Government officials have revealed they are actively looking at ways to make the 315-hour minimum industry placement in T-levels more flexible.

Senior leaders such as David Hughes, chief executive of the Association of Colleges, have long expressed concern that young people, especially in rural areas, will be unable to pass the T-level owing to a lack of local and lengthy placement opportunities.

In a webinar put out by the Education and Skills Funding Agency in February, T-level developer Sarah Knights said the government is listening to concerns and could “accommodate flexibilities” before the first T-level students start in 2020.

“It’s very much something under consideration – access to industry placements, particularly in areas where opportunities are limited. There is a lot of work going on at the moment to see how we might be able to accommodate flexibilities within the delivery model,” she said.

FE Week understands one area of flexibility the ESFA is looking at is allowing students to take several short industry placements at different employers, as opposed to one long one, which would add up to the minimum duration.

Jo Maher, the principal of Boston College, one of the pilots of the new technical qualifications, is one person campaigning for the change to allow for multiple placements to count towards the 315-hour minimum.

She also wants a change in government rules so that simulated work within a college, at a college-run restaurant or hair salon, for example, can count towards the placement.

“I fully understand there is a view that it’s an artificial environment, but having paying members of the public in the building means students can still learn,” she said.

She believes this flexibility would be particularly helpful for students with special educational needs and mental health issues who can use it to “build confidence” before going to work at other companies.

Maher has also asked the ESFA to make 45 days the minimum requirement, instead of 315 hours.

“The spending rules say the placement can last a minimum of 45 days, but that’s a misnomer. It’s the 315 hours that’s the real crux point,” she told FE Week.

Maher said many of her 72 T-level pilot learners have to get up at 7am, but cannot start work until 10am.

This is because they have firstly to travel to college before being taken to their work by a designated minibus as they cannot afford to travel to the placement.

“Why would we then put in a measure that they have got to this for 60 days?” Maher asked.

Boston College had to buy a minibus and delegate a member of the work placement team to make an hourlong trip ferrying the learners to their placements.

“That is not what funding should be used for,” Maher said.

She added that without these various flexibilities to the industry placements she does not believe T-levels will be a success. Another area the ESFA still needs to work out is whether part-time jobs can count as part of the work placement.

“When asked a question about this in the ESFA webinar, Elisabeth Baines, who works for the agency in funding and programmes development, said: “It depends. We have outlined the principles of what an industry placement should be so I do not think we can give a blanket ‘yes it could’.”

On the possibility of flexibilities, a DfE spokesperson would only say: “We are working closely with colleges, providers and business to get the delivery of this right and more information will be made available over the year.”

However, he confirmed that there are no plans to change the 315-hour minimum requirement.

Figures for the apprenticeship starts published this morning for the period August to December 2018 are up 10 per cent on 2017 – but 24 per cent down for the same period in 2016 – the year before the levy reforms were introduced.

The Department for Education reports: “There have been 192,100 apprenticeship starts reported to date between August 2018 and December 2018 for the 2018/19 academic year. This compares to 175,100 reported in the equivalent period in 2017/18, 230,400 in 2016/17 and 224,400 in 2015/16.

“Of the 192,100 apprenticeship starts reported so far in 2018/19, 59.1 per cent (113,500) were on apprenticeship standards.”

The 15,300 starts in December 2018 were 8 per cent lower than the 16,700 reported at the same time last year for 2017.

December is the second month in 2018/19 to experience a fall in starts compared to figures published at the same time last year.

Analysis by FE Week shows that for the Government to achieve their manifesto commitment of 3 million starts by April 2020 there will need to be an average of 82,031 starts every month over the next 16 months. Since May 2015 the average monthly starts have been 38,352.

More to follow

The Department for Education is “encouraging” colleges to be more transparent about senior staff pay when they file their accounts – along with whether they have adopted the Association of College’s new code.

A “college accounts direction” for 2018/19 was published by the department today and included “substantial” updates that corporations should include when submitting their upcoming financial statements.

“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,” it said.

“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.”

While the DfE has clamped down on chief executive pay in multi-academy trusts and vice-chancellor wages in universities, including writing to demand a justification of salaries of over £150,000, no such action has been taken against colleges, despite many principals earning over £200,000.

Addressing colleges today, the DfE said: “We encourage corporations to make every effort to evidence their disclosures fully, and to consider what other information enhance transparency and understandability.

“For example, corporations could consider providing stakeholders with more meaningful information to help them understand pay structures and movements, such as: remuneration paid or payable in the year, alongside full-time equivalent information [and] whether they have adopted AoC’s Governor’s Council’s The Colleges Senior Staff Remuneration Code.”

The voluntary guidance from the Association of Colleges, which received mixed reactions when it was being consulted on, was published in December.

It encompasses “three core principles: fairness, independence and transparency”.

The main policies include only giving seniors a pay rise if all staff also receive one, removing top college bosses from remuneration committees, and separate publication of principal salaries.

It was developed after tension between lecturers and their bosses intensified as college leaders enjoyed bumper wage increases while pay for lower-level staff has reportedly failed to keep up with inflation.

The University and College Union blasted principals for being “greedy and hopelessly out of touch” in April last year, after its analysis of 2016/17 accounts showed a third enjoyed a pay rise of more than 10 per cent.

Seventeen principals earned salaries of over £200,000 that year.

Today’s accounts direction from the DfE emphasises that colleges “risk” intervention from the Education and Skills Funding Agency if they do not submit their audited accounts for 2018/19 by December 31, 2019.

It also highlights that colleges and their auditors “need to be mindful of the new insolvency regime in preparing accounts”, which came into force on January 31.

The National Audit Office is expected to publish its long awaited follow-up review on the state of the apprenticeships programme next Wednesday, in the middle of National Apprenticeship Week.

The independent Parliamentary body was damning in its verdict of apprenticeship reform in its last report in September 2016, when it warned of a high risk of fraud and “market abuse” and revealed a lack of contingency plans.

The new report, which is due on March 6 and will focus on whether the reformed apprenticeships programme is delivering value for money, is also expected to be highly critical.

This latest review was launched last July. When FE Week asked the NAO why it had chosen the middle of National Apprenticeship Week to publish the report, a spokesperson said: “We were always going to publish this report around now and are of course aware that next week is Apprenticeship Week. Given the focus it seems a good time to reflect on the programme.”

Its report will consider whether the Department for Education has defined appropriate indicators of success for the apprenticeships programme, whether the DfE is doing enough to ensure apprenticeships and the levy system are not being abused and what progress has been made against previous NAO and public accounts committee recommendations.

The NAO is also expected to comment on why thousands of apprentices do not have a regulator responsible for inspecting the quality of their training. This comes after FE Week revealed that providers who delivering apprenticeships at levels 6 and 7 that have no HE qualification – such as a degree – and are not on the Office for Students register go completely unregulated.

The new report is also expected to be damning on issues of apprenticeship oversight after repeated issues with applications to the register of apprenticeship training providers, which led to cases of one-man bands with no delivery experience being given access to millions of pounds of apprenticeship funding.

A new “tougher” register opened in December, which forces all providers who gained access to reapply, and new applicants must have traded for 12 months at least in order to be eligible and provide a full set of accounts to be on the register.

When the NAO launched its follow-up review it also said it would also focus on why apprenticeship starts have dropped and the work of the Institute for Apprenticeships and Technical Education. It is also expected to examine the impact of the policy.

Earlier this month, the DfE commissioned research to examine whether apprenticeship delivery is being adjusted to account for apprentices’ prior learning, signalling the government is preparing to clamp down on funding overclaims. The NAO also told FE Week that this is one area of concern that it is likely to address in its new report.

In September 2016, the first NAO report on apprenticeship reforms found that a delivery team had been set up to “consider the risks of fraud and gaming” but said it was “too early to say what impact this group will have”.

It urged the DfE to “do more to understand how employers, training providers and assessment bodies may respond to ongoing reforms, and develop robust ways of reacting quickly should instances of market abuse emerge”.

A criminal investigation into disgraced apprenticeship firm Aspire Achieve Advance could soon be launched after the Department for Education requested a meeting with the police.

The company, better known as 3aaa, went into administration on October 11 after the government pulled its skills funding contracts following allegations of fraud.

Derbyshire Constabulary then started making enquiries into the defunct provider, following a referral from Action Fraud, while the DfE continued to conduct its own investigation separately, which got underway in the summer.

In December the police told FE Week that it was waiting for the DfE to conclude its own investigation before deciding whether a criminal investigation needs to be opened.

The DfE now appears to have finished its work and has requested a sit down with officers to discuss next steps.

“Officers from Derbyshire Constabulary and officials from the Department for Education are meeting imminently to discuss the enquiries regarding 3aaa,” a spokesperson for Derbyshire Constabulary said.

“At this time, no formal criminal investigation has been launched.”

The police force is expected to have all of the information from the DfE and whistleblowers following the meeting and will then decide if the findings break any laws. If this threshold is passed then a criminal investigation will open.

A DfE spokesperson said: “We do not routinely comment on the details of investigations, ongoing or otherwise”.

While the department has not yet made public the allegations into 3aaa, FE Week revealed what was behind their investigation in November.

The company, which had over 4,200 learners and 500 staff before it went bust when the ESFA pulled its £16.5 million contracts, allegedly manipulated Individualised Learner Records to artificially inflate achievement rates and misused employer-incentive grants.

3aaa, which received nearly all of its income from government skills funding, was co-founded by Peter Marples and Di McEvoy-Robinson in 2008, but the pair stepped down in September as the ESFA came knocking.

Their latest accounts show that they took out huge directors’ loans totalling more than £4 million between them, and at the end of 2015, both owners purchased multi-million pound properties.

3aaa splashed its public funding on £1.6 million of sports-club sponsorships, an Elton John concert and Tesla supercars among other luxuries.

This isn’t the first ESFA investigation into the company. In 2016 auditing firm KPMG was asked to carry out an investigation and found dozens of success rate “overclaims”.

It is understood this resulted in 3aaa paying back a substantial six-figure sum at the time.

But this didn’t stop the agency from giving the provider a £7 million apprenticeships contract increase in the same year.

After launching its second investigation into 3aaa in June, the DfE called in an independent auditor to investigate the ESFA over its contract management of the former apprenticeships giant.

Ofsted paused its inspection at 3aaa, which was expected to result in another grade one rating, in the summer after the DfE launched its investigation. The education watchdog told FE Week in November it was continuing to look into the provider but a final outcome has still not been reached.

Last month FE Week reported that more than half of the apprentices that were affected by the collapse of 3aaa had still not been found a new provider.

Labour is planning to use National Apprenticeships Week to attack the government on their commitment to their own public sector apprenticeship recruitment target.

Over the last week multiple MPs from the party have submitted a series of questions to ministers asking for the number of apprentices working in their department.

The questions have all been asked in the run-up to National Apprenticeship Week in March and Labour has told FE Week its intention is to put a spotlight on the government’s shortcomings in the area.

Since April 2017, all public sector organisations with 250 or more employees – including the civil service – have been told to make sure that new apprentices make up at least 2.3 per cent of their overall workforce numbers on average over the next four years.

FE Week revealed in November that only 1.3 per cent of the government workforce was made up of apprentices in 2017-18 – the first year of the policy.

FE Week has asked Labour how many apprentices it employs itself, but the party did not respond at the time of going to press.

This week, the Ministry of Defence replied to a question from shadow skills minister Gordon Marsden and said that 1,280 of its civilian personnel were currently on an apprenticeship scheme, which represents some 2.3 per cent of its civilian workforce.

It did not state, however, how many of these were new starters, and neither did any of the other government departments that responded.

Marsden also asked the Ministry of Justice, which said it has 587 members of staff on an apprenticeship, one per cent of its workforce.

The Department for Education also told the shadow skills minister that it has 209 apprentices, making up 3.2 per cent of the 6,427-strong workforce.

And three per cent of the staff at the Department for Work & Pensions are on apprentices, it told Marsden.

The Home Office told shadow education secretary Angela Rayner it  has 335 apprentices, which also equates to one per cent of its workforce.

Rayner also found that the Ministry for Housing has 68 apprentices, but did not say how much of the workforce is made up by apprentices.

Rayner also found the Cabinet Office has 90 apprentices, eight of which work for the Government in Parliament Group, which covers the Leader of the Commons’ office.

The Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy employs 80 apprentices, according to an answer it gave to shadow minister Emma Lewell-Buck.

Fellow shadow minister Mike Kane learned from the Department for International Trade that around 1.8 per cent of the department and UK Export Finance were apprentices, and 1.41 per cent of the Department for Transport’s workforce is made up of apprentices.

Kane also asked the Department for Health and Social Care, which said it employs 1,585 civil servants, of whom 48 are undertaking an apprenticeship, which equates to three per cent.

As for the Treasury, 1.7 per cent of its staff were apprentices as of January 2019, according to an answer it gave to shadow minister Tracy Brabin.

Minister Robert Jenrick added: “We expect an additional 15 new apprentices to start this financial year, meaning 2.5 per cent of our staff will be new apprentices over the period 1 April 2018 – 31 March 2019.”

Apprenticeships in the civil service haven’t been plain sailing. FE Week reported in November that a cabinet office approved apprenticeship provider to government departments had its levy funding terminated after a damning Ofsted report found it was ‘insufficient’ across the board.

Nearly 700 apprentices were affected.

The Department for Education is searching for an organisation to design and support the phased implementation of the T-level transition offer in 2020 and 2021.

As recommended in Lord Sainsbury’s technical education report from July 2016, the government plans to develop a course which 16-year-olds can take if they are not ready to start a T-level at level three, but who can “realistically achieve it” by age 19.

The post-16 skills plan, published later that month, then said the DfE would carry out further work and consultation on this transition year “over the next six months”, and for some, it “might be right to undertake a ‘traineeship’ during or after the transition year”.

But further information on this hasn’t been forthcoming since.

With just over a year to go until the first T-levels are delivered, the DfE is now seeking an organisation to help them create the transition offer.

A short procurement exercise, which will run for just 15 days, was launched today and states the successful bidder will help the DfE’s advisory panel finalise the content of the transition offer.

The winner will also provide support for “participating post-16 providers to develop, package and deliver their local T-level transition offer” and “encourage and facilitate participating providers to explore different approaches to implementing certain elements of the transition offer”.

The delivery agent will be procured via the DfE’s Dynamic Purchasing System. The department would not disclose how much the contract is worth.

Skills minister Anne Milton said: “We are making excellent progress to deliver our new gold-standard T-levels from September 2020.

“The T-level transition offer is an important part of this and will help young people, who may not quite be ready, get up to speed with the basic skills and gain the confidence they need before starting their T-level. 

“We are running a short procurement to appoint an experienced organisation to support the first T-level providers run a phased implementation of the transition offer in 2020 and 2021.”

The first three T-levels, which will be delivered from 2020 by 50 providers, will be in education and childcare pathway, design, surveying and planning, and digital production, design and development.

On today’s tender, Julie Oxley, chair of the digital production, design and development T-level panel, said: “As we prepare to roll out the T-level programme, this is a positive step forward as the transition offer will provide important tailored provision to support students to develop the academic skills, technical skills, knowledge and behaviours required to progress onto a T-level.”

A mega college that recently saw its principal quit before receiving a third consecutive ‘requires improvement’ rating from Ofsted is looking at demerging one of its divisions.

Birmingham Metropolitan College, which has five main colleges plus other satellite sites and had an income of £58.5 million and 20,000 learners in 2017/18, is one of the largest colleges in the country.

It owes the government millions in bailout cash that it received after running into severe financial difficulty and is currently subject to intervention from the FE Commissioner.

To find savings the college, known as BMet, is reviewing its size and is likely to part ways with Stourbridge College, which it uses to teach students across the Black Country and Kidderminster.

Cliff Hall, who took over as interim principal when Andrew Cleaves left with immediate effect in September, said: “The review is being led by the FE Commissioner’s team. The plan is to make any recommendations by April.

“We are consulting all of our local stakeholders, staff and students. Any changes will only be made with the agreement of the BMet board of governors. 

“Our overriding priority is continuity of provision for our students. 

“In the short time that I have been BMet Principal, I have come to have the highest regard for the quality of provision at Stourbridge College.”

BMet has held a government notice of concern for financial health since July 2015.

Its latest set of accounts, for 2017/18, show that the college owed the Education and Skills Funding Agency £7.7 million at July 31 2018, of which £6 million was exceptional financial support.

The college has also been granted an additional bailout of £4.3 million from the agency, which was expected to be paid in January 2019 after it “implemented an institutional review to determine the strategic future of the college”, according to the financial statements.

The accounts suggest site sales will be the main way of getting BMet out of financial trouble.

They state that the college sold a building for £9.9 million in 2017/18, of which £7 million went to repaying exceptional financial support.

At the time of the accounts being published, BMet was selling two other buildings that are currently not being used, which the college is hoping will raise £5.3 million.

The accounts also show the college breached bank covenants on loans with both Barclays and Lloyds over 2017/18 worth £9.2 million, as it has done the two previous years.

The college’s deficit before other gains and losses was £8.5 million.

Despite its severe financial problems, BMet continued to make Cleaves one of the highest paid principals in the country in 2017/18, paying him a salary of £266,000.

The former senior executive at National Express resigned with immediate effect in late September. A week later, BMet’s chief financial officer Simon Cosson, also departed from the college, the accounts reveal.

A month later the college was hit with a grade three Ofsted report for the third time in a row.

BMet was created in 2009 and includes Matthew Boulton College, Sutton Coldfield College, James Watt College, Stourbridge College, The Art & Design Centre in the Black Country, and the Academy in Kidderminster.

Awarding organisations could soon have to conduct surprise audits to colleges and training providers as Ofqual seeks to tighten controls on the controversial direct claims status practice.

The qualifications watchdog has today launched a consultation on changing the way awarding bodies manage and oversee centre assessments.

Ofqual has identified a risk with so many assessments being approved by providers with ‘direct claim status’ and no moderation taking place by the awarding organisation.

Awarding organisations using a verification process after the certification is now something Ofqual wants to clampdown on by being clearer that moderation should take place before certification.

The most controversial proposal appears to be for awarding organisations to conduct a “minimum” of two monitoring visits and an “additional unannounced visit per centre every year”.

Ailin O’Cathain, head of policy at the Federation of Awarding Bodies, is not happy about the prospect of no-notice visits, which she views as “deeply impractical”.

“It is a disproportionate response to how awarding organisations will choose to manage centres,” she said.

“Monitoring visits are already based on risk assessments and where awarding organisations believe a rapid response is required they will already take appropriate action.”

She added that the unannounced visits have the potential to cause “significant disruption to the working of centres and raise a wide range of practical implementation issues”. 

The chief executive of the Association of Employment and Learning Providers, Mark Dawe, welcomed the “additional scrutiny because we believe accurate and consistent results are important”.

However, he said, providers’ “main concern will be to maintain a quick turnaround between assessment and certification”.

Centre assessments are where AOs devolve some responsibility for assessment to schools, colleges and training centres.

This is often known as direct claims status, where AOs do not moderate prior to certifications being awarded.

In February 2018, Ofqual wrote to awarding bodies to say it would begin auditing the organisations’ control over individual providers.

This was because of concerns the control AOs exerted over providers had lessened and the lack of moderation for direct claim status centres was leading to inconsistencies in attainment.

In the letter, Ofqual executive director for vocational and technical qualifications Phil Beach warned: “A failure to comply with the conditions of recognition can call into question the integrity of assessments, undermine the maintenance of standards and damage public confidence in the qualifications Ofqual regulates.”

Ofqual said today that there is evidence that the “variety of approaches currently in place to manage this provide different levels of oversight”.

It has also been found that the terms “moderation” and “verification” are often used interchangeably and in ways which are inconsistent with Ofqual’s rules.

Chief regulator Sally Collier said: “We have conducted a detailed review of the use of centre assessment and believe that there are risks that can be managed better.

“The controls that awarding organisations have in place with centres must be sufficiently robust for the public to have confidence that assessment standards are being maintained between training providers and over time.”

Dawe added: “While to many it sounds like a technicality, the differences between verification and moderation are critical, particularly in terms of the timely confirmation of apprentices and students achievements.”

Awarding bodies will be given time to introduce these new requirements for existing qualifications, after Ofqual gave them a deadline of January 2021.

A spokesperson for the regulator said the proposed deadline will allow AOs to make the necessary changes to meet its new requirements and roll them out to centres, following announcement of its final decisions at the end of this year.

She added that where AOs can “meet these sooner, including for new qualifications, we would expect them to do this”.

FE Week understands that the changes could be in place in time for the new functional skills qualifications, due for introduction at the end of this year.

Ofqual’s consultation is open until 20 May.