Ofsted watch: 4 ‘insufficient progress’ verdicts in mixed week for FE

A software firm and three providers working in the care sector have been heavily criticised by Ofsted, in a mixed week for FE providers.

Genius Software Solutions Limited was one of two new private providers to be awarded three out of three ‘insufficient progress’ grades in early monitoring reports.

The education watchdog found its apprenticeships “are of little benefit to too many apprentices and do not develop or extend their knowledge, skills or behaviours” and “too many apprentices do not make rapid enough progress”.

Inspectors added that apprentices who need to achieve English or mathematics qualifications do not receive enough structured support to develop their skills and are not well prepared for exams.

Leaders and managers were also deemed to “have not put in place effective arrangements to improve quality”.

Genius Software Solutions delivers apprenticeships across England and Scotland but only the 109 apprentices on programmes in England were in scope for the visit.

Phoenix4Training LLP was the other provider found making ‘insufficient progress’ across the board.

The company, which was established by two partners in 2007, offers a range of commercial training and funded training to the health and social care and rail sectors.

At the time of the monitoring visit, it delivered training to 59 apprentices.

Ofsted said leaders have “insufficient oversight” over the quality of the programme and apprentices’ progress.

The report also stated “leaders and managers have insufficient understanding of the expectations and requirements of an apprenticeship programme”.

According to inspectors, “too few apprentices develop new vocational knowledge, skills and behaviours as a result of their apprenticeship” and assessments were “insufficient”. 

Another two independent learning providers – Principal Skills Limited and Care Assessment Training Services Ltd – received two ‘insufficient progress’ grades in their early monitoring reports.

Principal Skills Limited had just 11 apprentices on programmes at levels 2, 3 and 5. It delivers its provision in care homes and in engineering and construction settings.

The education watchdog reported leaders and managers have “not ensured that their provision meets the requirements and principles of an apprenticeship” or that “employers fulfil their obligations to their apprentices”.

While steps have been put in place to address the finding that around half of the apprentices on standards-based apprenticeships are significantly past their intended completion date, inspectors said it is “too early” to identify the impact of their actions.

Ofsted found “many” employers working with Care Assessment Training Services Ltd sector did not know their staff were on apprenticeships (click here for full story).

Providers that are deemed to have made ‘insufficient progress’ in early monitoring reports are suspended from recruiting apprentices until their Ofsted grade improves, under government rules.

Elsewhere this week, independent learning provider Youth Force Limited was graded ‘good’ in its first full inspection. Inspectors who visited the Sussex-based provider found that apprentices “are enthusiastic to learn”.

They also “enjoy developing new knowledge and skills” and are “increasingly confident to apply their new learning at work”.

Employer provider Rentokil Initial (1896) Limited was also graded ‘good’ in a full inspection. The global company trains over 350 of its own apprentices who “enjoy their learning and show high levels of professionalism at work and in training”.

Ofsted added that the apprentices “benefit from a carefully planned curriculum that enables them to build their knowledge and perfect their skills”.

The JGA Group maintained its grade two in a short inspection, with inspectors noting that learners “particularly appreciate being taught by experts who help to bring their subjects to life and make them relevant in the workplace”.

Another grade two went to HTP Apprenticeship College Ltd, but it wasn’t all celebrations as it had actually dropped from a grade one following an 11-year respite.

Meanwhile, the University of Hertfordshire was praised for making ‘significant progress’ in its apprenticeship provision in all three assessed themes in an early monitoring visit.

Leaders have a “clear strategy” to provide “highly effective” programmes that “meet the requirements of an apprenticeship”, inspectors said.

And two providers – Paddington Development Trust and the Virtual College – were found making ‘reasonable progress’ in all assessed themes in monitoring visits following ‘requires improvement’ grades in full inspections earlier in the year.

The remaining independent learning providers assessed by the inspectorate this week received ‘reasonable progress’ across the board following their monitoring visits.

These were: Captiva Learning Ltd, Bottle Green Training Limited, Happy Computers, Mercia College Limited and Trainplus Ltd.

 

Independent Learning Providers Inspected Published Grade Previous grade
Captiva Learning Ltd 14/11/2019 05/12/2019 M N/A
Care Assessment Training Services Ltd 24/10/2019 02/12/2019 M N/A
Genius Software Solutions Limited 24/10/2019 02/12/2019 M N/A
Happy Computers 13/11/2019 04/12/2019 M 2
HTP Apprenticeship College Ltd 15/11/2019 02/12/2019 2 1
Mercia College Limited 13/11/2019 04/12/2019 M N/A
Paddington Development Trust 06/11/2019 03/12/2019 M 3
Phoenix4Training LLP 07/11/2019 04/12/2019 M N/A
The JGA Group 31/10/2019 04/12/2019 2 2
Virtual College 21/11/2019 03/12/2019 M 3
Trainplus Ltd 14/11/2019 05/12/2019 M N/A
Youth Force Limited 15/11/2019 05/12/2019 2 M
Bottle Green Training Limited 14/11/2019 06/12/2019 M N/A
Principal Skills Limited 14/11/2019 06/12/2019 M N/A

 

Employer providers Inspected Published Grade Previous grade
Rentokil Initial (1896) Limited 15/11/2019 02/12/2019 2 M

 

Other (including UTCs) Inspected Published Grade Previous grade
University of Hertfordshire 24/10/2019 04/12/2019 M N/A 

Providers win CoF challenges every time

Every provider that challenged the government on English and maths condition of funding penalties over the past three years had its appeal accepted, new data has revealed.

A Freedom of Information request by FE Week shows that 135 eligible business cases which contested funding adjustments were submitted to the Education and Skills Funding Agency (ESFA) between 2017/18 and 2019/20. All of them were “supported”.

Their successful appeals would have saved them tens of thousands of pounds, although it is not clear exactly how much as the agency did not provide costs in its response.

The ESFA explained that it considers “evidenced and credible business cases from institutions where there has been a significant error in the data returned by the institution”.

The agency’s data showed there were another 74 appeals which were not supported, but only because they “were below the business case threshold”.

ESFA rules state that the “standard minimum thresholds” for condition of funding cases are “an overall impact of 5 per cent on total funding or £100,000, whichever is lower”.

The Department for Education’s condition of funding rule means all students in England aged 16 to 19 who have achieved a grade 3 in English or maths GCSEs are required to retake the subjects.

Providers with more than five per cent of eligible students failing to enrol on the qualifications have their funding adjusted by the ESFA.

FE Week analysis of 16-to-19 allocation data from the 2017/18 academic year found that 19 general FE colleges were deducted a total of £1,211,930 under the rules.

Annual eligible applications to appeal condition of funding penalties dropped significantly from that year, when there was 63, to 2018/19, when 36 were entered.

In 2018/19, this newspaper revealed 13 general FE colleges had lost slightly less than the year before – £1,137,091.

However, the number of colleges and amount of funding that was withdrawn this year rose again.

FE Week analysis found 23 colleges were stripped of £1,468,934 in total. For all provider types, including academies and private providers, £5,712,092 was taken back by the ESFA.

All 36 eligible business cases that were submitted in 2019/20 were granted.

Silverstone UTC’s principal Neil Patterson criticised the criteria for the recovery of condition of funding last month after his appeal, which did not meet the required threshold, was rejected.

The university technical college’s allocation data stated that 18 students did not meet the threshold, which resulted in a deduction of £10,406 in this year’s adjustment.

Patterson told FE Week there had been an error in the UTC’s management information system which led to those students being incorrectly identified.

“All 18 students did in fact meet the condition of funding, so we submitted a business case to the ESFA to seek to recover the amount,” he said.

“However, as the amount is smaller than the ‘5 per cent of revenue’ threshold that the ESFA apply, our business case was, unfairly in our view, rejected by the ESFA.”

Patterson added that the UTC felt that, with post-16 funding being “fairly complex,” the threshold rule is a “barrier” to receiving full funding.

Original ESFA condition of funding rules stated that any eligible student who failed to enrol would be removed in full from funding allocations for the next-but-one academic year.

The condition was relaxed from 2016/17, with the penalty halved and only applied to providers at which more than five per cent of students did not meet the standard.

Marsden in a fight to survive as an MP

One of the most prominent and long-standing further education representatives in the House of Commons is battling to save his seat in next week’s general election.

YouGov has predicted shadow further and higher education minister Gordon Marsden will be unseated in Blackpool South, a constituency he has represented for Labour since 1997.

The pollster’s Multi-level Regression and Post-stratification model, which successfully predicted a hung parliament in the 2017 general election as well as 93 per cent of seats, believes Marsden’s area is leaning towards the Conservatives. The Tories lost this seat to Labour by 2,500 votes at the 2017 general election.

Marsden’s first stint as a shadow minister for FE was from 2010 until 2013, before he moved to cover the transport brief for two years.

Then, in 2015, he returned to shadow the FE portfolio and has served Labour in that role for four years.

Prior to entering parliament, he was an Open University lecturer and editor of a history magazine and while Labour was in government, he served as parliamentary private secretary to a number of different secretaries of state.

During his time as shadow further and higher education minister, he has been a highly-visible presence on the Labour frontbench during education questions and backbench debates.

He has also been a regular speaker at sector conferences, including for the Association of Colleges, the Association of Employment and Learning Providers, and FE Week’s Annual Apprenticeship Conference.

And when Labour launched its adult education policy for this election, it did so in Marsden’s constituency.

Another FE champion looking likely to lose her Commons seat is ex-minister Anne Milton.

She resigned from the apprenticeships and skills position ahead of Boris Johnson becoming prime minister in July.

Milton then lost the Conservative party whip – essentially her right to sit and stand as a Conservative MP – in September after abstaining on a Commons vote to stop Johnson from proroguing parliament.

Unbowed, Milton decided to stand in Guildford as an independent, but YouGov also predicts the seat is leaning towards electing her Conservative opponent.

To find out how vulnerable all the big FE MPs are, read our special general election 2019 guide here.

Only research can stop more product recalls in FE policy

The prominence of technical and vocational education in this electoral campaign is significant for the sector, writes Andrew Morris, but if reform isn’t informed by research, history will repeat itself

“You’re joking! Not another one?” Not the words of Brenda from Bristol, but those of Professor Gareth Parry as he opened the recent Learning and Skills Research Network (LSRN) workshop on technical and professional education. To see political parties vying for FE policy primacy added a sense of urgency to proceedings.

But a few weeks on, and only a week away from the election, technical and vocational education is out of the news cycle again despite its central importance to delivering the country’s future prosperity. The incoming government will have carte blanche to deliver its manifesto.

Unfortunately, as Geoff Stanton, Honorary Fellow at UCL Institute of Education, pointed out during the workshop, the track record is not promising. In fact, a recurring motif throughout the day was “echoes of the past”, with many participants underlining how today’s concerns mirror perennial questions dating back as far as the 1950s.

Historically, government technical education initiatives have tended to require “product recalls”. Qualifications have been used to drive sector change rather than improved programmes of learning that directly shape learners’ progress and outcomes.

In essence, the requirements of employers that often lead the reform conversation need to be complemented by those of effective teaching, learning and assessment. However, as former Association of Colleges CEO Martin Doel says, the collaboration needed to acquire that balance has proved elusive in a marketised system.

Research about effective teaching in specific vocational areas is underdeveloped

The evidence is clear. The recurrent question of progression continues to blight the technical curriculum offer. Director of the Centre for Vocational Education Research, Professor Sandra McNally cited evidence that despite level 2 qualifications serving to facilitate progression, only about half of level 2 learners actually progress. By just missing a grade C in English, many drop out at 17+.

Designing clear transitions for young people with GCSE grades below C requires research, and so do incentivising local employers to engage, supporting student choices and narrowing the gap at 16+.

Making a difference in the classroom or workshop is also a hobbled process. Professor Kevin Orr’s research in STEM – supported by the Gatsby Foundation – is a shining example of what can be done, but research about effective teaching in specific vocational areas is generally under-developed.

Unfortunately, as Dr Sai Loo of University College London testified, the very concept of pedagogy is poorly developed in the UK compared to continental Europe. Where it exists, pedagogic discussion tends to be too locally based. CEO of education data intelligence consultancy RCU, Richard Boniface suggested lecturers could be organised at national level in specialist areas, but once again, that idea is not new. Former principal of City and Islington College, Anna Douglas pointed out that subject associations are important in promoting evidence-based approaches for school subjects, and that vocational equivalents are long overdue.

And producing better research alone is not sufficient. Ashton Sixth Form College assistant principal, Jo Fletcher-Saxon rightly pointed out that it needs to be communicated effectively to teachers. Thankfully, good practice exists for the sector to draw on. Bryony Evett Hackfort of Coleg Sir Gar set out her organisation’s work to build experimentation and enquiry into staff development activity, through teacher-training and whole-college professional development days.

Teachers can be encouraged to engage meaningfully with research evidence. The Education Endowment Foundation proves that in the schools sector. While some research conducted in school settings could be readily translated for use in the FE and skills sector, a dedicated and comparable organisation could be something truly new.

If we are ever to assert ourselves, and end the repeating cycle of poor policy and pressured performance, sound research on the specifics of vocational education, applied sensitively to practice and policy, will be central to the solution. Perhaps colleges could even hope for more sustained interest than the occasional policy one-upmanship of an election season.

ETF wants to tell the stories of disabled learners ‘living their best lives’

The Education and Training Foundation is on the lookout for stories of learners with learning difficulties or disabilities (LLDD) who are “doing something wonderful”.

The foundation, which leads on professional development for the sector, wants to feature about 50 learners “living their best lives” by being politically active or doing something with work, in their community or as part of their studies.

Learners with LDD are “often overlooked because their successes may not be measured in the conventional way”, says Simon Welch, the principal of National Star, a specialist college for young people with disabilities and learning difficulties.

Welch told FE Week he would welcome anything that celebrated the success and positive outcomes of young people with more complex disabilities or medical issues, as “not everyone is able to do a full-time job, but that does not mean they cannot be active citizens and have active lives”.

The ETF has put out a tender for a supplier to find these stories and create a publication, which will be downloadable from the foundation’s website and possibly available in a physical format.

According to the tender, which is worth £20,000, the foundation “wants to shift the emphasis, so we see bright young people first and disability second.

“The publication will show how by embracing inclusion we enable our young people to be, and lead, the change they want to see in the world.”

It will also celebrate the work of the FE sector to support learners with LDD. “While the focus of each learner profile is the young person, we feel it is also important to acknowledge the organisation where they studied or trained.”

The ETF says it is looking to hear “how the sector has been the springboard that enabled our young people to flourish”.

Teresa Carroll, the foundation’s head of wellbeing and social inclusion, said it wanted “to challenge outdated ideas of what young people with learning difficulties and disabilities can do and achieve”.

Di Roberts, the principal of Brockenhurst College in Hampshire and chair of the Association of Colleges’ disabled learners’ group, welcomed the plan. “FE colleges carry out valuable work with a range of students with learning difficulties and disabilities, which greatly enhances their ability to participate in their communities.

“We look forward to seeing all the successes colleges and their students have achieved.”

Inspired by the Shaw Trust’s Disability Power 100 – an annual list of the UK’s most influential disabled people – the stories will be published in the summer.

The tender is open until next month and can be found on the government’s Contracts Finder website.

The National Union of Students has said that while it is important to recognise learners’ achievements, too often “the barriers disabled students face are as a consequence of decisions by their institutions”.

“Many of the most engaged student activists are working to make change in their own colleges, to remove barriers to education that are the responsibility of their institution.

“When colleges celebrate the work of their students, in particular disabled students, they must recognise the responsibility they bear to examine the conditions they create and meaningfully engage with the challenges that their students are highlighting.”

The foundation has also tried to push forward the interests of learners with LDD through its centres of excellence for special educational needs and disability (SEND).

In June, City College Norwich, Derby College and Weston College shared £1.2 million to each host a SEND strategic leadership hub and develop “effective practice” for colleges by creating pathways to employment, curriculum co-creation and promoting staff and learner wellbeing.

 

Pledge to ‘reverse privatisation’ in FE clarified by shadow minister

Labour will not prevent independent providers from accessing public funding if the party wins next week’s general election, even though its manifesto pledged to “reverse the privatisation” of FE.

And nor does it want to “dictate the management of colleges or bring them under new forms of control”, the shadow skills minister insisted this week.

FE Week approached Gordon Marsden after reading a Labour pledge that said: “We will reverse the fragmentation and privatisation of further and adult education, incorporating it into a single national system of regulation that functions for education as our NHS does for healthcare provision.”

“We want to ensure there is a common system of regulation”

He conceded that he would not have used “reverse privatisation”, and said that in an attempt to mention “absolutely everything” in a manifesto, “the people writing it try to compress things and there is some degree of ambiguity”.

Marsden said that this pledge was “about ensuring that there is a common system of regulation across the sector”.

This meant ensuring “all institutions, whether they are colleges or private training providers, follow the principles” of Labour’s proposed national education service’s (NES) charter.

“This is not about changing the management of colleges or bringing them under new control, and it is not about private training providers not being able to receive public money,” he told FE Week.

“Sometimes there is a broader context in which you have to see these things. There is a big divide between us and the Tories. They believe everything can be done by the market.

“We believe that the market can operate within a set of principles that are common and to that extent give parity of esteem between higher education, skills and further education.

“At the heart of that will be the principle of the provision of universal learning, available as a right.”

Marsden said a Labour government would act as an “enabler, not a top-down micromanager from Whitehall” and described its approach as “pluralistic”.

“We have made it very clear that we are moving away from the market-driven, fragmented and siloed view of FE – the context of the words used in the manifesto under the Conservatives, which has led to the problems, disparities and in some cases scandals that have afflicted the senior management of a minority of colleges,” he said.

“We are committed to promoting a more collaborative and strategic approach, as well as significant extra funding, between colleges and a range of providers.

“Whether people agree with it or not, the fundamental thing we are saying is that the marketised competitive approach this government has used has not only failed in social justice, it has failed economically. You can see that in the apprenticeships area. We are charting a different route.”

Marsden refuted the assumption that Labour was looking to take the profit motive out of FE, but did say every provider needed to be held to account.

“This is not about changing the management of colleges”

“No one is saying an organisation shouldn’t make a profit, but that profit and the way in which it makes it and the salaries it pays in terms of ratio between the people such as lecturers and senior management, needs to be accountable and realistic.”

FE Week previously reported that colleges’ status as independent corporations could be at risk under Labour’s plan for free lifelong learning in 2017, after the party’s leader Jeremy Corbyn hinted that he wanted to bring them back under local authority control.

Asked to clarify the party’s position, Marsden said: “As we’ve said in the NES charter, colleges should operate with the maximum of democratic accountability at local and regional level.

“Some people tend to talk about FE as simply a product of government doling out money here, there and everywhere to providers and colleges. The reality of it is we are in a changing universe where you’ve got mayors and combined authorities and, for that matter, local enterprise partnerships.

“So the 2020s are not just going to be about what a minister of whatever party says in Whitehall about FE or skills or whatever. It will be a mixed universe of these various bodies.”

T-levels aren’t just about economic sense but social justice too

While T-levels have suffered criticism and setbacks, the UK government’s plan to revolutionise vocational education can benefit employers and students alike. I should know, writes Alfie Earlam, I’m one of the few lucky students trialling them and I couldn’t be happier

T-levels will be introduced in autumn 2020, replacing a wide range of qualifications. In the meantime, I am a student trying to open as many doors as possible in terms of my future career and further education, and T-levels are proving to be the perfect way to do this.

Like many of my peers, I’m not sure what I will do after my studies, or even what kind of studies I will continue to do. People who have that level of certainty are rare. But whether you want to go to university or straight into a job once you have finished post-16 options, T-levels prepare you for both.

The qualification works in a similar way to the current apprenticeship scheme. However, whereas apprenticeships require students to learn at a local college one day a week, with the rest of the week spent at work, T-levels include three days at college, with two days in a placement relevant to the course you are studying. Ultimately, 315 hours of work experience are required to gain the qualification. 

As Julie Girling, T-level coordinator from New College Stamford, explains: “For students who are looking for a job at the end of the placement, T-levels improve their potential for employment. They provide real experience in the industry, which they can use on their CV.”

T-levels stand to make the job market fairer

But you don’t have to be someone with a clear vision of your future career; the new scheme is a way of trialling what you think you would like to do in the future. For example, a student may want to work as a veterinary nurse, and T-levels provide the opportunity to do this part-time as an element of their qualification – as long as their course relates to animal care. If, during their studies, they realise they don’t like being a veterinary nurse, they can choose to change their course, or to change their placement. 

So, while more colleges should definitely prepare for this scheme, it’s also imperative to get the word out to businesses. Their awareness of, and participation in, the scheme is what will provide willing students the opportunities they need.

Many industries, such as construction, agriculture, manufacturing and engineering, are currently lacking skilled young workers, and apprenticeships are not filling the gap. This might be due to employers favouring their existing employees, but the level of commitment employers require from young people is also too great for many of my peers.

Anna Morrish, owner of Quibble Content, where I’m doing my placement, says that “the T-level programme has brought fresh perspectives, insights and ideas to the business as well as providing additional support on the two days our intern is with us”. She believes that supporting the younger generation with their studies is something that should be more common for the business community, especially in those dependent on skilled workers. 

If employers are proactive and get involved, T-levels could create a whole new generation of workers who are more knowledgeable and experienced than ever before.

T-levels present another advantage for students who may have little or no work experience. It provides them with an understanding of how businesses work, how it feels to have a job and responsibilities. Quibble treats me as an employee, and that gives me real-life experience and the chance to feel part of the team and to prove myself in the adult world.

This is all to the benefit of industries while also creating the conditions for tackling youth unemployment. T-levels stand to make the job market fairer, allowing students who lack the connections that many entry-level jobs require – due to geography, demographics and culture – to shape a career based on their own merits.

Profile: Corrina Hembury

Corrina Hembury has seen it all: Jess Staufenberg meets the training provider managing director who started as an apprentice

Corrina Hembury “started everything young”. She began teaching at 19, got married the same year and was a qualified teacher by 21. Despite “loving school”, she only managed half a term of sixth form before switching to college and doing half a term there.

The managing director of apprenticeships provider Access Training decided what she “really needed was to be free and earn some money”. It was all looking rather spontaneous until she sat the old RSA (now OCR) wordprocessing exam and got an office job at an Asian women’s training charity in her hometown of Derby. They encouraged her to do a business administration apprenticeship.

Two decades later she is the boss of 50 staff and working with about 200 employers. She’s seen all the fancy new ideas in further education and can cast a caustic eye over the policy changes with civil servant-like precision.

Her parents were warehouse managers, so a career in education wasn’t in the blood. However, Hembury had a deeply supportive granny who encouraged her to get qualifications.

It was at Babington Business College in Derby, where she was getting her level 3 business administration apprenticeship, that lecturing caught her eye. She shadowed staff and began teaching her subject a couple of hours a week, before doing her level 4 diploma in education. “I really, really enjoyed it. That’s where I got the bug. The passion for me has always been about the learners and the difference you begin to see in them.”

It’s at this point that Hembury remembers the FE structures in place many years ago. While she was at Babington, national “training and enterprise councils” were replaced by “learning and skills councils”, which were more local.

“We were working really well with employers in the local area and building up relationships. It was certainly a very different time. That’s sadly missing at the moment – these opportunities for support for the sector. In those days there were big organisations like LSIS (Learning and Skills Improvement Service) who supported providers. They had a much bigger budget than nowadays and did a lot more, so there were good opportunities to meet other providers and get learning and training for yourself.” The LSIS that she speaks fondly of was scrapped and replaced in 2013 by the scaled-down Education and Training Foundation.

Hembury continued to gather various titles at the college, including “lead internal verifier”, and, by 30 was the regional manager for the college overseeing six sites across Derby, Nottingham, Stoke, Lichfield, Dewsbury and Sheffield.

Following a change of ownership, she became the college’s training director and saw staff numbers double to about 200. “It was a really exciting time for me. I also had my daughter!”

I find it hard to think it’s anything other than snobbery

Having done almost everything else young, Hembury held off becoming a parent for 14 years. Now she was where she wanted to be. “I also got really interested in policy stuff at this time,” she recalls, harking back to the SFA, or Skills Funding Agency as it was called in 2010 before becoming the ESFA in 2017.

The SFA was trying out an “employer ownership pilot”, in which employers were being encouraged to get involved in designing training themselves. “It was almost a trial for the trailblazer apprenticeships we’ve got today, with this idea of the employers being ‘in the driving seat’,” she says.

However, the idea results in a raised eyebrow. “The reservation that I have around this employer-first’ rhetoric is that the learner or apprentice seems to get a bit forgotten. For instance there are practical changes in funding rules, which is a real frustration.”

Hembury’s description of the problem points to an irritating flaw in the system. “The issue is when an apprentice has a break between moving employers – for example if they decide to take a week off between finishing one job and starting the next, they are then classed as a ‘new start’, meaning they have to complete the minimum duration of 12 months again, even if they only had six months left on programme.”

Doubly annoying, the provider doesn’t get all the funding again, only the remainder that has not been used up. “So I’m not sure why this can be resolved, but not the minimum duration?” You can imagine her silently tearing her hair out.

Around this time Hembury was also on the SFA group for advanced learning loans, which she says gave her “the leadership bug” and “some strong ideas around how I think things should be done”. When the MD job came up at Access in 2015, she thought she’d “better put my money where my mouth is”.

One of her first moves was to give the eight-strong executive team more management development training such as she had benefited from at Babington. The organisation was graded level 2 during a short inspection in 2015 – and Hembury, as ever, has her eye on policy areas for improvement. She mentions three quirks which again strike me as significantly irritating.

First, the ESFA was late in sending over the college’s report on the number of learners it has been paid for this year, Hembury says. “As of last month, we hadn’t had the proper reports of what they were paying us for. It’s these kinds of frustrations that for providers are very real, and really impact your business and take up time.” 

You have a gut instinct when the latest change comes in

Second, she’s concerned about the lower funding bands for certain qualifications such as adult care. The funding cap for an adult care level 2 and 3 taking about 15 to 18 months is £3,000, but the equivalent for customer service is £4,500 and for a property maintenance operative it’s £9,000. “It’s really difficult for me to understand why a programme that helps people do such an important role, that we all will probably need one day, has one of the lowest funding bands.”

Hembury also worries about the Institute of Apprenticeships’ refusal to approve a level 2 business administration apprenticeship when old-style apprenticeship frameworks are switched off next year. She suspects it’s yet another unvalued qualification. “I find it hard to think it’s anything other than snobbery. Speaking as someone who started their career through the level 2 business administration route, I wholeheartedly disagree.”

She is clearly in love with her work. She talks glowingly of the “brilliant time” she’s had handing out certificates to learners nominated by staff. “What a nice job, to be able to turn up and help create happy people, who tell you how much this has helped their career.” She also has a sharp sense of humour and laughs that she’s being a “whinge”.

But she has a point. And since she’s been in the sector from the start of her working career, she probably knows what she’s talking about. She quips: “In FE, why have one policy when 20 will do?” It’s a joke, but she’s clear the complex and ever-changing rules governing the sector discourage new talent. “If you’ve been in it for two decades, then when the latest change comes in, you have a gut instinct about it. But new entrants into the market can find it really hard, even with the best will in the world.” Most people in FE think the many rules are “crazy”.

Hembury, 41, is at the top of her game, but, given her early  start, she has been through more structures, systems and rules than many people her age in FE.

Her biggest wish? “Consistency.” Will the next government listen?

Northern Ireland’s colleges are more important than ever amid Brexit uncertainty

Amid Brexit chaos and the continued suspension of the Stormont assembly, what Northern Ireland’s colleges need most from this election is certainty, writes Marie-Thérèse McGivern

Brexit has created huge tension across the whole of the UK, but probably nowhere more so than in Northern Ireland, a region that voted in its majority to remain in the European Union. The continuing uncertainty about what Brexit will mean practically and Northern Ireland’s place in any settlement have created an environment which has had significant impacts already. Unpredictability has caused difficulties in maintaining and landing investment in the region, made businesses reluctant to invest until they have more clarity, and slowed down inward migration considerably, causing skills shortages.

For colleges here, as everywhere else across the UK, the need is to continue to deliver skills for the region that are aligned to business needs. While obvious skills shortages might be thought to at least make identification of those needs easier, decreasing funding presents a big challenge and uncertainty about the region’s future economic direction has a paralysing effect.

As if this wasn’t enough, Northern Ireland has had to contend with the absence of an Assembly now for over 1000 days, at a time when the region needs one most. There is now a significant backlog of reforms awaiting decision from local ministers in education, as well as health and the environment. The Northern Ireland civil service has tried valiantly to keep the region moving forward and to work for success, but it is a difficult job without a clear mandate or political direction.

The only certainty seems to be that Northern Ireland is facing increasing challenges. A lot of hope here hangs on the election providing the clarity and certainty the country desperately needs, and perhaps even nudging the Assembly towards reforming.

Our colleges are ready to bring solutions to the challenges facing the region

If so, then that resolution won’t come a moment too soon for our skills sector. When it last met, the Assembly was moving strongly in the direction of seeing skills, and the delivery of a talent pipeline, as essential to the future prosperity of the region. There was growing consensus that the six Northern Ireland colleges have a central role in developing a new ecosystem for success. 

The Department for the Economy have continued to underline that work. They are currently building the evidence and analysis for a new Northern Ireland skills strategy for endorsement when the Assembly eventually returns, as surely it must.

While Brexit and Stormont divisions have put a lot on hold, the fundamentals haven’t changed. Aligning to business needs requires flexible, responsive delivery that can adapt training to a rapidly innovating digital sector at one end and, at the other, a sustained supply of highly trained and motivated workers across more traditional sectors such as hospitality and social care.

Colleges in Northern Ireland have worked hard to increase collaboration to ensure excellent delivery across the region. A concrete example has been the development of specialist hubs whereby each college has become a ‘Centre of Excellence’ for the sector as a whole, in areas such as digital industry, life sciences and advanced manufacturing. This strategy has allowed us to maximise limited resources to create maximum impact.

Our colleges are ready to bring solutions to the challenges facing the region, both economic and social. Yes, we work directly with businesses to increase productivity and skills levels in all industry sectors.

But getting skills policy right is about more than that; it is a clear route to increased social mobility too. Colleges routinely intervene in communities with high levels of poverty, giving individuals the opportunity to embark on lifelong learning journeys that are transformative for them and their communities.

Regardless of who forms the next government come December 13, colleges are waiting to play their part in Northern Ireland’s prosperity. What they require to do so above all else is political stability and a clear sense of direction.