It is time for joined-up thinking on adult education

Much of the talk about adult education has been around the devolved budget and whether it’s being spent effectively. With 72 administrators hired to manage the London adult education budget – to the tune of £3 million – these are important questions.

However, less well discussed are the issues of why adult education is often relegated to the very bottom of the pile of government priorities – even within the technical education sector, in which it sits.

Apprenticeships, T-levels and careers strategies are all of vital importance, but the government often seems to overlook one vital complement to young people’s education.
All the research shows that parental education levels correlate with child development – from the earliest days. By the time children arrive at nursery, the disadvantage gap is already well established. And indeed a survey carried out by MORI (2001) revealed that more than two thirds of twelve to sixteen year olds consider that their parents are the strongest learning influence in their lives.

Lack of parental understanding of their children’s education and career choices is often a factor that prevents disadvantaged young people from being aware of and indeed accessing aspirational further and higher education pathways. Aspirational routes into education and employment need to be placed firmly within the world picture of all communities and not left to those with the right social networks or cultural capital.

Role models matter; the very first role models children have are often their carers. However, there seems to be little understanding as to the importance of family influence and the logical next step in redressing inequality, seems often to be missed: investment in good quality flexible adult education that reaches within communities and into homes. This is surprising when the socio-economic factors which the government is so keen to address correlate closely with educational attainment.

Prevents disadvantaged young people from being aware of and indeed accessing aspirational further and higher education pathways

A recent research project carried out by myself and a colleague, Rob Smith of Birmingham City University, illustrated just how much of an impact adult education can have on parents and their children. The transformative power of adult education, including literacy classes, was shown to be a catalyst in breaking the intergenerational cycle of inequality.

For example, Jade a young mother who attended adult literacy classes run by a charitable trust in the north west of England was motivated to attend classes after becoming a mum. These classes raised her aspirations for her future and that of her young son. She also talked at length about how she encouraged other friends in a similar situation to access the classes.

Motherhood was a motivational force for Jade as an adult learner. It is important not to underestimate this affective dimension of the learning experience. Becoming an adult learner enabled Jade to take back agency in the face of poverty and unemployment. For her, there was a relationship between these aspects of her life and her mental well-being. The classes enabled her to reconnect with society more broadly and on a different footing. She acquired agency and a view of a new possible future for her and her son.

Importantly, acquiring adult education and indeed social literacy is about being able to navigate the complexities of different social groups; it’s about being able to move without feeling like a fish out of water between different contexts: home, the classroom, the school on parents’ evening, the doctor’s surgery, the police station with a sense of agency.

Adult education and literacy education can be transformative. It can offer spaces in which individuals and their families can take charge of their own life and widen the possibilities and choices for their future: an enjoyment of learning and success as learners that connects with their lives in the outside world, including through employment.

Clearly, it’s time for a strong drive in policy and funding that recognises that the attainments of young people are intertwined with the achievements of their families and communities. It is time to have some joined-up thinking that places the family at the centre.

How to build a collaborative college culture

Good leadership is all about relationships and taking people with you, says Steve Frampton, President of Portsmouth College for 13 years and now President of the Association of Colleges

I firmly believe that the fundamentals of good leadership are all about relationships – you have to take people with you.
With this in mind, here are six things I’ve found crucial to building a positive, collaborative college culture.

Interview everyone personally

I used to interview all my staff, and now my successor at Portsmouth College is doing the same. What we’re looking for is cultural fit and people who really sign up to our core values, what we’re trying to do and where we’re trying to go.
Involve staff in decision making

If you involve the staff and students in the decision-making process, you all own it together. It’s not dependent on one person and their vision and their ideas – it’s a massive, collective responsibility so everybody feels part of the college. At Portsmouth College we had a real family culture. Everybody had their role and no-one was more important than anyone else.

Involve students in decision making

I think we’ve over-relied on the voice of employers and under-relied on the voice of students in education for too long. I think the students are much more sophisticated than we give them credit for.
It’s not just about focusing on employability skills. We want to produce well-rounded citizens who are capable of achieving their potential.

Never underestimate how important it is to enjoy what you’re doing

Work with students before they apply

It’s a good idea to work with students and their parents while they’re still in their secondary schools. We would run revision skills sessions in the evenings at schools, as well as head boys’ and head girls’ training in Year 10 and 11 assemblies.
Then when students come for open days, it helps to run sessions laying out the expectations. Since any rules that we had were agreed by the students’ union, along with the governing body, it was easy to explain that these are ground rules that everyone has agreed to.
Students also need to know that they’re going to be safe, respected and valued. So it’s important to emphasise that there will be zero tolerance of bullying. Then the students buy into that and reinforce it.

Get involved in the local community

I’ve been a chair of governors for a local school, on the board of a community radio station and head of the volunteers’ association for Portsmouth City football club.
It’s vital to plug into all of those networks, so that you can pick up what the voluntary sector is saying, what the secondary education sector is saying, and what the local authority is saying. It makes your job as college principal so much easier.

Enjoy your job!

Never underestimate how important it is to really enjoy what you’re doing, even though the pressures in the sector have never been bigger.
If you can create a dynamic, positive, creative culture, despite all the things that we’re trying to deal with, it will have an impact on your staff and your students.

Tom Bewick, chief executive, Federation of Awarding Bodies

Tom Bewick recently took over the top job at the membership organisation Federation of Awarding Bodies. FE Week caught up with him just a couple of months into the job, to find out what led him to where he is today

“You’re not going to write one of those profiles where you dissect my food choices, are you?” asks Tom Bewick, scanning the menu nervously.

Having had nothing but breezily confident emails from the new chief executive of the Federation of Awarding Bodies, his apprehensiveness takes me by surprise.

It’s been a big couple of months for Bewick. In fact, everything is coming to a head on the day we meet, with the federation threatening to take the government to court over their decision to allow only one awarding body for each T-level pathway.

“I’d barely finished my induction when we were thrown into this,” he admits, with a candour that suggests he’s not one to blag.

It’s not the first time Bewick has wrangled with government ministers. In 2005, together with Tony Hall, now director-general of the BBC, then chief executive of the Royal Opera House, he persuaded the government to fund the country’s first creative and cultural apprenticeships, apparently by “banging down the door” of then minister for vocational education Phil Hope. “It was quite a battle, because the Learning and Skills Council said they would only fund existing apprenticeships. It’s not like these days with the Institute for Apprenticeships. There was no process.”

I’d barely finished my induction when we were thrown into this

The apprenticeships were part of Bewick’s masterplan as founding chief executive of the Creative and Cultural Skills council, to end the “grossly unfair” practice of unpaid internships in the creative industries. “It was out of control. It was almost being used – sometimes by quite prestigious public and private arts organisations – as a way of satisfying their recruitment needs.”

This was towards the end of the Blairite years. A decade earlier, Bewick had been on the inside, slogging away for the party he joined as a teenager.

“I was drafted into Tony Blair’s Labour Party dream in 1997,” he says. In other words, he landed a job as national policy officer for education and employment, working in Milbank Towers under Matthew Taylor – then Labour’s director of policy, now chief executive of the RSA. “It was the classic ‘boy from Nuneaton, been a member of the party, done a bit of student politics, socks it to them as to why he thinks he’s the best person for the job in education and employment policy’”, he jokes of his interview technique, self-effacingly.

This was only Bewick’s second job after a couple of years in a building just across the river, as European policy officer for the Training and Enterprise Council.

From the age of 17, the Labour Party functioned as a “surrogate family” to Bewick, who grew up in care. “It was like the family I never had,” he explains. “It was a great place to go for further education in a way – people who were passionate about politics. But also for mentors – people who you looked up to in the community, who could give you a bit of a steer and a helping hand.”

He remains loyal to Labour to this day as a councillor for Brighton and Hove, despite reservations about current in-fighting. “It’s almost like your solemn vows, you make a lifelong commitment to a political party – it’s very hard to leave, even if things change around you”.

Bewick’s early childhood was marked by the sudden death of his mother, followed by multiple foster placements. “Dad was what we’d call him an addicted gambler now, but basically, there wasn’t any money in the house to pay for anything, so it was only a matter of time before I became the subject of a care order,” he confides. He was seven years old.

“I obviously didn’t react to school as a system very well, as I was in care,” he adds, with heart-breaking fatalism. Indeed, school left him woefully unprepared for a world in which the care system used to spit children out at 16 and expect them to make a life for themselves.

“David Cameron went to Eton, I went to Etone comprehensive in Nuneaton and I left with just one O-level in English,” he quips. “So at least I learned to read and write.”

Luckily for Bewick, his foster parents allowed him to live with them for an additional two years. By day, he applied himself to the arts of shelf-stacking and trolley-gathering at a Kwik Save supermarket. By night, he slogged through four GCSEs and two A-levels at what was then North Warwickshire College.

“Getting into further education – a different approach to learning, really transformed my life,” he says. “That’s why I’m so passionate about it.”

Despite his dedication to the Labour Party, five years “being at the end of a pager 24 hours a day” burned him out. “You’re not just working for an employer – this is a mission – this is an all-consuming thing in your life and it feels like that from the day you’re in it”.

I obviously didn’t react to school as a system very well, as I was in care

Drained, he “decided to up-sticks, bugger off” and spend all £30k of his hard-earned savings “chasing the sun”. Bewick’s usually careful language deteriorates at this point, as if to better illustrate the degenerate character of what he calls his “early mid-life crisis”. He went to stay with a friend in Cape Town, “did tennis lessons, bought a classic 1970-something Vespa and pissed around on that for six months and watched the bank balance drop”. A further six months in Ibiza just about did it for him – “you’ll appreciate,” he confides candidly, “I don’t have a lot of memories of that period” – and he duly returned to East London in late 2003, making it back with barely enough funds to turn up looking respectable for his new job as a director for Thames Gateway at the Learning and Skills Council. “With hindsight, running on empty like that was taking it a little bit too far,” he says, all too aware of the fact that he, like many care leavers now helped by the charity of which he is a trustee, had no family support to fall back on. “You can be £200 away from disaster.”

This was Bewick’s third year abroad – the other two had been more obviously purposeful. He’d spent a year in Ljubljana, Slovenia, on an Erasmus exchange in the early nineties, post-Balkan conflict – somewhat against his will, as Bath University’s sole condition of offering him a fully-funded masters in European public policy analysis.

He remembers arriving fresh from the Aeroflot jet in early January, climbing to the 14th floor of a grey, dank, concrete tower block “that wouldn’t have looked out of place in Warsaw, Poland or Walsall in the West Midlands” and bursting into tears.

But living in care had made him resilient. “It wasn’t that unusual to rock up somewhere completely strange where you don’t know anybody, you’ve got a few pennies to your name and few worldly possessions.” By the end of the year, he knew basic Slovenian – or at least “the words for beer and pizza, you know, all the key social ones” – and had made one of his best friends to this day, who now works for the OECD in Paris, and to whose children Bewick is godfather.

His first year abroad was several years earlier, at the flighty age of 18, when he checked out of his foster home, packed up all his worldly possessions in a backpack, and jetted off to Canada on “the equivalent of Charlie and the Chocolate Factory’s golden ticket” – and almost never came back.

It was a fully-funded programme he’d found through his local library – for volunteers from backgrounds like his own, to go and work with disadvantaged teenagers from indigenous communities in Canada. He learned to drive, play baseball and teach functional skills. “It was the making of me,” he says. “It made me realise that my vocation in life was going to be working to advocate on behalf of communities, that I had this skill to get on with people from all different backgrounds at all levels of seniority. That was something that people around me told me: ‘You’ve got a natural talent for that’.”

The charity, Frontiers Foundation, helped him secure a scholarship to the prestigious McGill University in Montreal, but the pull of “home” was too great and he threw his lot in with the great British clearing system, coming out with a place at Brighton Polytechnic to study social policy and administration. After a year, he wangled a transfer to Bath University (for a girlfriend, not the prestige) where he became Labour club president and editor of the student magazine.

The way he speaks about his first job at the Training and Enterprise Council is indicative of an attitude of general gratitude that he seems to apply to other areas of his life: “I remember reading the job advert and feeling ‘somebody up there is really looking out for me’ as it was like they’d written the job for me,” he says.

Bewick feels incredibly lucky to have the job, life and family he has now – his wife and three children live with him in Brighton: “Frankly, I wake up now every working day and just feel brilliant to be alive.”

 

CV

Mar 2018 – Present
Chief Executive, Federation of Awarding Bodies

Jul 2015 – Present
President of the Transatlantic Apprenticeship Exchange Forum (TAEF), Atlantic Apprenticeships

May 2015 – Present
Council member, Brighton & Hove City Council

Jul 2016 – Mar 2018
Co-Founder, Franklin Apprenticeships LLC

Jul 2011 – May 2015
Chief Executive Officer, INSSO

Apr 2010 – Apr 2011
Chief Executive, Enterprise UK

May 2004 – Feb 2010
Chief Executive, Creative and Cultural Skills

Sep 2003 – Sep 2004
Director of Skills, Thames Gateway, LSC

Jun 2001 – Nov 2002
Adviser to the Minister for Adult Skills, Department for Education and Skills

2001 – 2002
Director of Communications, Sector Skills Development Agency

1997 – 2001
Labour Party then government advisor on skills policy

Apprenticeship funding bands needed reviewing to be fair

A new approach to funding apprenticeships will provide better value for money so that people can benefit from the training opportunities on offer and progress in their careers, says Anne Milton

I have spoken a lot about the important changes we are making to improve the quality of apprenticeships in this country. One of the biggest changes has been to introduce apprenticeship standards – new, high-quality apprenticeships replacing the older “frameworks”. I’m really pleased the number of people starting on new, high-quality apprenticeship standards is now over 40 per cent compared to just 2.5 per cent this time last year.

Apprenticeship standards are designed by employers themselves. By putting employers in the driving seat, we make sure that apprentices receive the training they need and make sure people have the skills businesses are crying out for, so they can get on and grow their career.

Since its creation in April 2017, the Institute for Apprenticeships has been responsible for managing the development of these new apprenticeship standards. Their work includes advising me about the right funding level for each new standard that is approved.

As more and more standards have been created, the Institute has been learning what a quality apprenticeship looks like. They have also been looking at how we can make sure apprenticeship training provides value for money.

In February the Institute introduced a new approach to recommending apprenticeship funding bands as part of its Faster and Better programme. This approach means a wider range of evidence will be used to help decide which funding band to recommend. It also means standards are decided more quickly, so that there are fewer delays.

It is right that we price all apprenticeships fairly, whether they were developed first or last

I have also made changes to the funding band structure, increasing the number of funding bands to 30, and narrowing those bands.

But all this positive change means that there is now a difference between how older and newer standards were allocated funding bands.

Our intention has always been to review standards regularly, to make sure that they remain fit for purpose and that there is a fair approach – no matter when a standard was developed. That is why I asked the Institute to review the funding bands of 31 standards, in line with their new approach and using the new 30-band structure.

Over the summer the Institute has been working with trailblazer groups of employers to review these 31 standards. They have applied their new funding approach to recommend to me what they think the right funding band is for these apprenticeships.

This means for some of the apprenticeships, the funding band will remain the same, as the original funding band still represents the best value for money. Others will see their funding band increased, if evidence suggests the original band was set too low. And for others, the funding band will be reduced.

Changes will shortly be made available on the IfA’s website and on the government funding bands page (https://bit.ly/2jVbFyo).

I have asked the Institute to continue its work to bring more standards into the new 30-band structure. Further information on these reviews will be available later in the autumn.

I think that it is right that we price all apprenticeships fairly, whether they were developed first or last. As the apprenticeship market develops, I will keep working with the IfA to make sure we get this funding right. We want people to benefit from the amazing opportunities apprenticeships offer, get the fantastic training providers give and get on in their careers.

Monthly apprenticeships update: June starts down 40 per cent on 2016

Apprenticeship starts for June are down 40 per cent on the same month in 2016 – but up 57 per cent on last year.

There have been 22,300 starts recorded so far in June 2018, compared with 37,000 in June 2016 according to the Education and Skills Funding Agency’s monthly apprenticeship statistics update, published this morning.

The 2016 figures are final, whereas the 2018 figures are provisional. June 2016 is a better comparator than June 2017 given that there was a huge drop in starts following the introduction of the levy the previous month. 

Comparing first recorded starts for June 2018 to final figures for June 2017 gives an increase of 57 per cent.

However, starts for the month in 2017 were down 62 per cent on June 2016, according to final statistics for the year. There were just 14,200 starts in June 2017, compared with 37,000 in 2016.

According to the commentary published alongside this morning’s statistics, “caution should be taken” in interpreting the figures as they are not final and “it is not possible to determine how complete or incomplete the information returned so far is”.

First reported figures for 2016/17 were “as much as 18 per cent” below the final figures, it said. 

“The latest apprenticeship statistics appear to show a new ‘steady state’ of apprenticeship starts of around 20-30,000 per month”, said Stephen Evans, chief executive of the Learning and Work Institute.

“This is much lower than before the introduction of the levy and other reforms and makes the government’s 3 million target look increasingly out of sight.

“The real focus should be on boosting quality and widening access and tackling the barriers to participation that too many groups of people face who would like to take up an apprenticeship.”

 

Apprenticeship provision at two providers hangs in the balance following poor Ofsted monitoring visit reports

The apprenticeship provision at two ‘new’ providers hangs in the balance while the government reviews their early Ofsted monitoring visit reports that accused them of making ‘insufficient progress’ in some areas.

Entrust Support Services Limited, a joint-venture company between Capita and Staffordshire County Council, was deemed to be making poor headway in two of the three fields judged, while Unique Training Solutions Limited, based in Hertfordshire, was ‘insufficient’ in one area.

Under new ESFA rules, any provider with an ‘insufficient’ rating in at least one theme being reviewed will immediately be banned from taking on any new apprentices – either directly or through a subcontracting arrangement – until the grade improves.

We will write to the provider about the next steps shortly

The agency can only overrule this guidance if it “identifies an exceptional extenuating circumstance”.

A spokesperson for the Department for Education told FE Week it was “currently looking at” both report findings, which were published this week, and will “write to the providers about the next steps shortly”.

Entrust, which launched in 2013 and started to offer publicly funded apprenticeships in 2017, was slammed by Ofsted for weak governance.

“Governance and oversight of the apprenticeship programme by Entrust’s operational board is insufficiently thorough,” inspectors said.

“Directors meet monthly and receive regular operational-performance reports from the various heads of service responsible for key business units including apprenticeships. However, the information that is presented to them focuses almost entirely on contractual compliance, and financial and business-development matters.”

Managers also “do not monitor or report on all aspects of apprenticeship performance and quality” while “planning for the standards-based apprenticeships is not good for all programmes”.

But there were also some positives at the provider.

“The joint venture board has established a well-informed multi-year strategic business plan that provides a clear focus for Entrust and for measuring its growth against a shared vision and a set of contracted-service commitments,” inspectors said.

Leaders’ plans for improving the provision are “detailed”, and programme leaders “monitor effectively the progress that individual apprentices make in developing new knowledge, skills and behaviours”.

An Entrust spokesperson welcomed the findings of the report, which “provides a helpful guide to our progress”.

“As the report states, our apprenticeship programme leaders are well qualified and provide good educational and vocational support,” she said.

“It also highlights areas where we need to improve, and we have already taken steps to address the concerns raised, including introducing changes to the way our leadership team evaluates the apprenticeship programme to drive continuous improvement.”

Philip White, Staffordshire County Council’s cabinet member for learning and employability, added: “We understand Entrust are awaiting information from the ESFA regarding the status of any future apprenticeships, but we believe that Entrust are in a good position to deliver on their commitments and provide a high quality apprenticeship service.”

Unique Training Solutions Limited started training publicly funded apprentices in June 2017.

READ MORE:
Ofsted given final say over new apprenticeship provider quality

When Ofsted went knocking to monitor its performance as a ‘new’ provider, the inspectorate found it was making ‘insufficient progress’ in meeting all the requirements of successful apprenticeship provision, and ‘reasonable progress’ in ensuring training is of “high quality” as well as safeguarding.

“Leaders have been slow to implement actions to assess the quality of provision, given the rapid growth in the number of apprenticeships in recent months,” Ofsted said.

“Leaders do not have comprehensive improvement arrangements in place to ensure that the quality of provision is at least good.”

But leaders were praised for collaborating with employers “very effectively to plan apprenticeship programmes that aim to meet the needs of the care services that they provide”.

“Staff have significant expertise to train apprentices in health and care,” inspectors also pointed out.

“The large majority of apprentices make good progress in developing their knowledge, practical skills and behaviours to improve and increase the contributions they make in the workplace.”

Unique Training Solutions Limited was approached for comment.

CITB pauses ‘reverse subcontracting’ negotiations with colleges after AoC steps in

The Construction Industry Training Board has paused discussions with colleges about its proposed “reverse subcontracting” deal following a meeting with the Association of Colleges who fear it would break funding rules.

Colleges were in uproar last month after the CITB tried to force them to enter the arrangements where it charges top-slices of at least 28 per cent even though it won’t be the prime.

The AoC immediately stepped in to say it was “deeply concerned” while colleges told FE Week it was “unfair”.

Good progress has been made in developing a future agreed approach.

A meeting between the association and the CITB took place this week to fix the issue.

“Following discussions between CITB and AoC regarding the subcontract arrangements for non-levy apprenticeships in England, we have this week held a very productive meeting,” a spokesperson for the CITB said.

“Good progress has been made in developing a future agreed approach.

“CITB and AoC will now work together on finalising a way forward which will remain fully compliant with ESFA funding rules. This is currently a priority activity for both organisations and we aim to jointly share the outcomes of our discussions shortly.”

He added: “We have agreed that while finalising the proposals, CITB will pause discussions with colleges regarding the current proposal for subcontracting.”

Teresa Frith, senior policy manager at the AoC, said: “CITB and AoC had a very productive meeting with good progress being made in developing a solution which is mutually beneficial to all parties.

“Whilst we appreciate we need to move quickly at this time, CITB and AoC need to engage with individuals within our organisations to ensure the proposed solutions are agreeable and are fully compliant with ESFA funding rules.

“This is currently priority activity for both CITB and AoC and we aim to share the outcomes of our discussions shortly.”

The bizarre deal was thought up by the CITB after it failed to win a non-levy apprenticeships contract.

Whereas before the levy it would use its apprenticeships contract as a prime and subcontract the training out to colleges, the CITB now wants colleges to agree to a “reversal of our contracts”.

Colleges would be the prime but have to pay a huge management fee believed to range from 28 to 36 per cent, like a subcontractor, for which the CITB will give access to construction employers and provide other services such as inductions and health and safety training, according to a contract seen by FE Week.

It means that for apprenticeships on the carpentry and joinery level two standard, for example, the training provider would receive £12,000 government funding but have to give £3,360 of it to the CITB.

When it was first proposed the CITB deceptively said the AoC and Department for Education had endorsed the deal.

Part of the reason why this “reverse subcontract” will be deemed as uncompliant by the ESFA is that a number of activities the CITB contract proposes they will do are listed in the rules as ineligible for funding, such as recruitment.

College pension contributions set to rise and could cause ‘financial crisis’ in FE

The employer contributions colleges pay towards teacher pensions look set to rise and could cost them an extra £100 million a year, a move which one sector leader has warned could spark a “financial crisis” in FE.

The outcome of a valuation of teachers’ pensions, which the Treasury runs every four years, suggested the public sector workers will get improved benefits from April 2019.

New “draft directions” for the Teachers’ Pension Scheme, published last Thursday, then stated that “early indications are that the amount employers pay towards the schemes will need to increase”.

It is unclear at this time what the employer contribution rate will eventually be.

But in a move which is likely to frustrate college leaders, the Department for Education has committed to “providing additional funding to maintained schools and academies in 2019-20 in view of the unforeseen costs” while it is only “looking at” how it can “support FE colleges with the additional costs involved where necessary”.

The introduction of higher employer pension contributions for college teachers will be welcomed news to them following the DfE’s decision not to fund a salary rise, despite doing so for school teachers.

But on the other hand it is likely to trouble college leaders who continue to struggle with significantly tight budgets and funding cuts.

Colleges currently contribute £350 million annually towards the pension scheme but the Association of Colleges has warned an increase in contributions could force them to stump up an extra £100 million on top.

“This would be 1.4 per cent of total income and would play havoc will financial plans drawn up this summer – unless there is full compensation for the higher costs,” the association said.

Bill Watkin, chief executive of the Sixth Form Colleges Association, warned that a significant increase in employer contributions to the Teachers’ Pension Scheme “has the potential to lead to a financial crisis in our sector”.

“Years of cuts, cost increases and a static funding rate since 2013 have had a negative impact on staff, students and the financial health of institutions,” he said.

“The government must find the funding to cover any increase in employer contributions and this funding must be for the long term.”

He added: “We have made it clear that any financial support offered to schools to cover these costs must also be extended to Sixth Form Colleges, and that this funding is no substitute for a desperately needed increase to the 16-19 funding rate in next year’s spending review.”

Julian Gravatt, deputy chief Executive of the Association of Colleges, said: “We’ve been highlighting to colleges and government since 2016 that the teacher pension valuation ‎is likely to result in cost increases which will be hard to manage given current funding levels.

“It is good news that the Treasury plans to cover the higher cost for the period to March 2020 but it is unclear what happens after that. It’s difficult for colleges to make long-term plans when the information is presented so late.”

The DfE draft direction stated: “Initial indications are that the protections in the new cost cap mechanism mean public sector workers will get improved pension benefits for employment over the period April 2019 to March 2023.

“This test, known as the cost control mechanism, was introduced to offer taxpayers and employees protection from unexpected changes in pension costs.

“In addition, early indications are that the amount employers pay towards the schemes will need to increase.

“This is because of proposed changes to the discount rate, which is used to assess the current cost of future payments from the schemes.

“At this time, we’re unable to provide information on what the employer contribution rate will be, but the Department will be providing additional funding to maintained schools and academies in 2019-20 in view of the unforeseen costs.

“The department is also looking at how it can support FE colleges with the additional costs involved where necessary and will further consider the funding position for HE establishments as the valuation progresses.”

The DfE added that it will now complete the valuation and, following discussions with the Teachers’ Pension Scheme Advisory Board, will provide details of the employer contribution rate and any options for amending member benefits.

“We will of course continue to provide further updates as soon as information becomes available,” it added.

Unions and colleges to march on parliament to lobby for fair FE funding

Unions, college principals and staff will join forces on October 17 in a nationally coordinated lobby of MPs and parliament to call for fair funding for colleges.

The day, which is being run as part of the Association of Colleges upcoming “week of action”, has the backing of the National Union of Students as well as the Universities and Colleges Union.

Emily Chapman, the NUS’ vice president for FE, tweeted yesterday to announce the partnership and encourage all college students’ unions to “have a conversation with your principal about funding your attendance at this crucial day”.

She added that there will be “all sorts of opportunities to get involved besides the lobby”, including local action on campuses, as well as a FEstival on October 16, where the “theme will be around FE funding and campaigning”.

The week of action, taking place between October 15 and 19, follows the Department for Education’s decision to fund a 3.5 per cent pay rise for school teachers while ignoring college lecturers – an announcement which left AoC boss David Hughes “angry” and “frustrated”.

He pledged after this decision to switch from 10 years of “politely” highlighting the impact of funding cuts to making “a lot more noise”.

The AoC is still deciding exactly what action will be taken during that week, but Ms Chapman’s tweets offered an insight into what is planned.

“For eight years, we have seen cut after cut, putting FE staff under increased pressure,” she said.

“FE has always been a special place where students can grow and release their potential, yet we have seen our education becoming more about the qualification expense crucial aspects of FE.

“Throughout my time as VP (Further Education), I have been known for my hashtags #myFEjourney and #FEisheretostay. I’m not one to shy away from the fight. Which is why I am proud to announce that we are partnering with @AoC_info and @ucu on a Week of Action for FE Funding.

“As part of this week, NUS is asking for two key things: fair pay for staff, and fair funding for colleges. Together, as a movement, we can show that a strong learner voice can make the difference when it comes to bringing about positive change in FE.

“Crucially on Wednesday 17 October, we will be heading to Parliament to lobby our MPs in a nationally coordinated lobby of Parliament, alongside college principals and staff.

“But that’s not all. There will be all sorts of opportunities to get involved besides the lobby, including local action on your campuses. Alongside this, on Tuesday 16th October, we will be hosting FEstival, where the theme will be around FE Funding and Campaigning.”

She added: “It’s time for FE to stop surviving and start thriving! It’s time for FE Voices to be heard, and show how our SUs and voices need investment for our futures. @AoC_info @ucu #FEisHeretostay Save the date!”