The government will fund free sanitary products for all students in colleges and secondary schools from September.

Chancellor Philip Hammond made the announcement in his Spring statement today in an effort to tackle period poverty.

“In response to rising concern by headteachers that some girls are missing school attendance due to an inability to afford sanitary products, I have decided to fund the provision of free sanitary products in secondary schools and colleges in England from the next school year,” he told MPs.

“I congratulate those honourable members who have campaigned on this issue on all sides of the House, and the education secretary will announce further details in due course.”

Newcastle College became the first college in England to offer tampons and other such products for free in October.

It followed a successful fight in Scotland when its government committed £5.2 million to fund the initiative. The announcement, made last August, made Scotland the “first in the world” to offer free tampons and sanitary towels to all students.

The Treasury told FE Week today it has not costed the plan for England, but confirmed it will be fully funded for all secondary schools and colleges – not just sixth forms.

A survey conducted by development charity Plan International in 2017 found that one in 10 young women aged 14 to 21 had been unable to afford sanitary products. It also discovered that 12 per cent of those surveyed had to improvise sanitary wear and one in five had changed to a less suitable sanitary product due to cost.

Following today’s announcement, University and College Union acting general secretary, Paul Cottrell, said: “Having a period should not be a barrier to education and we welcome the chancellor’s promise to provide free sanitary products in schools and colleges.

“Ensuring that sanitary products are available to all students will enable women and girls facing real hardship to be able to attend their classes in comfort and dignity.”

Ofqual has ruled itself out of delivering the apprenticeship external quality assurance service for the Institute for Apprenticeships and Technical Education.

Sally Collier, the chief executive of the exams regulator, told the Commons education committee during an accountability hearing this morning that her organisation would like to expand its role in monitoring apprenticeship end-point assessment organisations.

However, when asked by committee chair Robert Halfon if Ofqual bid in the institute’s recent tender to do the quality assurance on its behalf, for 262 of the 410 standards approved for delivery, Collier revealed they had not.

It would not seem appropriate for a regulator to bid for a contract with another part of government

“No, it would not seem appropriate for a regulator to bid for a contract with another part of government,” she said.

There are currently 18 approved external quality assurance (EQA) bodies that monitor end-point assessment organisations, to ensure the process is “fair, consistent and robust”.

Ofqual is the external quality assurer for 61 standards, but many in the sector have questioned why the whole job isn’t given to the exams regulator.

Collier told the education committee today that her organisation has done a “good job in proving that as the regulator we can do this job and can do it well” and they are “ready to take on a larger role”.

“It is complex and confusing in places, I think we can bring some clarity to the process,” she explained.

“As the independent regulator and having end-point assessments independently regulated in the same way that other types of qualifications are I think that would help public trust and confidence in the system.”

But to expand their role, Ofqual would “need more people and more resource to do that”.

She agreed with Halfon that it is “unnecessary” to have so many different bodies doing apprenticeship regulation.

Concerns have been raised that EQA has added “another unnecessary administration cost” to the apprenticeships system, after FE Week last month revealed the “ridiculous variability” in approved external quality assurance charges.

EQA bodies are allowed to apply a charge as long as it is on a “cost-recovery basis” – the amount of which is taken directly from the government funding given to training providers to deliver the apprenticeship.

But FE Week found the charges range from a free service to a whopping £179 per apprentice.

Ofqual does not charge for the service.

I think we can bring some clarity to the process

The Institute for Apprenticeships and Technical Education also does not currently charge for its EQA service, but this will change come May.

It launched a tender at the end of January for an organisation to provide quality assurance for apprenticeships assessment on its behalf until the end of March 2021.

Open Awards has held the contract to deliver this service since August 2017, which was worth an initial £160,000 and did not charge per apprentice, but this will end in March.

Tender documents for the new contract, seen by FE Week, state that “legislation allows the institute to charge end point assessment organisations (EPAOs) a fee per apprentice that undertakes an end-point assessment and it is these fees that will pay for the EQA service”.

The winning bidder is expected to earn at least half a million pounds over the two-year contract period.

The new contract doesn’t start until May, meaning there is a month-long gap where no permanent organisation is in place to do the EQA for the institute.

It has been forced into hastily finding “interim” arrangements for the month, but in a recent interview with FE Week, the institute’s boss Sir Gerry Berragan remained tight-lipped about the plans, other than to say: “Rest assured there are arrangements in place.”

PICTURED: Ofqual chair Roger Taylor and chief executive Sally Collier in front of the Commons education committee

The chair of the boards of governors for the troubled Hadlow College and West Kent and Ashford College has resigned with two other governors, FE Week can reveal.

FE Week reported earlier this month the boards at The Hadlow Group, which controls both colleges, went into meltdown as serious governance failings and financial inexperience were put in the spotlight.

It came after the government and FE Commissioner launched investigations into financial irregularities at the group, which subsequently suspended its principal Paul Hannan and deputy principal Mark Lumsdon-Taylor.

It is understood that the FE Commissioner met the ESFA on Friday, ahead of a decision on whether the education secretary should continue to financially support the colleges, or let either of them go into administration.

Today, Theresa Bruton, who has served on the Hadlow board for seven years; Bob McNicoll, the chair of the audit committee; and April McMahon all handed in their resignations as governors at the group.

They follow Paul Dubrow, the former chair of West Kent and Ashford College’s board, who resigned in February, as did governors George Jessel, Harvey Guntrip and Chris Hearn.

Last week, FE Week revealed The Hadlow Group had refused to comment on whether the boards of each college had confidence in Bruton.

She was leading the investigation into Hannan and Lumsdon-Taylor and was also chair of the remuneration committee for both colleges; chair of West Kent & Ashford College curriculum and quality committee; and chair of governance and search committee for both colleges.

The West Kent and Ashford College board had been due to decide on a new chair to replace the interim Bruton, however her term as board chair of Hadlow College was not due to run out until July.

Bruton previously worked as head of regeneration projects for Kent County Council and as a director of Visit Kent.

Bob McNicoll had been a governor at West Kent and Ashford College since 2014 and a governor of Hadlow College since 2007. He works in private equity funding for small businesses that provide electric vehicle technologies.

April McMahon, a member of the curriculum and quality committee, has been on the West Kent & Ashford College board since 2017. She is a deputy vice chancellor of education at the University of Kent and is an honorary fellow of Selwyn College, Cambridge.

Pictured (left to right): Theresa Bruton, Bob McNicoll, April McMahon.

The Education and Skills Funding Agency has reminded providers to conduct prior learning assessments when taking on apprentices, and warned they will be audited to ensure price reductions are being made.

New guidance on the rule was published today, and follows the launch of a tender by the agency in February to find a researcher that can explore whether the policy is being complied with.

Prior learning refers to skills and knowledge gained by learners before they start their apprenticeship, and must be taken into account by providers when negotiating a price with an employer to ensure cash is not being used to teach an apprentice something they already know.

Today’s guidance reiterates what the funding rules state: that funds “may be recovered” where initial assessment of prior learning has not taken place.

“Apprentices should not be spending paid time doing training they do not need, and the apprentice will not have a good experience if they are repeating training,” it says.

“Apprenticeship funding should not be used to pay for, or accredit, existing knowledge, skills and behaviours.”

Initial assessments need to be carried out before the apprenticeship starts, which checks how much of the apprenticeship programme the individual requires to reach occupational competency.

“Assuming there is some relevant prior learning, the training provider must assess whether the individual still needs an apprenticeship with a minimum duration of 12 months with at least 20 per cent off-the-job training,” the guidance explains.

“In some circumstances, this amount of training will not be necessary for the individual so the learner is ineligible for the apprenticeship programme and an alternative should be considered.”

Prior learning can include “work experience, prior education, training or associated qualifications in a related sector subject area (this goes beyond just English and maths); and any previous apprenticeship undertaken”.

The guidance adds that there are audit checks to “ensure a price reduction has been made to account for prior learning and the reduced training content required”.

Earlier this month a highly respected funding auditor told FE Week that apprenticeship providers are typically not complying with the rule.

“The ESFA strengthened their funding rules this year and make it very clear that they will claw back funding when providers fail to reduce apprenticeship funding for prior knowledge, skills and behaviour,” said Stephanie Mason, head of further education and skills at the audit firm RSM.

“When conducting reviews since the introduction of the levy, we typically find providers have not fully accounted for prior learning.”

The Institute for Apprenticeships and Technical Education also “flagged concerns” about the policy in their the minutes from a meeting of its approval and funding committee last June.

Last March it was revealed that employers were paying the maximum amount in more than 95 per cent of apprenticeship starts since May 2017, when maximum funding rate caps were introduced.

And Ofsted has been finding problems at many new apprenticeship providers like Citrus Training Solutions, where inspectors found last December that many of its 188 apprentices were enrolled on “inappropriate” programmes which merely accredited existing knowledge, skills and behaviours.

DfE has intervened in providers that are not teaching apprentices new skills before.

Last year, the ESFA terminated its contract of Premier People Solutions Limited after Ofsted found many of its 686 civil service apprentices were not developing substantial new skills, knowledge or behaviours.

In her annual report for 2018, Ofsted chief inspector Amanda Spielman highlighted how apprentices were “not learning anything new”, but were just getting accreditation for knowledge and skills they already had.

 

More than 30 of the country’s best and brightest young skilled people have been chosen to represent the UK at WorldSkills Kazan later this year.

The team [see below] of young professional from sectors including engineering, hospitality and professional services, construction and digital and IT will fly to Russia in August to compete in the competition known as the ‘Skills Olympics’.

They’ll battle it out with their counterparts from more than 60 countries and go for bronze, silver and gold in 56 different skills disciplines.

Neil Bentley-Gockmann, chief executive of WorldSkills UK, which selects and trains the team, said: “Think Olympic Games – but much more important to the economic future of the United Kingdom.

“This is a life-changing opportunity for all those involved.

“I couldn’t be more proud of these extraordinary young people who will be on the plane to Russia.  They have worked tirelessly for weeks, months and years to be the best – they are a shining example to the next generation – let’s celebrate their spirit, commitment, and success.”

While 32 members of Team UK have now been announced, more will join them in April when the cyber security, cloud computing, chemical lab technician, floristry, cooking and car painting competitors are selected.

All competitors will then undergo a rigorous regime of Olympic-style training in preparation for the most intense week of competition imaginable.

These skilled young people have undergone a two-year challenge to get this far, and have already triumphed in regional and national competition, as well as a grueling team selection event that took place last week.

The 45th WorldSkills event will take place in Kazan from August 22 to 27.

At the last WorldSkills, which took place two years ago in Abu Dhabi, saw Team UK retain its top-10 position, after our competitors bagged one gold, three silvers, three bronzes, and 13 medallions of excellence.

FE Week is proud to be the official media partner for WorldSkills UK and Team UK.

Team UK for WorldSkills Kazan:

Competition	Forename	Employer and Training Provider
3D Digital Game Art	Patrick Buckley	West Cheshire College
Aircraft Maintenance	Haydn Jakes	Nottingham University
Architectural Stonemasonry	Ethan Conlon	Bath College and APS Masonry
Beauty Therapy	Rebecca West	East Sussex College and Bespoke You
Bricklaying	Lewis Greenwood	York College and PDS construction
Cabinet Making	Owen Aldous	Chichester College and Callow & Co
Car Painting	Conor McKevitt	Riverpark Training and Wrights Accident Repair Centre
Carpentry	Jack Goodrum	The College of West Anglia and Peter Goodrum Ltd
CNC Milling	Elliott Dawson	Training 2000 Limited and Fort Vale
CNC Turning	Jack McCarthy	DMG MORI UK
Confectioner/Pastry Cook	Connor Stow	Hull College and Compass Restaurant Association
Construction Metal Work	Tyler Atkinson	Burnley College and WEC Group LTD
Cooking	Sam Everton	Pembrokeshire College and Crwst
Electrical Installation	Thomas Lewis	Cardiff and Vale College and Blues Electrical
Electronics	Thomas Andrews	Alton College and Sonardyne Int Ltd
Hairdressing	Phoebe McLavy	Coleg Sir Gar and Morgan Edward Salon
Jewellery	Samuel McMahon	The Goldsmiths Centre and Mappin & Webb (Aurum Holdings)
Joinery	Christopher Caine	Pembrokeshire College and DH Carpentry & Joinery
Landscape Gardening	Samuel Taylor	Myerscough College and Garden TLC
Landscape Gardening	Shea McFerran	CAFRE and Logan Landscape
Manufacturing Team Challenge	Andrew Joyce	Carnaud metalbox
Manufacturing Team Challenge	Isaac Khan	Carnaud metalbox
Manufacturing Team Challenge	James Thomason	Carnaud MetalBox
Mechanical Engineering: CAD	Ross Megahy	New College Lanarkshire
Mechatronics	Jack Dakin	Toyota Manufacturing UK
Mechatronics	Danny Slater	Toyota Manufacturing UK
Painting and Decorating	Callum Bonner	Forth Valley College of Further and Higher Education and Clackmannanshire council
Plastering and Drywall Systems	Curtis Johnston	SERC and SB Plastering
Refrigeration	Orlando Rawlings	Grimsby Institute of Further Education and Higher Education and Daikin UK
Restaurant Services	Collette Gorvett	Gower College Swansea
Visual Merchandising	Konnar Doyle	City of Glasgow College
Wall and Floor Tiling	Mark Scott	City of Glasgow College and J McGoldrick & Sons Ltd

 

The Hadlow Group has hit the headlines following allegations of financial irregularities and the departure of several senior leaders and governors. Now, FE Week has learnt further details of issues which brought about the FE Commissioner and Education and Skills Funding Agency investigations, as well as the fallout from the controversy.

Deputy CEO could face police probe over faking ESFA email

The deputy principal of The Hadlow Group could face a police investigation into claims he doctored government emails to claim taxpayer funding on behalf of the group, FE Week understands.

Last year, as part of an Education and Skills Funding Agency audit of West Kent College, the agency asked deputy principal Mark Lumsdon-Taylor why significant sums of funding had been claimed when no activity had taken place.

He is said to have told the agency that the claims for this additional funding had been agreed as part of transitional arrangements during the transfer of K College contracts.

The ESFA asked him for evidence proving that they had given him permission to claim this additional funding, and he allegedly presented them with an email from the ESFA, which he claimed to have received in 2014.

However, when the ESFA checked their own email servers for this email, it was found that it had been altered.

ESFA investigators found no such permission to claim additional funding could be proven – and the audit concluded with a demand for a significant sum of funding to be returned to the ESFA.

Asked whether the Department for Education had contacted the police about a possible criminal investigation into certain employees of The Hadlow Group, a spokesperson said: “We do not routinely comment on investigations ongoing or otherwise.”

In addition to his role as deputy principal, Lumsdon-Taylor is also finance director of The Hadlow Group and a trustee of the Kent Mining Heritage Foundation (which is building a museum at Betteshanger Park, which is part of The Hadlow Group).

His relationship with Hadlow College first began when he worked for chartered accountant Macintyre Hudson as its director of audit, with the college as a client, in the early 2000s.

At the time, Hadlow College was struggling financially and academically, after receiving a grade three from Ofsted.

He became finance director in 2003, before taking on a wider role at The Hadlow Group once it adopted West Kent and Ashford College in 2014.

A spokesperson for The Hadlow Group would not be drawn on the matter of doctored emails, simply stating: “Hadlow College’s board is conducting its own internal investigation and the outcomes of the investigation will determine the next actions to be taken. Until the investigation is concluded, we cannot comment further.”

Lumsdon-Taylor did not respond to multiple requests by FE Week for comment on these allegations.

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Former chair was ‘misled and lied to’

The former chair of West Kent and Ashford College’s board and group finance committee has said he was “misled and lied to”, but would not say by whom.

Paul Dubrow stepped down last month, around the same time Hadlow Group principal Paul Hannan and deputy principal Mark Lumsdon-Taylor were suspended.

Dubrow said: “I stepped down as chair of West Kent and Ashford College as it was the honourable thing to do.

“As former US president Harry Truman said: ‘The buck stops here.’

“As chair of governors, ultimate responsibility lies with me, even though the board and I were misled and lied to.

“In spite of this, I felt it the right thing to do to resign my position.”

Dubrow would not be drawn on who misled and lied to the board; but he said that evidence he has provided to the FE Commissioner proved that it had happened.

“It would not be correct of me to give any further details at this point, as the investigation is still ongoing.”

Dubrow was the only representative of West Kent and Ashford College on the Hadlow Group finance committee, which he chaired before he resigned.

He is also a director of a number of businesses based in Hadlow, Kent.

Last week, FE Week reported on how the governance of the Hadlow Group was in meltdown following the departure of a number of leaders, together with the lack of either a chief financial officer and a chartered accountant on the finance committee.

Dubrow’s departure was part of a recent raft of governor resignations from The Hadlow Group, which also included George Jessel, Harvey Guntrip and Chris Hearn.

The role of chief financial officer has now been filled by Anna Fitch, a member of the FE Commissioner’s team.

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Betteshanger: £4m failed sale and £1.2m extra cost

The Hadlow Group’s financial situation has been further thrown into doubt by revelations around the sale of a business park that never happened and building cost over-runs of £1.2 million.

According to minutes from a February 2017 meeting of the group’s finance committee, it had “negotiated a sale price of £4,000,000 for the sale of the Betteshanger Business Park to Corinthian Land”. 

The group brought in James W Rae, a real estate consultant, to market the park to potential investors, but did not put the site up for sale on the open market.

The college has confirmed this sale never went ahead and Corinthian Land’s development manager Tom Billings said he had never heard of it when he was contacted by FE Week.

However, it is understood that Simon Wright, still listed as a director at Corinthian Land, had looked into buying it with David Tugwell, a director at Corinthian Living and Corinthian Mountfield, which are also part of the Corinthian Group.

Tugwell said: “It was not something we ever progressed with and we never made an offer.”

The business park is part of the Betteshanger Sustainable Parks scheme, which will include a visitor centre and the Kent Mining Museum, all built on the 121-hectare site of the closed Betteshanger Colliery.

For the project’s former chair, the suspended deputy principal Mark Lumsdon-Taylor, the redevelopment of Betteshanger Colliery was a pet project.

In an article by the Kent Messenger Group, Lumsdon-Taylor was said to have spoken about the redevelopment of the colliery in “personal” terms.

He also spoke enthusiastically about the 175m visitor centre being “longer than the Gherkin” in London. However, his labour of love was to become another financial headache for The Hadlow Group.

It has had to spend an extra £1.2 million on the project due to the challenges of building the visitor centre on the former colliery site.

Ground tests and the length of the centre meant the group needed to use piles for the foundation, which cost more than the original plans for a raft foundation.

The cost of these changes was brought up at a Hadlow Group audit committee meeting in March 2017, which discussed whether to seek financial compensation for the initial advice the group had received about the visitor centre. According to the minutes: “This advice was not correct, leading to both a significant time delay and additional project costs.”

The committee tasked Lumsdon-Taylor to work with solicitors to find out the likely costs and returns from a settlement.

However, a Hadlow College Group spokesperson said Lumsdon-Taylor did not seek legal advice.

At an audit committee meeting in November 2017, it was agreed to defer the matter to the group board for a final decision.

Then, at an audit committee meeting in June 2018, the committee received a “route of action”, but asked for a further update in the autumn.

The group declined to comment on whether the £1.2 million costs had been written off in the overdue 2017/18 accounts.

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The over £20m ESFA transaction unit loan application that failed

A former member of The Hadlow Group finance committee was paid on sabbatical to help the group apply for more than £20 million from the Education and Skills Funding Agency transactions unit.

Originally, in February 2018, the group enlisted the help of consultancy Edscencio, co-founded by Chris Hearn, to help with a loan restructure at West Kent and Ashford College.

Hearn offered to resign from the board, but it was decided he could declare his interest at each meeting, recuse himself from any decisions concerning Edscencio, and stay on.

In July 2018, Hearn offered to resign again, as Hadlow College had requested Edscencio’s help with their application for ESFA funding to facilitate a formal merger.

But the board wanted him to return as governor at a later date, so it was agreed that Hearn would take a sabbatical until Edscencio’s work was completed.

The application was not only rejected by the ESFA, it is understood the need for funding raised significant concern with the Department for Education.

Asked about this arrangement, Hearn said: “Edscencio worked with the governors to assure that the relationship was open, transparent and declared in the register of interests.”

He only resigned as a governor a few weeks ago, and the FE Commissioner has required the group to stop working with Edscencio.

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What future for chair of board leading investigation into principal and deputy?

The future of The Hadlow Group’s top governor could be in doubt after the group refused to comment on whether the rest of the board had confidence in her.

Theresa Bruton has been on the Hadlow College board for seven years and has been its chair since 2016.

She took over from Paul Dubrow as interim chair of the board of West Kent and Ashford College, having previously been vice chair, after Dubrow resigned in February.

She is leading the investigation into Paul Hannan and Mark Lumsdon-Taylor and sits on a number of committees, as well as on an advisory group for Betteshanger Business Park, making her one of the key leaders of The Hadlow Group following Paul Hannan’s and Mark Lumsdon-Taylor’s suspension.

Asked whether the boards of both colleges had confidence in her, a group spokesperson did not address that directly.

They would only say Bruton’s term as chair of the Hadlow College will last until July, when an election for the chair and vice chair will take place.

The WKAC board, meanwhile, will decide on a new chair at its next board meeting.

The spokesperson did say: “We anticipate the FE Commissioner intervention and resulting report will involve a review of the role of the governors.”

According to her LinkedIn page, Bruton previously worked as head of regeneration projects for Kent County Council and as a director of Visit Kent.

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More bailouts or bust: FE Commissioner expected to advise this week

The ESFA clawback for claiming funds without permission, combined with the £1.2 million extra visitor centre costs and a failed application for more than £20 million in restructuring funds from the ESFA’s Transactions Unit, has left The Hadlow Group in a precarious financial position.

The FE Commissioner will meet the ESFA on Friday, ahead of a decision on whether the education secretary should continue to financially support the colleges, or let either of them go into administration.

The group has this week confirmed that it is receiving Exceptional Financial Support from the ESFA, which has demanded the return of significant amounts of funding it had previously given to Hadlow College and West Kent and Ashford College.

A Hadlow spokesperson said: “We are working closely with the ESFA to ensure we are able to meet all of our liabilities, while not compromising on the quality of the courses currently on offer at any of the Hadlow Group colleges or sites.”

Damian Hinds, the education secretary, could either finance a recovery, by loaning them money and making the college sell some of its 300-plus acres of land, or he could call in the administrators.

This would mean Hadlow College and West Kent and Ashford College could become the first to fall under the new insolvency regime, which came into force on 31 January.

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Auditing firms under the microscope in light of allegations

Questions are being asked about the two college auditors for The Hadlow Group, in light of the swirling allegations about financial irregularities.

Macintyre Hudson, the internal auditor, and RSM, the external auditor, were both asked whether either of them were investigating their role at the colleges; whether they believed they had performed their roles as auditors properly; and whether they think their own auditors failed in any way.

A spokesperson for RSM said: “It would be professionally inappropriate for us to comment on this matter.”

Macintyre Hudson declined to comment on those questions and on whether it would be re-employing Mark Lumsdon-Taylor, the deputy principal of The Hadlow Group, who resigned before being suspended last month.

He was brought in as a “troubleshooter” to help balance the books and, according to his LinkedIn page, he stopped working for Macintyre Hudson in February 2003.

Six per cent of adults with learning disabilities are in paid employment – something that specialist colleges are working hard to redress through their own enterprises, supported work experience or supported internship programmes. FE Week visits two Leicestershire colleges to see how they’re going about it

I meet Tracey Forman at the Barrow of Treats café, a four-table eatery that serves baked potatoes, sandwiches and omelettes on the high street of the village of Barrow upon Soar.

Isaac carefully records our order on an iPad that uses pictorial representations, something that makes it accessible to most students from the nearby Homefield College.

“The students who work in here will generally be able to serve customers or cook,” Forman, the college’s principal, says. “Sometimes we have students who wouldn’t be able to cope with this environment.”

We don’t have many traditional classrooms; we are about accessing the community

Those students might work in one of 14 sites – including a sweet shop, internet café and various houses – that make up the Leicestershire college that educates 73 students with social, emotional and mental health needs.

“We don’t have very many traditional classrooms because we are about accessing the community,” Forman explains. “We don’t tend to do a whole lot of formal qualifications. We will do things that will let students access the community or access employment, or move them nearer to employment.”

The employment rates for adults with disabilities are dismal. In 2018, only 51 per cent of people with disabilities were in paid employment, compared with 81 per cent of the general population. When you drill down to those with learning disabilities, the figure drops to 6 per cent, according to the NHS.

“The employment rates are still far too low for people with learning difficulties,” says Clare Howard, the chief executive of the National Association of Specialist Colleges, when we chat about what I’ve seen in Leicestershire.

“There is an issue around the culture of making sure that we are demonstrating that this group of students could be really good for the economy, and we’ve got to demonstrate to employers how valuable that is.”

Back in Barrow, in the sweet shop across the road, 19-year-old Robert has just packed up 20 cellophane party bags with brightly coloured sweets. He’s had to calculate and count out a pound’s worth for each bag, and is now sitting at the work table facing away from the shop door, his cone-shaped creations piled high.

“Somebody who didn’t know about us would just come in and see Robert sitting there, and think, ‘What’s he doing? Why is he there?’” Forman says. “Whereas he’s somebody who needs a break every so often.

“The challenge with enterprises like this is how do you make it a good experience for the customer, while not forgetting that it’s a learning experience for the student.”
Robert doesn’t serve customers, but some students are being trained do just that.

At the Sip and Surf internet café in Loughborough town centre, Homefield students serve tea and coffee and run a print shop that produces mugs, posters and desk mats. Sheila Page, the centre manager, oversees operations.

“Even if you came in and said, ‘Can I have a cup of tea?’ they’ve got to follow that on with, ‘Would you like sugar, would you like milk?’” she says. “It’s about communication. Some of them won’t answer a telephone, but that’s what we work towards – answering the phone and passing messages on. Because it’s work skills – if you’re going to work
in a work placement or get a job, this is what you need to be doing.”

Page, who is also studying part-time for her diploma in education and training at Loughborough College, has worked at Sip and Surf since it opened nine years ago. Touch screens have revolutionised how much her students can do – they can now all use the till, for instance, and set up the designs for the mugs and mats they print.

 

Watching the transformation of some students can feel like watching the TV show Stars in their Eyes, Page says. “They walk through the door not knowing, and then they can go through the door at the end of the three years and they’ve learned all these work skills that they can take away and use in a workplace, in voluntary, whatever. And you know that you’ve helped them achieve that.”

As well as practising at the college’s own training businesses, students do work placements with businesses in the community. So how many students go into paid employment when they leave?

“The number is still very small,” Forman says. “Some of them could work, but the work placements don’t always turn into paid work.”

There’s no national reporting of destination data for the 4,200 learners in specialist colleges, with most learners remaining at pre-entry level, entry level, or level 1.

Their destinations, Howard says, are likely to be split between general FE college – having used specialist college as a stepping stone from a special school – supported living (in which case the specialist college will be training them to be independent) or into voluntary or paid work.

Those with more complex needs or health needs, or who are unable to work, will go into social care, “but we’re hopeful that the education they’ve had in college will enable savings on the social care budget,” she says.

A National Audit Office report in 2011 concluded that supporting one person with learning disabilities into employment could reduce lifetime cost to the public purse by about £170,000 and increase their income by between 55 and 95 per cent.

The estimated savings for the social care budget are about £1 million a person if adults destined for residential care are trained and supported to live in more independent housing.

Sip and Surf also functions as a drop-in centre for staff and students, which can be useful as students often travel to Loughborough with a support worker to go for lunch at Weatherspoons. Forman, sensing my scepticism over whether this kind of activity really counts as education, counters with a story of a parent who told her that what she really wanted for her son was to have lunch together in a pub.

That means, she says, that the young person must learn how to travel independently on public transport, function in a busy public place, read a menu, order food, count money.

“Sometimes they will arrive with us in one location, only to go off on a train somewhere because that’s the lesson for the morning. So it doesn’t take place in a room.

“For us, going somewhere to do something is part of your preparation. As you will know in your work, you do have to go places, don’t you? And you have to learn how to do that. So that’s why our strapline is ‘achievement through experience’, because everything we do is part of the learning.”

The government’s supported internship programmes, which started in September 2013, are aimed at getting more people with disabilities into work through personalised learning programmes. About 700 people are now on these internships, either through an FE college or the local authority.

Five are run by RNIB College Loughborough, a specialist sight-loss college for 73 students, adjacent to Loughborough College.

“We were built here specifically to work alongside the mainstream college,” says June Murray, the principal, a move she describes as “very progressive, very innovative” when it was founded in 1989. At the time, blind and partially sighted students might have done their A-levels in the mainstream college, with the RNIB providing additional life skills and specialist skills training.

The RNIB college now educates students with a whole range of disabilities, as a result of the shift towards the “presumption to mainstream” introduced in the Children and Families Act 2014, and an emphasis on local provision.

Murray sees this as a good thing, as long as the right kind of additional specialist support is still available: “We’re looking at student choice here, and there are a number of young people who are choosing to be in their local college, stay at home in their own community. That’s a positive thing. Providing, of course, they’re going to get the kind of wraparound support that they need.”

Unlike Homefield, RNIB operates from a traditional college campus, but it also places a strong focus on work readiness. Students can choose to work in one of the college’s five “enterprises”: the office, which provides photocopying and letter packaging services for internal and external clients; the arts centre, which makes crafts to sell; the media hub, which has recently been commissioned to create a video on people with autism for the local police authority; the Bell Bar college canteen; and Sell4U, where students process items to list for sale on Ebay in return for a percentage of the profit.

Students also do long-term work placements of two hours a week over their first two years, where they are accompanied by a learning support assistant.

Gina Hufford is the work placement officer for RNIB College and part of her job is to convince employers of the benefits of taking on students. “Obviously you do get hesitations,” she says, “and a lot of the hesitations are around their time – how much of their time is going to be taken up. But the students do go supported so it takes that pressure away from them, because they don’t need to have a buddy all the time.”

What incentives can Hufford offer the employers to invest in the programme?

“There is none really,” Murray says. “Except for the fact that we build the relationships up with them and we help them to understand that we will be very supportive. And it’s a kind of social commitment. So when you get an employer on board, they’re hugely enthusiastic. What there is, is, ‘If you give this young person a chance, we think they could be a good employee for you later’. And they are!”

Occasionally a student will move on independently. One, for instance, went on a work placement at Costa Coffee last year and is now on a supported internship with the same employer.

Supported internships, Murray says, “in very crude terms” are the equivalent of an apprenticeship for people who aren’t able to complete a standard apprenticeship. It involves one day in college studying maths and English, and two days with an employer – again accompanied by a learning support assistant.

“Obviously on the internship we want that support to be gradually pulled away,” Hufford says, “We’ve highlighted these students as able to go into paid employment, so they’re not going to have someone there all the time. Throughout the process the support kind of pulls back.”

The ideal outcome of a supported internship is that at the end of the year, the employer will take them on as a paid employee, something that is communicated from the start.
Of the five supported internships run by RNIB College last year, two led to part-time employment – about four hours a week cleaning tables at McDonalds and helping customers with queries. “That was suitable for the employer and more than enough for the students as well,” Hufford says. “There’s no stipulation on how many hours they need; it’s just an outcome for the college that we’ve got someone into paid employment, which is amazing.”

Nineteen-year-old Robbie has been competing in gymnastics for several years and wants to work in the sport. He is doing his supported internship at Hinckley Gymnastics, where he learns about setting up the equipment, helps to runs sessions, and cleans the communal areas. The club is in conversation with a provider to try to build a bespoke apprenticeship for Robbie through British Gymnastics.

We don’t want inclusion linked to the word mainstream, we want it linked to integration

These are all great examples of inclusion, Howard says, who is keen to insist that being in a specialist college doesn’t mean you’re not included in society.

“Inclusion means a lot of other things than being in mainstream. It means the sorts of things you saw at Homefield. If you look at Barrow of Treats – that’s a specialist education, but they are completely integrated within the community. So we wouldn’t want the word inclusion linked to the word mainstream, we’d want it to be linked to integration and making sure that people are well supported into their adult lives and being able to make contributions to the community. You can do that within a specialist college just as well, if not better, than you can within a mainstream.”