concern” and the only object found was a fruit knife. “We want [students] to understand that carrying weapons doesn’t make them safe, it puts them more at risk,” she told FE Week.

Students “felt that we were taking their safety very, very seriously” and parents had praised the measures at open evenings. As a result, she believes the policy has “paid dividends” and had “the desired impact”.

Jayne Holt, assistant principal for learning services at Walsall College, said her college has “always worked proactively” with West Midlands Police to carry out knife arch operations as well as undertaking other safeguarding measures within the institution and alongside other agencies.

East Coast College principal Stuart Rimmer also told FE Week the college uses targeted and random bag searches in combination with tutorial sessions on knife crime. He said: “Working in the prevention space feels positive and is well received by students.”

London South East Colleges established a “Twilight College” in 2019, as a result of several high-profile reports of knife crime in the capital. It delivers extra-curricular activities four days a week from 4pm to 6pm, when students may be more vulnerable to becoming a victim of knife crime on their way home.

This month, survey results from the college found 82 per cent of students agreed that they felt safer travelling home after attending, and four-fifths would like to be able to stay even later.

Principal Sam Parrett said expanding the initiative with “limited resources is challenging and we have had to (and will continue to) divert resources to it”.

“We would like this to be recognised with additional funding to support our capacity to develop this important area of work,” she added.

An Ofsted research report into knife crime in London from March 2019 found the “biggest barrier” that colleges face when tackling the issue was the cost.

Further data released in September 2019 by the education watchdog found that seven colleges in the capital use knife detection wands and six use knife arches. It also showed that five use stop-and-search, and seven use “anonymous reporting procedures”.

The inspectorate reported the common denominator of students who were found carrying bladed objects was their “vulnerability”, with almost all having experienced poverty, abuse, neglect or living within troubled families.

Iryna Pona, policy manager at the Children’s Society, which works with young people at risk of, or affected by, criminal exploitation, said the data obtained by FE Week was “a real worry”.

“Exclusions only provide them with more time to spend on the street getting into trouble”

“Colleges could do more to spot the early warning signs that a student may be at risk,” she continued.

According to Pona, “too often” there is a rush to exclude students. She claimed colleges should work to understand and address the underlying reasons for concerning behaviour, and that colleges should raise incidents of a young person carrying a knife with their local children’s social care team as a safeguarding concern.

“We know that funding cuts mean capacity can be an issue and the government must ensure all colleges have the resources they need,” Pona added.

A 2019 report by the all-party parliamentary group on knife crime also found colleges were said to not always engage well with students who were starting to get involved with street gangs or low-level criminal activity, with permanent or temporary exclusions only providing them with “more time to spend on the street getting into trouble”.

David Hughes, chief executive of the Association of Colleges, said: “Knife crime is a complex and worrying issue which AoC is working on with a range of national agencies and policy makers.

“We know that colleges take safeguarding and the security of their staff and students extremely seriously, based on a strong culture of non-violence. Sadly, there have been some serious incidents in colleges which always have a wide-reaching, long-lasting impact but those cases are relatively rare.”

Hughes added that no single institution can tackle knife crime alone and that he has been impressed with the partnerships which colleges have been developing with local partners, including local violence-reduction units, community safety partnerships and resilience forums.

In January, a new “Lives Not Knives” report by social justice charity Nacro revealed young people aged 15-to-19 believe they are not protected by the police, and that harsher penalties would not deter those who carry knives out of fear.

It called for an “urgently needed” shift on prevention, for interventions to be focused on tackling the underlying causes of violence as well as the provision of funding to support students who have been excluded.

A government spokesperson declined to comment on the figures obtained by FE Week but said engagement in education is a strong protective factor against involvement in violence and that it is important for colleges to equip children with the skills they need to be safe. 

Whitehall is lapping up the MBA apprenticeship that the education secretary Gavin Williamson is “unconvinced” provides value for money, FE Week has found.

The Department for Work and Pensions told this newspaper it had 86 on the controversial programme, including those in the application process, while the Ministry of Defence has 17, with seven being “onboarded”.

And the Department for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport had two taking the level 7 senior leader apprenticeship standard with the Open University.

The Department for Education itself has 34 staff on the programme.

Several government departments – including the Home Office, Cabinet Office, and Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy – said they had none.

Williamson made his comments in a letter to Institute of Apprenticeships and Technical Education chief executive Jennifer Coupland ordering a review of the standard last week, adding: “I recognise that looking again at this standard may be unpopular with some levy payers.

“Whilst respecting the decisions that employers make about which apprenticeships and apprentices are best for their organisation, I am of the view that we absolutely need to safeguard the integrity of the apprenticeship brand and value for money of the levy.”

Shadow further education minister Emma Hardy has gone further by calling for degree apprenticeship funding to be limited to people aged under 25, those without a first degree, and in sectors with skill shortages.

She told the Annual Apprenticeship Conference this week the government’s “rushed implementation of the apprenticeship levy has resulted not in an increase in apprenticeship opportunities for the most disadvantaged, but quite the opposite”.

The integrity of the apprenticeship brand is not being damaged

Ofsted chief inspector Amanda Spielman used her speech at conference to express concerns that doubling the number of higher-level apprenticeships in general between 20116/17 and 2018/19 is to blame for a 45 per cent drop in starts at level 2 during that period.

However, the chief executive of the University Vocational Awards Council’s chief executive Adrian Anderson has defended keeping the MBA apprenticeship as “apprenticeships have just as important, if not more important, role in developing new progression routes and higher-level occupations for under-represented cohorts” as supporting them into lower-paid jobs

He added that stopping the senior leader apprenticeship would have a “detrimental effect” on the NHS and police, which UVAC believes to be among the biggest users of the standard.

FE Week found several hospital trusts advertise the level 7 apprenticeship on their websites, and Health Education England, which oversees training for NHS staff, reported it has 13 staff on an apprenticeship with an MBA. 

The Department for Health and Social Care does not have any.

“Government should be proud of the policy success of the apprenticeship reforms,” Anderson continued.

“The integrity of the apprenticeship brand is not being damaged. Apprenticeships are increasingly being seen as an aspirational programme and not just a programme for other people’s children.”

But degree apprenticeships like the senior leader standard, which has a maximum funding band of £18,000, have been criticised for taking up great chunks of the apprenticeship budget.

The National Audit Office said employers are developing and choosing more expensive standards at higher levels than was expected by the Department for Education, which was “absorbing” more public funding.

The Institute for Apprenticeships and Technical Education predicted in 2018 the levy could soon be overspent.

A college has fessed up to failing to declare a £20,000 bonus made to its principal in 2018 amid a government crackdown on transparency.

Lincoln College boss Gary Headland told FE Week he was “both embarrassed and disappointed” that the payment was “erroneously not included” in that year’s accounts owing to an “honest error”.

His salary of £199,000 in 2017/18, as recorded in the Education and Skills Funding Agency official college accounts data, also does not include the bonus that was awarded for international work.

The £20,000 payment was disclosed in Lincoln’s 2018/19 accounts (see image right), alongside a £40,000 bonus for that year, but nowhere does it note the discrepancy and the only explanation came after FE Week started asking questions.

A financial auditor told FE Week that they would have expected the £20,000 prior year (2018) adjustment in the 2019 accounts to include a note to explain the past error, particularly as the government is very sensitive to the disclosure of senior staff pay.

Lincoln College’s main international venture is in the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia, where its subsidiary is Lincoln College International (LCI) runs colleges.

LCI generated £30.1 million in 2018 and £25.7 million in 2019, more than half the college group income.

Headland (pictured) said: “At the complete discretion of the board of corporation, I am able to be awarded an annual payment based upon the scale and performance of our commercial and international work.

“In our annual accounts submitted in December 2018, the discretionary payment was erroneously not included. This was an honest error and I am both embarrassed and disappointed in equal measure.

“Importantly, the oversight was not repeated in December 2019 in which full disclosure of all emoluments in 2018 and 2019 was made.”

The college did not explain why there was no note in the 2019 accounts to explain the error.

FE Week has asked the college’s external auditor firm, RSM, about the discrepancy.

The ESFA said it “strengthened” its financial reporting requirements for sixth-form and further education colleges last year.

Specifically, the agency’s finance record spreadsheet for 2018/19 requires, for the first time, that colleges record a figure for its “principal’s performance related pay and bonus”.

For colleges, this should be as simple as listing it separately from the “principal’s salary”.

Their updated rules state: “Corporations receive significant investment from public funds and need to demonstrate to stakeholders that decisions made on executive pay are evidence-based, proportionate and represent value for money.

“This year, as a matter of policy, we have increased transparency around executive pay to support accountability, and to help maintain public confidence and trust in executive pay.”

Burton and South Derbyshire College accounts for 2019, for example, now list a £35,000 bonus for 2018 and £36,000 bonus for 2019 separately from the salary figure.

Its 2018 accounts had lumped the bonus given to principal Dawn Ward in with her salary, totalling £218,000.

Her college runs the International Technical Female College in Jeddah in partnership with Highbury College.

A spokesperson for Burton and South Derbyshire College said: “As you’ve identified, ESFA requirements around disclosure changed in the year between the two sets of accounts.

“Our 2019 accounts adhere to the new reporting requirements and so the value is split out. Obviously, the total value reported in both sets of accounts is unchanged.”

However, it is clear from the ESFA’s college accounts direction for 2017/18 that “corporations must separately disclose the emoluments of the accounting officer” and “emoluments include: performance-related awards (including other bonuses)”.

Highbury College told FE Week the ESFA had given them permission to delay the filing of their 2018/19 accounts.

One college FE Week found that has been in full compliance of the rules is Leeds City College.

It declared a £40,000 bonus separately for boss Colin Booth in its 2018 accounts, and again in 2019.

The Association of Colleges developed its own pay code in 2018. It states that “awards made in respect of annual bonus arrangements linked to the achievement of specific annual objectives should not be consolidated”.

The membership body’s chief executive, David Hughes, told FE Week: “AoC’s governor’s council took the initiative in 2018 to adapt the university senior staff remuneration code for college use.

“We’re confident that the code and the open way in which colleges present information about senior staff pay will ensure that governing bodies properly account for the way in which they use public funds and the approach they take to rewarding, motivating and retaining staff to do incredibly challenging jobs.”

A Department for Education spokesperson said: “Further education colleges set their own salaries for staff, which we expect to be fair, represent value for money and be fully justifiable. We now require colleges to explain and justify the salaries of their key management staff in published accounts.”

The Education and Skills Funding Agency is working on plans to require providers to be “accredited” for the apprenticeship standards they offer.

Keith Smith, the agency’s director of apprenticeships, this week said the limits are being considered to give employers more “confidence” in the “future” register of apprenticeship training providers.

Currently, end-point assessment organisations can only assess apprenticeship standards they’re experts in and approved for via application.

Yet providers that have never delivered apprenticeships have no restrictions on which or how many standards they deliver.

During a speech at FE Week’s Annual Apprenticeship Conference on Tuesday, Smith said: “That is something we talk a lot about in terms of the future provider register and the extent to which we should start to look at accreditation by a different type of standard.

“At the moment we have taken the view that we want to provide the opportunity that providers can play to their strengths. One thing we are beefing up in the provider register all the time is looking at the capacity of those providers in their workforce, about the professionalisation and the skills they bring to the bear in the sector.”

He continued: “We are trying really carefully to make sure we understand what it is to be a good provider, to actually have confidence in the provider register, and very carefully understand how we give assurance to employers and apprentices that they are going to be finding their way to new providers who actually have the right capacity and infrastructure to be able to do good things.

“More on that to come.”

Smith added that it is “the reality” that providers will already be specialising in certain standard areas, and his agency is working to ensure any limits do not add further unnecessary layers of “bureaucracy” for training organisations.

Any restrictions would form the second phase of the ESFA’s attempts to strengthen its register of apprenticeship training providers, which was relaunched last year following a host of problems with the original application process.

One-man bands with no delivery experience were, for example, being given access to millions of pounds of apprenticeships funding.

FE Week analysis shows that the ESFA has cut the number of main and employers providers on the register down by a quarter over the past year – from 2,234 in April 2019 to 1,628 in February 2020.

The reduction shouldn’t come as a major surprise considering the agency had promised to tighten up the register’s application rules and kick off those who aren’t delivering.

But this cull still has some way to go, as FE Week analysis also shows a further 29 per cent of providers currently on there are still not delivering and many more are in single starts figures.

What makes restrictions even more likely is the fact that new providers with no track record will no longer be limited by a lack of non-levy allocation from November 1 as the ESFA moves small employers onto the digital apprenticeship system.

FE Week understands there are also plans being drawn up to potentially introduce funding caps on providers yet to have full Ofsted inspection.

Last year, the education watchdog was handed £5.4 million to carry out monitoring visits of all new apprenticeship providers, which have so far suggested the quality at about a quarter of them is poor.

It is also understood that the ESFA will dedicate a special team to watch over the largest apprenticeship providers to ensure the sector does not suffer from another “too big to fail” scenario if one of them goes bust, as was the case with Learndirect.

A review into the “uniquely narrow and short” technical courses in England has been called for ahead of the introduction of T-levels this September.

The Education Policy Institute think tank (EPI) made the recommendation in an international comparison of technical education funding systems, published today, which said this country’s 16 to 19 curriculum “remains an outlier for its narrow breadth, both for academic and technical pathways”.

This approach “may be depriving students of valuable skills”, it added.  

While welcoming T-levels’ increased teaching hours, the “substantial” 315-hour industry placement and how they “will bring England closer to technical provision in high performing countries”, the report also says the curriculum “looks narrower” than similar qualifications in other countries.

The new flagship courses will not address the differences in curricular breadth between England and countries like Norway and Germany beyond securing basic levels of literacy and numeracy, the report says.

As T-levels will last for half as long as technical qualifications in other countries, this “probably stands in the way” of broadening the curriculum.

EPI’s research was funded by the Gatsby Charitable Foundation, which is working on preparations for T-levels and is co-running professional development for the qualifications with the Education and Training Foundation.

“The views expressed in this report are those of the authors, and do not reflect those of the foundation,” the report stresses.

The government, the report proposes, ought to commission an independent review to consider if the breadth of 16 to 19 courses is properly providing the basic and technical skills “young people need for the labour market and for progression to further study”.

If this means providers have to increase provision, the government “must” match this with appropriate funding rates. The report found funding support for students fell by 71 per cent in real terms between 2010/11 and 2018/19.

The joint general secretary of the National Education Union Kevin Courtney said the government “must learn from this challenging report” and 16 to 19 students need “sustainable funding” and “real support” for living, learning and travelling costs.

The Association of School and College Leaders’ post-16 and colleges’ specialist Kevin Gilmartin urged the Chancellor of the Exchequer Rishi Sunak to address the “desperate need” for additional government funding for the sector in the Budget on March 11.

The countries the EPI compared England against were found to offer a broader curriculum, for example technical students in Norway spend more of classroom time studying subjects like English, maths, PE, natural sciences, and social sciences than their vocational specialisation. Technical students in Austria take courses on entrepreneurship, digital skills, communication skills and, in many cases, up to three foreign languages.

In Germany’s dual-system, students attend a vocational school up to two days a week and apart from theoretical and practical knowledge for their apprenticeship, they also take general subjects like economics and social sciences.

Germany’s system was thrown into the spotlight after education secretary Gavin Williamson pledged the UK to overtaking Germany in technical education opportunities by 2029.

However, the report did note the breadth of curriculum in other countries varies dependent on factors like qualification level and whether it is a classroom-based programme or apprenticeship training.

David Robinson, report author and director of post-16 and skills at the EPI, said: “If it wishes to draw level with countries like Germany, the government must give further consideration to properly funding technical education, in order to sustain quality.

“We must also ask serious questions about the structure of our upper secondary programmes, which are uniquely narrow and short by international standards. The breadth of the curriculum and length of technical courses should be reviewed.”

A Department for Education spokesperson said: “The secretary of state has been clear that boosting further education is at the heart of his vision for a world class education system.

“We are investing significantly to level up skills and opportunity across the country. In addition to our £3 billion National Skills fund, we have announced a £400m increase to 16 to 19 funding for 2020-2021, creating longer, higher-quality technical apprenticeships.

“Alongside this, our traineeship programme is a great way for young people to develop the skills and confidence they need to progress on to employment, or a high quality apprenticeship.”