Latest news from FE Week

It has been a mixed week for FE as two colleges succeeded in climbing higher in the ranks, while two new providers received the lowest possible Ofsted grade.

The greatest accolades were handed to Preston College and St John’s School and College, both of which managed to climb from a ‘requires improvement’ rating up to ‘good’.

Ofsted commended leaders at Preston College for having “rectified successfully the vast majority of weaknesses identified at the previous inspection”, and particularly for working well with partners and employers and implementing effective improvements to the quality of teaching.

The report said the proportion of students achieving their qualifications “has risen considerably since the previous inspection” and applauded the high levels of academic and pastoral support available, but warned that the quality of apprenticeships has not improved quickly enough.

St John’s School and College, and independent specialist college for learners with complex learning disabilities in Brighton, was said to offer a “rich and creative curriculum that provides opportunities for self-expression and enterprise”.

“Learners develop the skills, knowledge and understanding they need to move on to their next steps and to become more independent,” the report said, commending the “ambitious” leaders for taking “decisive action that has led to improvements throughout the college”.

It was also ‘good’ news for Kent-based independent learning provider Profile Development and Training, which received a grade two after its first full inspection.

Inspectors said staff had “built successfully on a strong past record of achievement under subcontracting arrangements and made a good start to their direct provision,” and praised tutors for their “excellent understanding and extensive experience”.

Brighton’s Varndean College, a sixth form college, and London-based provider Train’d Up Railway Resourcing both received their second consecutive ‘good’ ratings from Ofsted.

Varndean was praised for its curriculum, the “exceptional quality” of its learners’ work and its “highly inclusive culture”, while Train’d Up was commended for “excellent partnerships” that allow it to provide “high-quality apprenticeships” for learners who were described as “highly motivated” and “keen to learn”.

However, others had a far less successful week, with two new providers receiving the lowest possible grade.

London-based training provider Touchstone Education Services was rated ‘inadequate’ in every category, and slammed by inspectors for working with employers who did not recognise the names of their apprentices.

And Chic Beauty Academy in Middlesbrough also received a grade four rating, attracting criticism for “misleading” careers advice and not consulting with employers to ensure courses provide learners with the skills and qualifications they need to gain employment locally.

And Southampton Solent University was deemed by inspectors to be grade two for its apprenticeship provision – its first full inspection for this type of provision. It was rated ‘outstanding’ for its maritime FE provision in 2011.

The report said apprentices “rapidly develop good clinical and health-related vocational skills and behaviours” and lecturers have “considerable vocational knowledge and strong occupational expertise”, but found personal development reviews were not “fully effective”. 

Two early monitoring reports of new apprenticeship providers were also published this week. Both University Hospital Southampton NHS Foundation Trust and London-based Reed Specialist Recruitment were deemed to be making ‘reasonable progress’ in every category.

GFE Colleges	Inspected	Published	Grade	Previous grade
Preston College	15/10/2018	29/11/2018	2	3

 

Sixth Form Colleges	Inspected	Published	Grade	Previous grade
Varndean College	30/10/2018	30/11/2018	2	2

 

Independent Learning Providers	Inspected	Published	Grade	Previous grade
Touchstone Educational Solutions Ltd	16/10/2018	26/11/2018	4	N/A
Chic Beauty Academy Ltd	16/10/2018	28/11/2018	4	N/A
Profile Development And Training Limited	06/11/2018	26/11/2018	2	N/A
Train’d Up Railway Resourcing Limited	30/10/2018	27/11/2018	2	2

 

Independent specialist colleges	Inspected	Published	Grade	Previous Grade
St John’s School and College	16/10/2018	27/11/2018	2	3

 

Employer providers	Inspected	Published	Grade
Reed Specialist Recruitment Limited	24/10/2018	29/11/2018	M
University Hospital Southampton NHS Foundation Trust	12/11/2018	29/11/2018	M

 

Other FE and skills	Inspected	Published	Grade	Previous Grade
Southampton Solent University	30/10/2018	30/11/2018	2	1

 

Ofsted’s view that colleges are giving students “false hope” by putting them on courses where there are slim job prospects has been criticised by a leading principal for being based on “anecdotal” rather than robust evidence.

Chief inspector Amanda Spielman (pictured above) questioned whether some colleges are chasing income over students’ best interests at the Association of Colleges conference last week.

She was referring to the inspectorate’s thematic report on level two qualifications which found some subjects, namely arts and media,“stand out” as areas where there is a “mismatch between the numbers of students taking courses and their future employment in the industry”.

Writing for FE Week, the principal of Grimsby Institute, who spoke out during a question-and-answer session with Ms Spielman at the AoC conference, explains why she was“incensed” by the view that arts and media students are being sold an“impossible dream”.

“The [level two] report identifies that art and media courses were generally perceived to give the least chance of gaining employment within those industries,” writes Debra Gray (page 18).

“The interesting term here is‘perceived’. The research is based on the perceptions of a small number of providers.“There appears to be little triangulation with verifiable labour market intelligence from reliable sources to see if perception matches reality.

“What appears to be credible research is simply an account of provider perceptions presented as fact.The methodological dangers of relying on anecdotal evidence rather than empirical evidence are legion.”

The section in Ofsted’s level two report that Ms Spielman based her view on shows a graph with just 11responses which said arts and media courses have the “least chance of progressing to employment in a relevant industry”.

Ms Gray writes: “The problem doesn’t just lie with assumptions that anecdotal evidence is generalizable, it also begs the question whether the right question is being asked in the first place. The chief inspector states in the report ‘I am therefore concerned about the number of courses on offer that college leaders know do not lead to good local employment’.

“The report assumes we have a common understanding of the term‘good local employment’. Fifty per cent of Grimsby’s catchment area is the North Sea, but we have road and rail links to Hull, Lincoln and Sheffield,all of which are thriving creative cities. Is this ‘local’ enough? It is also vital to point out that a significantly higher proportion of jobs in the creative industries are freelance and commission-based than is typical. Is this considered ‘good’ employment?”

Responding to the criticism, Ofsted said: “Our report recognised that the numbers of students going from arts and media courses into jobs in that industry was low. On the other hand,we found colleges advertising these courses as having extremely good career prospects, and as a result these are some of the most popular courses available.

“That is doing a disservice to students who take those courses.”

The Education and Skills Funding Agency is clamping down on employers who fail to pay the 10 per cent co-investment fee for apprentices, by withholding completion payments from providers.

A change to a calculation in the agency’s funding software will enforce the new rule from early next month, which will see nearly 20 per cent of the total apprenticeship cash held back until employer payments are up-to-date.

It means that up to £4,860 of ESFA funding, 90 per cent of £5,400, would be withheld if the apprenticeship price is at the highest upper funding band of £27,000, for example.

In a little known monthly update for “MI managers, software writers and suppliers” published this afternoon, the ESFA says: “We plan to update the apprenticeship funding calculation at R04 [Individualised Learner Record data return deadline 6 December] to withhold any completion payments that do not meet the criteria in the funding rules.

“The rules state that co-investment due to be paid by the employer must be collected and recorded in the ILR for the completion payment to be paid.”

Additionally, the agency plans to clawback cash from providers who’ve not claimed the fee from employers.

“This change will also apply to any completion payments already made in the 2018 to 2019 funding year and where necessary payments will be recovered,” the ESFA said.

“We will also identify and recover any completion payments paid to providers in 2017 to 2018 funding year that were not compliant with funding rules. All adjusted payments will be made as part of the December payment run.

“Providers must ensure all co-investment is collected and recorded on the ILR in a timely manner as stated in the funding rules.”

The way the agency funds providers for delivering the training is by paying monthly payments for 80 per cent of the negotiated price up to the funding band, but where the employer has no levy funding or it is insufficient, then co-investment must be paid, currently set at 10 per cent.

The ESFA in future will only pay the provider for the final 90 per cent of the total remaining 20 per cent, once the framework has finished or the end point assessment has taken place and the employer has paid their 10 per cent.

Chancellor Philip Hammond announced last month that the co-investment fee will be halved to 5 per cent, but a start date for this change has still not been revealed.

The return deadline for providers to get their co-investment payments in is tight – December 6.

However, the completion payment is only being withheld until the financial fields in the ILR show the employer has fully paid their share. Once that happens, the completion payment would be released in the next monthly funding cycle.

Fears are growing over the creation of a postcode lottery for adult learners, leading one devolved area to seek special treatment from the Department for Education, FE Week can reveal.

From August 2019, more than £600 million of the £1.5 billion adult education budget will be devolved to the seven mayoral combined authorities. However, these authorities will only be able to fund students who live within their boundaries.

Guidance on AEB devolution, published last month, confirms there will be “no direct reciprocal agreements between the Education and Skills Funding Agency and any mayoral combined authority or Greater London Authority arrangements to fund residents who travel to learn across boundaries from devolved areas to non devolved areas, or vice versa”.

This change could have a big impact on the number of learners accepted by colleges inside the seven devolved areas – Cambridgeshire and Peterborough, Greater Manchester, Liverpool City, Sheffield City, Tees Valley, West Midlands and the West of England – and London, as well as the institutions nearby.

With the prospect of colleges and providers being forced to check postcodes at enrolment, and out of area learners being turned away, FE Week has taken a closer look at the reality of devolved funding.

Special treatment for London

The Greater London Authority is in the process of trying to negotiate a special agreement for the capital which would allow for greater flexibility.

 A spokesperson said the Mayor of London, Sadiq Khan, is asking for Londoners to “receive the same treatment as learners from Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland”, rather than England.

“This includes an acceptance that learners from London could be funded if specialist skills training is not available other than outside of the capital and they want to travel to, or live in, other areas of England to study or learn,” he said.

Many colleges outside the capital are used to enrolling Londoners, including Guildford College, Harlow College and North Kent College, while colleges based inside of London but close to the border, such as London South East Colleges, may now face difficulties recruiting learners from outside the capital.

A spokesperson for the DfE said the Greater London Authority had been given “access to information which identifies learner attendance and need”.

“This is a significant step that will give local areas the opportunity to better meet local economic needs,” she said, adding that the authority is able to enter into a funding agreement “with any provider, no matter where that provider is based, to fund learners who live there”.

Concerns from sector leaders

Sector leaders have been unanimous in their warnings about the new policy, which they say could have negative consequences for learners and institutions alike.

 Mick Fletcher, FE expert at the Policy Consortium, warned the changes “could cause all sorts of problems”.

 “One of the difficulties in running colleges is ensuring class sizes. Even if it’s just one or two students, that could be the difference of a class being viable or unviable,” he said.

 “All these negotiations will have to be done by people who haven’t done it before. We’re going to reinvent a whole load of bureaucracy.”

 He added: “I think it’s going to be damaging. It’s going to be damaging for some individuals and for some institutions, and it’s going to be an extra cost.”

Stephen Evans, chief executive of the Learning and Work Institute, called on the combined authorities and the ESFA to “take a proactive approach” to make sure learners can continue to find the best courses for them, and to make sure colleges are not subjected to “unnecessary bureaucracy” or uneven funding.

“The measure of the success of devolution will be whether devolved areas can deliver higher quality provision and better outcomes for individuals and employers, without adding extra burdens and bureaucracy,” he said.

Sue Pember, director of policy at Holex, warned that even in cases where colleges do agree contracts with an authority, these contracts will be “numbers driven” and so are likely to “limit a student’s ability to choose”.

“The feature of learner choice has been an important aspect of the English system of FE,” she said.

“It has driven up quality, allowed the best colleges to grow, and it will be a sad day when it is lost.”

Concerns have also been raised that the policy ignores the fact of people often travelling across geographic boundaries for work as well as for study.

Mark Dawe, chief executive of the Association of Employment and Learning Providers, said it would be “sensible” to have more “flexibility” within the devolved funding to use for learners who travel from outside of the relevant area.

“There is growing recognition that in most combined authorities there is significant travel for work outside the combined authority zone,” he said. “This presents a significant issue when looking at workforce rather than residency.”

Colleges fear postcode ‘restrictions’ 

Harlow College estimates the changes could affect up to 200 of its learners every year who come from both London and the Cambridgeshire and Peterborough region.

The college is particularly concerned about its newly established partnership with Stansted Airport, who work extensively on recruiting learners from London on to their campus.

A spokesperson said the GLA has made contact to try to find a way forward.

 He said: “Employers and potential employees increasingly do not work within the geographical boundaries defined by politics.

 “It is really important that contracting arrangements do not impede opportunities for people to gain access to better employment and training. There appears to be no proposed flexibility in rules related to postcodes.”

Ian Pryce, chief executive of Bedford College, said he was concerned the devolved budgets are “likely to restrict rather than increase opportunities” and “increase the complexity for colleges”.

 “I really don’t like the idea of us having to say to someone from St Neots ‘these are all the courses we do but you can only do these ones because of your postcode’.

“I hope it won’t come to that, and also hope we don’t see devolved authorities using funds to favour their own adult provision departments or creaming off money for admin.”

However, he added that the Cambridgeshire and Peterborough combined authority has been “excellent at involving us and wants us to carry on as normal for now”.

Sean Scully, director of student experience at Oaklands College, which takes learners from London and Cambridge, said the college was “aware and fully engaged” and expecting “very low numbers” of learners would be affected.

“Our initial thoughts are that by staying engaged with the areas we know students are coming from we will greatly reduce any possible impact,” he said.

A spokesperson for the Guildford College Group said it was “aware of the issue” and was still in discussions with the Greater London Authority “to find a resolution for the very few students that this will affect”.

Trouble ahead for colleges with multiple campuses

FE Week has taken a closer look at some of the complications that may arise from the new focus on postcodes.

As the emphasis is placed on whether colleges are inside a combined authority, this may overlook colleges with multiple campuses which can lie outside of boundaries.

The College of West Anglia, for example, was formed in 1998 out of a merger between the Norfolk College of Arts and Technology and the Cambridgeshire College of Agriculture and Horticulture, and a further merger in 2006 added Isle College in Wisbech.

The college is now based over these three campuses but, although Cambridge and Wisbech are contained within the Cambridgeshire and Peterborough combined authority, the third campus, in King’s Lynn in Norfolk, is not.

The College of West Anglia did not respond to requests for comment about what this will mean for the way the college operates, and whether learners in Norfolk will still be able to attend the local King’s Lynn campus.

The arbitrary nature of the boundaries also means that some learners living on the same street could be prevented from going to the same colleges.

 For example, the edge of the Greater London Authority boundary splits Crayford Road from Dartford Road, where it becomes Kent.

This means that learners who live on the Crayford Road side, in London, will not be funded by the GLA if they enrol at North Kent College’s campus in Dartford, just 1.3 miles away.

And their neighbours who live on the Dartford Road side, in Kent, will not be funded to go to the London South East Colleges’ campus in Bexley, just 2.38 miles away.

 

Figures from AoC

Estimates from the Association of Colleges suggest a huge variation in the amount of money that different devolved areas receive.

The Greater London Authority is expected to receive an AEB allocation of £311 million next year, whereas smaller areas can expect a fraction of that amount, with Cambridgeshire and Peterborough in line for £12 million and the West of England expecting £17 million.

The AoC’s estimates, based on data from 2016/17, suggest that 62 colleges are contained within the boundaries of the combined authorities and GLA, which will share £342 million from the devolved budget but just £42 million in separate funding from the Education and Skills Funding Agency.

There are 168 colleges not based within a combined authority, which will share £401 million from the ESFA but will be entitled to split just £81 million from the devolved budget.

Speaking at the AoC conference last week, its deputy chief executive Julian Gravatt said: “I think effectively what we will see is the devolved authorities will want to deal with fewer colleges and providers, and will effectively localise.”

 Asked about concerns over a postcode lottery, he told FE Week: “It would be much better if the DfE and the combined authorities could agree a cost transfer arrangement to avoid new bureaucratic obstacles.”

An academy trust run by a college has been warned it will be stripped of its only school if standards don’t improve – the latest in a string of college-run trusts falling into trouble.

The Burton and South Derbyshire Education Trust – set up by Burton and South Derbyshire College – was warned the Kingfisher Academy could be rebrokered unless standards improved.

 In a minded to terminate letter, published last week and sent in October, the government highlighted the school’s ‘inadequate’ Ofsted rating, after its first inspection in September 2017.

Although a monitoring visit in June found leaders were taking effective action to make improvements, the government has asked for further information to ensure progress is being made.

The trust has since said they have provided this information, and claimed closing the school had now been taken off the table.

Among the other college-run academy trusts to face problems is the Salford Academy Trust, founded by Salford City College, the University of Salford and Salford City Council.

In June it confirmed that it would give up all four of its schools and close. Salford City College retained 75 per cent control over the trust, which, according to accounts published in February, had been identified as “high risk” by the Department for Education after a review of one school identified “serious weaknesses”.

And in March the multi-academy trust Marine Academy Plymouth, sponsored by the University of Plymouth, Cornwall College and the Plymouth local authority, was warned its namesake school could be transferred to another trust after being put into special measures in November last year.

Kevin Courtney, joint general secretary of the National Education Union, said colleges are “very good” at providing post-16 education, but warned that “does not qualify them to run schools or manage academy trusts”.

He said: “The government was wrong to assume that a college provider could simply take over schools and run them successfully.”

According to DfE statistics, 21 colleges are listed as the main sponsors of academy trusts, with a total of 57 academies between them. They range from having one to 13 schools.

FE Week analysis found just one of these academies is rated as ‘outstanding’: Heath Lane Academy run by The Midland Academies Trust, which is sponsored by North Warwickshire and South Leicestershire College.

However, the trust’s three other schools are rated ‘requires improvement’. Three more of its academies, including two studio schools, have closed.

In total, 13 college-run academies are rated as ‘good’, nine as ‘requires improvement’ and five as ‘inadequate’. The rest have not yet been inspected by Ofsted.

Julian Gravatt (pictured), deputy chief executive at the Association of Colleges, said it was important to note that colleges “mainly” sponsor trusts with schools that were previously failing, or which run ventures such as university technical colleges or alternative provision academies.

He said there have been “many successes” in college-run trusts, but added: “Colleges don’t have deep pockets like some sponsors do, and the different legal structure of academies has been an unhelpful obstacle.”

The obstacles he referred to include the fact that colleges have a different financial year end, and that colleges can’t recover VAT although schools can.

Mr Gravatt also said that the DfE and Education and Skills Funding Agency have more than 1,000 officials who work on issues associated with academies but only a few hundred who work on colleges.

 “The former don’t always understand the latter,” he added.

 Kevin Gilmartin, post-16 and colleges specialist at the Association of School and College Leaders, said colleges can bring “great benefits” to trusts because of their “close links to employers and their expertise in vocational and technical education”.

He added the biggest challenges to education are inadequate government funding and teacher shortages.

The DfE offered this comment when FE Week asked why it thinks some college-run trusts have underperformed: “One of the benefits of the academy system is that sponsors are from a variety of backgrounds and can tailor their expertise to suit pupils’ needs.

“This freedom in the hands of school leaders is driving up standards across the country, with more than half a million children now studying in sponsored academies rated ‘good’ or ‘outstanding’ that often replaced underperforming schools. This includes academies that are sponsored by further education colleges.”