A year of shaking things up with the FE Literacy Movement

A year has gone since we launched The FE Literacy Movement, and it has been monumental in securing interest and discussion surrounding literacy across our sector.

We have welcomed FE professionals from across the United Kingdom to join ‘the movement’.

We have been kept busy with not only our events, but with building on our existing relationships with The National Literacy Trust, The English Association, Lexonik and Citizen Literacy, to name a few.

We have been interviewed by The Post 16 Educator magazine and have featured on a number of podcasts.

So we are confident that we are raising the profile of literacy within our colleges and proud to share that we are moving at speed!

As co-convenors for the Learning and Skills Research Network, we are passionate about bringing research and practice from both FE and HE institutions across the UK.  So we were delighted that teachers from England, Wales and Ireland were able to attend across our events.

In our Autumn term, we gave our ‘movers’ the space to discuss what they needed to know most about building literacy. The outcome was an oracy-focused training event in March, ‘Talk for Learning in Further Education’, hosted by us at Nottingham College and led by the National Literacy Trust. This was the first FE-specific oracy training of its kind.

The jewel in our crown was our end-of-academic-year inaugural conference ‘Literacy, English and the Subject Specialist Teacher’, held at the University of Derby in June. This main event was attended by over 80 practitioners from across the UK and from both FE and HE.

The conference blended evidence-based practice with our core mission: ‘to improve life chances for learners across the FE sector by harnessing literacy as a vehicle for social mobility’. 

We are raising the profile of literacy and moving at speed

We were blown away by the powerful messages and research shared throughout the day, which was kicked by Get Further’s Dr Alice Eardley outlining the challenges and positives that the condition of funding requirements can bring for our disadvantaged 16-19 year old students.

With this, she explained, comes the need to draw upon cognitive science and make words come to life by modelling our own expert reading and writing skills.

We were humbled too by the calibre and expertise of our keynote speakers and presenters. We heard from English curriculum specialist  Beth Kemp, University of Warwick and GCSE Resit Hub’s Dr Becky Morris, head of the University of Derby’s institute of education and dyslexia expert Sarah Charles, King’s College London literacy specialist Rose Veitch, adult literacy specialist Kerry Scattergood, Nottingham City of Literature director Hannah Trevarthen, Citizen Literacy’s Diane Gardner and John Casey, and national secondary assessment lead Helen Hewlett.

Each speaker shone a light on the potential we, as educators, have to shape better futures by equipping ourselves with what research shows us works to improve literacy across further education.

Finally, we were uplifted by a keynote from Dr Jo Bowser-Angermann, author and associate professor at Anglia Ruskin University, who has researched English resits extensively. She rightly pointed out that while post-16 resit policy is well-intentioned, we must pull away from teaching-to-the-test and embrace the freedom to innovate in our resit classrooms.

Further education colleges are more than just a mop-up for our students’ broken secondary education. We have the power to reignite creativity and must do so to truly re-engage students with improving their literacy skills, not forgetting that literacy crosses every vocation and discipline.

Our work continues across the next academic year, where we look forward to welcoming even more ‘movers’ to help us get closer to levelling the playing field for those from disadvantaged backgrounds.

Our events will be announced across the year, and they are not to be missed! This isn’t a top-down directive. This isn’t a commercial enterprise. What it is, is a grassroots movement that is putting FE literacy on the agenda

Every FE professional is welcome, so join us – and let’s shake things up.

Why we’ve adopted restorative practice – and how you can too

At South Devon College, we’re rethinking the way we respond to student behaviour. We’ve adopted a relational and restorative approach.

Zero-tolerance methods can work well for institutions, but not necessarily students. They are not needs-focused and they respond to ‘bad’ behaviour as a symptom rather than a form of communication.

In my experience, the most common misconception about restorative practice is that it’s permissive – that it sets low expectations and lets students ‘get away’ with poor behaviour. This is simply not the case.

The practice is not about being ‘soft’ on behaviour. Quite the opposite. Restorative practice holds students to high standards, with kindness, warmth and care. We never excuse bad behaviour; we address the underlying causes and support our students to move on from it.

This is especially important in FE, where many learners come to us having struggled at school, feeling as though they’ve already failed. For many of these young people, traditional punitive measures just don’t work.

‘Team Student’

Often, students who display poor behaviours are in distress. They may have unmet emotional or social needs or significant gaps in their ability to manage relationships and social interactions. They struggle to cope in a college setting.

Using a restorative approach allows learners to consider their actions, understand the effect of their behaviour on others and accept responsibility for their actions. By focusing on relationships, we’re giving learners valuable skills for life.

Done well, restorative practice can be transformative. Imagine a learner, let’s call them Danny, who hasn’t attended college for weeks. Traditionally, Danny might be disciplined, put on report, called to a meeting with their parents or even excluded.

The restorative approach starts by asking “what’s going on, Danny?”. This opens the door to a structured conversation to explore their thoughts and feelings, discuss the impact of their actions and work with them to resolve issues.

Far from lowering standards, this helps us understand the reasons behind Danny’s behaviour. We then develop a tailored support plan and share it with ‘Team Danny’, the group of staff who work closely with them. That way, everyone is aligned in helping Danny meet their needs and succeed.

While this process takes more time and resource, it’s already proving effective. We’re seeing fewer conflicts, and when issues do arise, they’re resolved in ways that strengthen our community rather than fracture it.

A five-year plan

We’re at the early stages of this journey. Restorative practice is more than a policy decision; it‘s a way of being. To properly embed it will take a few years.

We’ve started with staff training and awareness, and the goal is to integrate these practices into every level of our organisation – from how we handle behaviour in the classroom to how we engage with parents and the wider community.

We need to go further because the needs of our students are constantly evolving.

Like many colleges, we’ve seen increases in mental health issues, levels of social anxiety and challenging behaviours post-pandemic. We know a relational and restorative approach isn’t a fix-all, but it’s a start, a way of creating a college culture where everyone can feel safe, supported, and ready to learn.

How to get started

For any college considering making this shift, here are a few tips based on our experience:

Put relationships first

Everything starts with strong, positive relationships. If students feel that their teachers care about them, they’re more likely to engage. Don’t just focus on academic goals.

Make leadership visible

Senior leaders need to be active and visible, greeting students, building trust and setting the tone for a welcoming environment.

Work with educational psychologists

Engage professionals who understand trauma-informed practice. They can offer guidance on how to support students with complex emotional needs. Your SENDCo will be able to make introductions.

Appoint a champion for behaviour and attitudes

Designate a key person or team to drive this cultural change to ensure restorative practices are embedded across the college.

Drive the change from the top

For lasting impact, senior leadership should be committed to creating a culture that prioritises understanding and resolving conflict rather than resorting to exclusion or punishment.

Leadership development is about so much more than succession

Attracting the best talent is crucial; colleges need ambitious and responsible educators and leaders to shape the future. Our people are the heart of our organisations, so it is an important strategic pillar. That’s why over the past four years, NCG have developed a people-centred approach that prioritises recruitment, development and retention.

When we launched our Leadership Hub in 2020 to provide development for aspiring and experienced leaders, we knew that not everyone aspires to become a leader or a manager. However, the qualities of leadership should be accessible to everyone, so our programmes cater to colleagues across our organisation at every level and every stage of their journey.

We want our colleagues to know that they don’t need to be in a leadership position to be able to have influence and make contributions to their teams and departments. To back that up, we ensure our approach addresses their diverse needs.

So, alongside our Leadership Hub, we also launched a coaching pool and a mentoring programme. All new colleagues are assigned a mentor, many of whom have undertaken professional qualifications in these areas.

Differentiating between mentoring and coaching is important. Mentoring involves a more experienced colleague guiding a newer one, while coaching is about unlocking an individual’s potential by encouraging self-reflection and problem-solving. This tailored approach addresses the unique needs of each person.

Historically, mentoring might have been confined to subject-specific guidance, for instance matching a new dance teacher with an experienced one. However, our Leadership Hub has expanded to ensure that mentoring goes beyond technical advice to include personal and professional development.

Importantly, this creates relationships between people in different departments, and even in different colleges and areas of the organisation.

This strategic focus on development means that any of our colleagues, regardless of role, can be a future leader at NCG. Someone joining us in an entry-level position this year could be our future chief executive if we ensure the development opportunities are in place to support that possibility.

You don’t need to be in a leadership position to have influence

We are a very large organisation spread all over the country, but this approach has made us feel like a smaller, close-knit team. We have always aimed to be ‘One NCG’ and it is initiatives like the Leadership Hub and coaching programmes that help show our colleagues that they are part of something bigger.

Since we launched these initiatives, we have seen an improvement in staff perceptions, engagement, and a positive cultural shift. In staff feedback, some of our strongest areas are development and belonging, so we know we are creating a real community.

For any new colleague joining NCG, having a mentor can reduce the overwhelming feelings that often accompany the start of a new role, provide a sense of belonging and a clear pathway for development. 

As for student-facing staff who access coaching, they get an insight into a new perspective that sits outside of their usual day-to-day. We always talk about real-world experiences for students, and this is a way for our team to get out of the classroom, even figurately, by talking to someone with an outside perspective.

We expect our students to approach their learning with curiosity and commitment, and we expect the same of our colleagues. Our role is to ensure they feel supported to do just that, and that their development is valued.

The collaborative nature of coaching and mentoring fosters a culture of continuous improvement. As educators share best practices and innovative approaches, the quality of education across the institution rises.

This approach is not static; it is an evolving practice that adapts to the changing needs of the educational landscape. We’re very clear on our ambitions as an organisation, and our approach to development is not aimed at creating an identikit workforce.

The programmes we run through our Leadership Hub aim to equip our colleagues with the knowledge and tools they’ll need to be the best leaders they can be. 

The goal is to ensure that every educator, regardless of their role or location, feels supported and has access to the resources they need to succeed.

And the best means to that end is to value each one as a leader in their own right.

Revealed: How Ofsted will develop plans to inspect inclusion

Ofsted has provided further details on how it will draw up plans to assess whether education providers are inclusive in new inspections.

The inspectorate has pledged to introduce a new “criterion” for inclusion in the inspection report cards set to be rolled out for schools, colleges and training providers from September next year. 

The tricky issue of how inclusivity will be measured is due to be consulted on, but Ofsted last month awarded the National Children’s Bureau (NCB) charity a £90,000 seven-month contract to help it “conceptualise vulnerability and inclusion”.

This research will aim to answer how Ofsted can “better understand vulnerability and its complexity” so it can assess inclusive practice, terms of reference published today state.

Research in Practice, part of the NCB, will also look into how vulnerability is currently understood in the education and social care sectors, including the “strength and limitations of different understandings”.

What’s the approach?

NCB will carry out a “rapid evidence” review of existing literature around the definitions and understanding of inclusion in the education settings Ofsted inspects and regulates.

The charity will appoint an expert academic reference panel to provide quality assurance for the project, and engage with a representative range of stakeholders, such as students, professionals and senior leaders across sectors including FE and skills.

Key findings from both will be collated into a report to help Ofsted “better understand vulnerability”. The inspectorate said this will inform its future inspection work.

Ofsted aims to publish the findings of this research “anticipated in 2025”.

It has provided little detail so far on what metrics it will use to judge inclusion.

But it will “evaluate whether education settings are providing high-quality support for disadvantaged and vulnerable children”. 

The watchdog has said it will consult on the new report card, including the “criterion” on inclusion, in January.

Labour must not endanger the independence of end-point assessments

While ministers are right to consider reforms of end-point assessments (EPAs) in apprenticeships, the independence of the assessments themselves is the cornerstone of employer confidence in the system and must be maintained.

EPAs validate an apprentice’s hard-earned knowledge, skills and behaviours, boosting their confidence and providing a clear pathway into future employment.

For employers, it is crucial that these assessments are fair and rigorous. Without an independent assessment system, the trust employers have in the competence of employees – and in the apprenticeship system as a whole – would be severely undermined.

We recognise that the system is not without its challenges. Many apprenticeship providers have reported difficulties with EPAs. These include the availability of assessors, the consistency of end-point assessment organisations (EPAOs), the complexity of the process and the inclusion of mandatory qualifications within certain apprenticeship standards.

However, EPAs have provided a rigorous, outcome-based method of assessment since their introduction in 2017. As DfE begins to roll out pilots, here are some of the suggestions making the rounds and why each involves substantial risks.

Pilot 1: Provider-led EPAs

We understand that one of the options under consideration is for apprenticeship providers to carry out their own EPAs. The Association of Colleges argues that colleges could maintain the necessary rigour and independence, but this approach poses a number of challenges.

First, if providers are required to gain Ofqual recognition as EPAOs, this doesn’t necessarily streamline the process and could add more bureaucracy. There’s also potential for confusion stemming from colleges and ITPs administering EPAs alongside EPAOs.

Moreover, colleges deliver less than one-fifth of apprenticeships (17.4 per cent in 2022/23), and for smaller independent training providers (ITPs), setting up as an EPA organisation may not be feasible.

Then, there’s the significant risk of conflict of interest. With growing pressure to boost achievement rates, how can we ensure objectivity if those training apprentices are also responsible for assessing their competence?

And finally, we already have a shortage of assessors with the appropriate level of technical expertise, and provider pay lags behind the private sector. Therefore, they are unlikely to recruit and retain the staff they need to assess, in particular in emerging sectors such as technology and green energy.

Pilot 2: Employer-supported assessment

We understand that the pilots may also include the option to transfer assessment of behaviours from EPAOs to employers. This has some intuitive appeal; after all, employers see their apprentices in action daily and could be well-placed to judge workplace behaviours.

However, employers may lack the expertise required to measure them against apprenticeship standards, or at least would need significant support to carry out this role effectively.

More critically, placing this responsibility on employers risks introducing inconsistency across the system. It opens up the possibility of businesses applying varying standards, which may call into question the credibility of apprenticeship assessment.

Pilot 3: Simpler KSB assessments

One further option under consideration is to reduce the number of knowledge, skills, and behaviours (KSBs) that must be directly assessed. But while streamlining assessments could make the process more efficient (and should be considered) a one-size-fits-all approach risks undermining quality.

This is especially true for high-risk sectors such as science, technology, and engineering, where competence is critical to safety and performance. Employers in the science and technology industries have in fact argued for more – not fewer – assessment methods.

In short, simplifying the assessment process cannot come at the cost of protecting safety and competence.

The EPA system has evolved significantly since its introduction and, if reforms allow, will continue to do so. Proportionality and flexibility are key – streamlining where possible without sacrificing quality.

Testing new proposals with employers and sector skills bodies is also essential to ensure that changes work across their sectors.

But above all, preserving the independence of assessment is crucial. Independence ensures objectivity and upholds high standards; without it, we risk losing the confidence that makes apprenticeships such a vital part of our skills landscape.

How to stick it to the DfE on 16-19 disadvantage

As each day of the first half-term passes, I hear the knell of a ship’s bell.

It marks the students dropping out of their college study programmes. 30,000 won’t make it to day 43.

Needless to say, they are more likely to be from economically-disadvantaged backgrounds.

This is thanks to incoherent policy and regulation that seems unable to remember that compulsory education in England does not end at 16, and which systematically pushes older teenagers overboard.

Education Policy Institute has done some excellent work charting the plight of disadvantaged students in 16-19 education, arbitrarily stripped of their Pupil Premium support two years before the end of childhood.

They highlight the mismatch between what every teacher, leader, policy wonk, and Treasury official knows to be the definition of 16-19 disadvantage (having been eligible for free school meals in the six years prior to finishing secondary school) versus the jokers within the Department for Education who keep making up different definitions.

And yet, when it comes to college accountability measures, disadvantage is still based on the ‘proper’ definition of FSM6, perfectly illustrating the disconnect within DfE.

Meanwhile, 16-19 bursaries are very narrowly linked to benefits, for Tuition Fund (RIP) it was being “from the 27 per cent most economically deprived areas of the country”, and for the core blocks of 16-19 disadvantage funding it’s either postcodes or prior English and maths attainment.

Amid such chaos and confusion, it’s little surprise that EPI has also found that only 36 per cent of colleges are using the government’s data tool to identify who their FSM6 disadvantaged students are.

But I’m a ‘glass 78% full’ kind of guy (that’s a resits joke, teehee) so I think that 36 per cent represents a good-news story, driven by FE wanting to do the right thing in spite of any  incentives or support to do so.

Let’s smash last year’s 36 per cent

You see, in 2021 it was 25 per cent, then 30 per cent in 2022, and 36 per cent in 2023.

I’m pretty confident DfE has done little, perhaps nothing at all, to promote the tool or train colleges in how to use it. (Although there is an urban myth about a rogue civil servant who kept trying to write it into grant agreements.)

In fact, in some years DfE’s tool for colleges to identify their new disadvantaged learners has not actually been up and running before day 42.

And it’s certainly not Ofsted driving improvement either. Its FE inspection framework explicitly and frequently mentions disadvantage in its ‘Good’ and ‘Outstanding’ criteria, but they have been merrily handing out those grades to providers whether they had any idea which learners it referred to or not.

Wouldn’t it be poetic if there could be an unannounced inspection of Ofsted offices tomorrow to check how many FE inspectors actually know how to identify disadvantaged students?

No, this is a story of individuals within FE guided by their own moral compass and then sharing good practice with peers. Others have talked at length about FE as a self-improving system, but while they were busy navel gazing, these visionaries on the ground have been pro-actively doing something for their learners and for social justice that really matters.

Assuming DfE has the ‘Get Information About Pupils’ tool working before census day this year (it should be within your DfE provider portal), and we smash last year’s 36 per cent of colleges using it, then it could be life-changing for our otherwise-lost 30,000 young people.

And if you are about to withdraw a student and see they are flagged as disadvantaged, don’t cut them loose just yet. Try one more thing first.

Whether it’s one last phone call, one more one-to-one, or one more timetable adjustment to fit around whatever burden they are carrying, that disadvantage data empowers us to target our interventions on those who most need a helping hand to day 43.

Yes, they will almost certainly still need that help on day 44, and probably on day 144 too, but they will be safely in the lifeboat of FE, with a brighter future on the horizon.

Let’s be ambitious – not apologetic – about wanting more people qualified to level 4+

As a new government elected on a promise of change, a focus on growth and a close eye on the skills sector settles into the realities of decision-making, now is the time for colleagues across the further and higher education sectors to find common ground on which to campaign and work together.

Our co-authored chapter for this week’s UUK report, Opportunity, Growth and Partnership: a blueprint for change from the UK’s universities makes the case for “a whole-of-tertiary sector participation target of 70 per cent of the population aged 25 studying at level 4 or above by 2040, with a particular focus on increasing access in low-participation neighbourhoods”.

To deliver this, colleges, universities and employers, along with local leaders – whether mayors or council leaders – must seize this moment to create and build on the strong regional and civic partnerships we need to deliver economic growth and widen participation in skills training and technical qualifications.

This proposal is not about universities making a landgrab to significantly increase the number of graduates they produce each year. On the contrary, it is an acknowledgement that the old dichotomy of school leavers vs graduates is no longer relevant to the needs of today’s employers and tomorrow’s economy.

The competitive edge

What is required is an approach that brings together universities, colleges and employers to increase educational attainment and improve skills levels across the country and meet the needs of current and emerging industries.

This means not only producing more graduates but also creating an employable, home-grown workforce trained to sub-degree levels, with an embedded appetite for lifelong learning.

International evidence supports this approach. Advanced economies such as South Korea, Japan and Canada have increased higher education participation rates to between 60 and 70 per cent. The Australian government has set a target of 80 per cent participation in tertiary education.

Meanwhile, the UK remains stubbornly divided by educational attainment, as recorded in the 2021 census; 33.8 per cent hold a level 4+ qualification and 18.2 per cent have no qualifications. This clearly demonstrates the scale of the challenge our economy faces.

A sustainable pipeline

While UUK’s target highlights those aged 25, the reality is that we need investment to bring up the educational attainment of large sections of the adult population too.

All could benefit from a collective ambition for their future, made possible through the flexible and accessible funding approach to the Lifelong Learning Entitlement which we argue for in the report.

While the ‘graduate premium’ has been reducing in recent years, the demand for sub-degree qualifications remains high, particularly in technical areas. As much as 36 per cent of job vacancies were described as hard to fill due to skills shortages in 2022.

Colleges already play a critical part in this. They have an even more important role in creating the pipeline of part-time and adult learners who study for level 4 qualifications, particularly learners from non-traditional and disadvantaged backgrounds.

What’s needed

To do this, however, they must be supported by a whole-system approach. This will require changes to funding and regulatory systems as well as changes to the way FE-HE works.

Additional financial support must be provided for gateway provision. Arbitrary funding cliffs at ages 19 and 24 must be removed and additional funding for catch-up learners provided.

We will also need to streamline the regulatory process to remove requirements for duplicate reporting to different regulators for those institutions that collaborate on delivery or offer a mix of provision.

To underpin this, UUK is also calling for a tertiary education opportunity fund to support collaborative programmes to respond to the needs of learners in low-participation areas. Ideally, this would extend to the co-development of new level 3 and 4 provision.

We encourage colleagues across the FE sector to join with universities and employers in pressing the government for such reforms. Rather than holding individuals back through dysfunction, together we can create a skills system that works for everyone, delivering a qualified workforce equipped to support a growing, productive and innovative economy.

Tugendhat pledges millions for FE in Tory leadership bid

A contender for the Conservative party leadership has pledged to invest hundreds of millions of pounds in further education if they win the contest and win back the keys to Downing Street. 

Tom Tugendhat, the shadow security minister, is one of four candidates campaigning at this week’s Conservative Party conference in Birmingham.

In his mainstage speech this afternoon, he claimed he would reduce demand for migrant workers by spending the money raised from the immigration skills charge on training UK workers and would “end the cap on apprenticeships”.

Reducing immigration featured in each of today’s mainstage speeches by the four candidates hoping to replace Rishi Sunak as Leader of the Conservative Party, though Tugendhat was the only one to make a commitment on skills spending. 

“I’ll set a legal cap on net migration at 100,000. Not a target, not an ambition, a cap. But a cap alone won’t work,” he said.

“We issued the visas because businesses need the staff for our care homes and our hospitals to look after our families.

“We need to fix migration by fixing the gaps in education and skills, in transport and in housing so that we can recruit at home and not abroad. I will end the cap on apprenticeships and use the immigration skills charge to invest in further education and train our own people.”

The other candidates are former education minister Kemi Badenoch, Robert Jenrick and the former education secretary, James Cleverly.

Home Office data shows the immigration skills charge, a tax paid by employers hiring migrant workers, raised over half a billion pounds in 2022/23 and nearly £1.5 billion since it was introduced in 2017.

An FE Week investigation last year revealed the government could provide no evidence that funds raised from the charge were being spent on programmes to upskill UK workers. According to the Migration Advisory Committee, revenue generated from the tax was “not ringfenced or linked directly to any fund for training to reduce the reliance on migrant workers and is simply a tax on the use of migrant labour which goes to the Treasury.

This time next week, Conservative MPs will vote to reduce the number of candidates to 2. Party members then get to vote and the new Leader will be announced on November 2.

Young offenders denied legal right to education

Young people in young offender institutions (YOI) are being denied access to the education they have a legal right to, regulators have found.

The joint report from Ofsted and the HM Inspectorate of Prisons, released today, found that education in YOIs is “bleak” and has been steadily declining in the last decade.

It comes amid a stark picture of education in custody for both children and adults, with Ofsted grading the majority of prisons as ‘inadequate’ for their education and training, largely due to acute staffing and overcrowding crises.

A survey of adult prisoners, released last week, found “limited opportunities” with most of those lucky enough to spend more than two hours a day outside their cells feeling “disappointed” at a lack of training opportunities.

Young offenders

In today’s report on YOIs, titled ‘A decade of declining quality of education in young offender institutions: the systemic shortcomings that fail children,’ Ofsted chief inspector Sir Martyn Oliver said young people spend “far too long locked up in their cell”.

Based on inspections of England’s four YOIs and surveys of young offenders, the report found 15- to 18-year-olds have “only 10 to 13” hours education per week, despite having a legal right to at least 15 hours.

Many lessons are cancelled due to “severe” shortages of staff to teach or escort young people to classrooms.

In addition, time out of cells has “sharply reduced” in recent years and staff rely on “complicated regimes” to manage potential violence between students, instead of focusing on their educational and career goals.

In one case, young offenders studying construction were placed on a barbering course “with no educational rationale”.

Sir Martyn said: “Many of the children in these institutions are extremely vulnerable.

“They are in urgent need of high-quality education: at present, the system has already failed them and continues to do so at this most urgent and crucial point in their life.”

Chief executive of Prisoners’ Education Trust (PET) Jon Collins said:  “All this adds up to a total failure to provide a good quality education to these young people, at a time when positive, effective interventions could be transformative.

“This report demands urgent action from the prison service and the government.

“More funding is needed, but so is a greater focus on what needs to be done to secure much-needed improvements.

“More of the same is simply unacceptable if we want to give these young people the skills and qualifications they need to have a chance in life.”

Lack of purposeful activity

This comes as more than two-thirds of adult prisoners spend most of their days in their cells “with little to occupy them”, a report published last week revealed.

The HMI Prisons report ‘purposeful prisons: time out of cell’ is based on responses from 5,000 prisoners surveyed during inspections between 2023 and 2024.

A quarter of prisoners said they have less than two hours outside their cell on a typical weekday and 44 per cent had less than six hours unlocked, leaving limited time for education and training.

Charlie Taylor, chief inspector of prisons, said the lack of purposeful activity leaves prisoners feeling more likely to reoffend on release.

Only 34 per cent of prisoners felt it was easy to access education and 18 per cent felt they had access to work opportunities, including vocational or skills training.

The report said: “For these prisoners, we repeatedly heard a sense of hopelessness and a pervasive feeling of boredom from long hours spent in their cells.”

‘Inadequate‘

The bleak picture painted by adult prisoners is reflected in repeated poor gradings by Ofsted during prison inspections.

In September, all five full prison inspections resulted in ‘inadequate’ gradings.

The most recent inspection of HMP Hull found many prisoners locked up for up to 22.5 hours per day in “particularly cramped cells”, with many telling inspectors they felt “bored” with little access to activities and “poor” attendance at education.

Taylor said: “Despite having so little to do, prisoners’ attendance at education was poor, partly because some of the teaching was not good enough, and it was disappointing to see workshops closed because there were no staff available.

“The governor was trying to improve the performance of the education provider, but progress had been much too slow.”

A Ministry of Justice spokesperson did not respond when asked about the comment on the prisoners’ survey or recent low Ofsted grades.

However, minister for youth justice, and former sixth form college principal, Nic Dakin said: “This government has inherited a criminal justice system in crisis, and these damning reports highlight the unacceptable strain that has been placed on the youth estate for too many years.

“We are determined to tackle these challenges head-on – giving staff the support they need to reduce violence, increase access to education and help these children turn their lives around. “This includes working towards a clear strategy for youth custody reform and stepping up efforts to stop more young people from getting caught up in crime in the first place.”

An FE Week investigation earlier this year highlighted concerns about declining prisoner participation in education, contracts that prioritise value for money over quality, and a focus on English and maths over more interesting or advanced courses.