Heart of Worcestershire College wins top award for its SEND provision

A Worcestershire college has been recognised by the National Association of Special Educational Needs for its SEND provision.

Heart of Worcestershire College was acknowledged for its “excellent practice in further education” at the Nasen SEND awards 2017 during a ceremony hosted at the Museum of London in October, with Derby College and Chichester College also shortlisted in the category.

The college was recognised for its sensory room, which has beanbags, bubble lamps and even a projection of a dog, as well as a mock-up flat used to help learners develop the skills they will need to live independently.

The awards celebrate individuals and organisations making a difference in the lives of children and young people with SEND. Other categories include “inspirational teacher” and “exceptional parental engagement”, and HoW was the only FE institution to take home an award.

“This is a great reflection on all the staff and the hard work they put in every day to ensure our learners get the best quality experience,” said Claire Heywood, the college’s assistant principal for inclusive and employer learning. “Most of all though, it’s a brilliant reflection of all the talented, committed and enthusiastic supported learners we have here.”

Students diagnosed with autism-spectrum disorder share their experiences at regional autism conference

Students diagnosed with autism-spectrum disorder have shared their experiences of living with the condition at Rochdale’s regional autism conference.

Students from Hopwood Hall College gave a talk to parents, carers and educational professionals about their day-to-day lives and how ASD affects them.

One 18-year-old level two art and design student, Blaine Bennett, showed delegates some artwork he had created that has been inspired by his experiences, while a play written by the students about sensory overload and the Q&A session that followed helped guests understand their experiences further.

“The students were absolutely fantastic. There wasn’t a dry eye in the house,” said Julie Dalton, the autism lead at Rochdale council’s additional needs service. “It was brilliant for parents to see such positivity and that there can be light at the end of what must be a dark tunnel at times.”

The conference also featured keynote speakers including Ros Blackburn, a 48-year-old who lectures internationally on her experience of living with severe autism, and Rita Jordan, an emeritus professor in autism studies at the University of Birmingham.

Huge spike in higher level apprenticeship commitments

Levy-funded apprenticeships at higher and degree-level jumped by a whopping 424 per cent in September, according to the latest experimental Department for Education statistics.

The figures, based on commitments made through the apprenticeship service since May, suggest that the sudden rise of management apprenticeships is not slowing down.

Commitments at higher or degree apprenticeships – those at level four and above – shot up by 3,140 from August’s total of 740 to 3,880 in September.

While commitments at all levels were up by 153 per cent, the 424-per-cent rise at level four and above dwarves that at lower levels.

As a result, higher- and degree-level apprenticeships now make up a far greater proportion of the total commitments, from one in 10 between May and August to almost one in five.

These figures will fuel concerns that the apprenticeship levy, which kicked off on May 1, would encourage businesses to fund management courses for existing employees rather than offering lower-level apprenticeships to young people.

It’s not clear which standards or frameworks these commitments relate to, as that information isn’t included in the statistics.

However, the most popular higher or degree level standards in 2016/17 were both management courses: level five operations/departmental manager, and the chartered manager degree apprenticeship at level six.

And FE Week reported last month that management had soared in popularity to become the second most popular framework in 2016/17.

Degree apprenticeships were first launched in September 2015, but have only been eligible for funding since May.

Peter Lauener, the interim chief executive of the Institute for Apprenticeships, told the public accounts committee last month that businesses had been expected to use the levy to pay for higher and degree apprenticeships – which he described as a “rapidly growing element of the programme”.

“It’s certainly the case that that levy-paying employers can use their levy to pay for degree apprenticeships,” he told MPs.

The institute had “done a lot of modelling”, he added, which included “an expectation that there would be an increasing number of degree apprenticeships in the system as a result”.

Of the 195 standards currently approved for delivery, 65 are at level four or above.

Twenty of those are at level six, while a further six are at level seven, which is equivalent to a master’s degree.

Many of the new degree apprenticeship programmes have received funding through the degree apprenticeship development fund, administered by the Higher Education Funding Council for England.

The first phase of the fund, announced in 2016, provided £4.5 million across 18 projects, involving 35 HE institutions and 20 FE colleges, to support up to 5,200 new degree apprenticeship places from September.

The second phase, announced by the education secretary Justine Greening at the Conservative Party conference last month, awarded £4.9 million to 27 projects, to develop a further 4,500 degree apprenticeship places by September 2018.

The apprenticeships service is the online system that levy-paying employers use to manage their funds, including registering “commitments” or apprentices, and paying for training.

Currently only large employers that are subject to the apprenticeship levy – those with an annual wage bill of at least £3 million – can use the service.

 

Sunderland College’s football course welcomes first-ever crop of international students

Sunderland College has welcomed its first ever crop of international students onto its Football Development Centre course.

Andreas Kokoska from Spain, Dimitri Limbo from the Philippines and Mohab Elmarakbi from Egypt are the first international students to join the programme, which combines practical football training with academic study.

The trio have travelled from their home countries to pursue the qualification, which also incorporates participation in regional, national and international competitions as part of the course criteria.

“I chose Sunderland College because it allows me to study and play at the same time,” said nineteen-year-old goalkeeper Andreas. “It is a big change from home but I’ve been welcomed by everyone, although I’m still trying to understand the accent.”

“We’re thrilled to welcome our first international players to the centre,” added John Rushworth, the faculty director for sport and health and wellbeing at the college. “The fact we have students travelling thousands of miles to be part of the elite football development centre illustrates how well-thought of the programme is on a global scale.”

ESFA plans new ‘trusted provider status’ for employer levy account management

The government revealed today that they are working on a plan to allow employers to hand over much of the apprenticeship account administration to their providers, something they insist will still “maintain employer ownership”.

Keith Smith, director of funding and programmes at the Education and Skills Funding Agency (ESFA), told delegates at the AELP autumn conference in Manchester that a new “trusted provider status” could be introduced next year.

Describing plans to simplify the bureaucracy around apprenticeship account management Mr Smith said: “What we are potentially looking at for next year is to introduce the concept of a trusted provider status [see slide below].

“What we mean by that is allowing relatively good relationship where employers are really confident they have got the best provider and it is all working, we want to actually enable the employer in essence to authorise the provider to do much more of the accounting and administration on their behalf.

“That will stop some of this toing and froing. We think we will introduce this as a choice, some employers are telling us they absolutely do want to control everything end-to-end, others not so much. So we want to introduce something that gives them that choice and that is something you will be able to work with employers on to help with.”

Mr Smith said that in the “short term”, his agency is going to introduce a function for providers to change information within the levy system.

“The short term stuff that we are going to do by this autumn or by the end of this year, is introduce the ability for you to change information within the system. So editing of the information before a payment is made and this will stop the issues we have at the moment where if you have a problem and you have to go into it and it all gets very problematic. This editing functionality will be introduced to help this commitment process.

“We think this is all good news but I’d be interested in getting your feedback in the coming days and weeks about whether this goes far enough.”

AELP boss Mark Dawe was in support of the ESFA’s new proposed approach.

“We absolutely welcome this,” he told FE Week after today’s session.

“It is not so much about ownership rather saying that there are roles for the employers and the providers, and that the provider is there to support the employer. If the employer trusts the provider then fantastic, give them the opportunity to help. It is something that we and our members have been saying for a long time. My thing is the quicker the better.”

He added: “I think the choice is there because it is about the relationship between the provider and the employer and it is the job of the provider to get that trust and it may be that the employer just wants control anyway and that is not an issue, that is not saying the provider is no good, it is just saying the provider has a different view but at least it is there and can be done.”

FE Week edition 223 cartoon

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Major home health care employer provider branded ‘inadequate’

Ofsted has rated a major home healthcare employer-provider ‘inadequate’ across the board, in a report that condemns its “woefully low expectations”.

Nestor Primecare Services, which was previously rated as ‘requires improvement’ overall, was inspected in September – and today’s excoriating report finds “no key strengths”.

The company employs 125 apprentices, of whom “approximately a quarter were on a learning break” at the time of the inspection.

Inspectors were highly critical of teaching, assessing and apprentices’ progress, and raised grave safeguarding concerns.

“Managers set woefully low expectations for their assessors and these, in return, fail to motivate apprentices to complete their learning programme on time and to a high standard,” it stated.

Its assessment practice as a whole is “insufficiently rigorous”.

“In too many cases, assessors wrongfully accept and sign off, as valid and complete, work which is incorrect, or of a poor standard. For example, an apprentice described a sprained ankle as an example of a localised infection requiring antibiotics,” the report found.

Leaders and managers were also guilty of an “abject failure” to challenge themselves and their teams to deliver high standards.

“Teaching, learning and assessment are weak; they do not support apprentices to progress well and to acquire new occupational skills and knowledge,” it went on.

Management had “overlooked the importance” of keeping apprentices safe, and been slow to ensure that all leaders have taken required safeguarding training.

“Apprentices do not prioritise their learning; too often they miss appointments with assessors and/or do not complete their work on time,” inspectors decided. “As a result, many apprentices have long periods of time when they do not submit their work.”

Nestor Primecare Services, which was allocated £550,000 by the Education and Skills Funding Agency for 2016/17, was bought two years ago by the Aurelius investment group and now trades as Allied Healthcare.

Most apprentices are studying health and social care, with others on administration and business management programmes.

The report said the company, which has been approached for comment, must “radically develop” the quality of its teaching, learning and assessment.

Managers should “immediately implement a comprehensive review of the effectiveness of the existing safeguarding arrangements, ensuring that all weak processes are swiftly strengthened, paying particular attention to the urgent need to raise staff’s and learners’ awareness of the dangers of extremism and radicalisation”.

FE Week reported last June that firms taking on apprentices had been advised by the AELP to stick “to their core business” and use experienced providers after Citroën UK was humiliated by an ‘inadequate’ rating of its own.

Ofsted was then forced in February to deny it would reduce its inspections of apprenticeships employer-providers to mere “samples”.

According to briefing notes seen by FE Week from a stakeholder event at the Institute of Apprenticeships, Ofsted was slated to “continue to inspect training providers and sample inspection of employers”.

But confronted with our findings, a spokesperson insisted that it is “not planning to change how we inspect training providers and employers”.

 

What should the maths component of T-levels look like?

Much expert research and development has already been carried out into maths in technical education – let’s not reinvent the wheel, advises Paul Glaister

The post-16 skills plan refers to a “common core”, “specialisation” and “digital skills requirements”, but what should the maths content of each of these look like?

Anyone that chooses to answer that question by listing content has completely missed the point. Too much emphasis in maths reforms has been placed on content and procedures.

Focusing on developing competence and confidence, and the ability to problem-solve in meaningful contexts should take priority over the addition of content. The maths must also engage learners, be clearly relevant to their specialism but also transferable to others, and be highly valued by employers.

The parallel pathways outlined in the skills plan – academic and technical, with crossovers at set junctures – may be too simplistic. Should there be opportunities for those who embark on a technical route and taking T-levels to be able to take an “academic” qualification, say an AS/A-level, as well?

Of course the level of maths in any T-level is likely to vary across the 15 different sectors, and will also be dependent on the prior attainment of an individual learner, but for those taking T-levels at level three, and for whom level three maths is appropriate, there is already a qualification that meets the needs of both academic and technical pathways: core maths.

The maths component of T-levels should be heavily informed by core maths

Core maths is a level three qualification currently being taken alongside AS/A-levels and existing technical and vocational qualifications. Indeed, the importance of core maths to all on a level three programme was made clear by the first recommendation in Sir Adrian Smith’s recent review of post-16 mathematics: “The DfE should seek to ensure that schools and colleges are able to offer all students on academic routes and potentially students on other level three programmes access to a core maths qualification.”

As core maths is a qualification for “work, life and further study”, it is a good place to start. I am not advocating that all those taking T-levels should also be taking core maths, or indeed that all T-levels should have an equivalent qualification embedded within them, either as the existing level three version or a newly created level two version.

But I am suggesting that the development of the maths component of T-levels should be heavily informed by all the work that has gone into the development of core maths, together with the subsequent implementation: teaching, resources, assessment, use of technology and its emphasis on problem-solving in meaningful contexts.

This approach, whether at level two or three, and regardless of the underlying content, would make for a maths component with a common core that engages all learners but which can be made relevant to their specialism, is demonstrably transferable to other specialisms, and which is highly valued by employers.

The three key objectives of core maths at level three are to:

  • deepen competence in the selection and use of mathematical methods and techniques
  • develop confidence in representing and analysing authentic situations mathematically and in applying mathematics to address related questions and issues
  • build skills in mathematical thinking, reasoning and communication.

These includes anything quantitative, and particularly involves statistics, and statistical and data literacy. These objectives should be at the heart of the maths component of any T-level.

Much research and development has already been carried out by two of the leading experts in this field, Professors Geoff Wake and Jeremy Hodgen, along with their collaborators. Their work includes a look at the nature of maths in technical education and employment in other countries, and the increasing need and nature of maths for employment in the UK.

The Institute for Apprenticeships and expert panels, and the recently announced stakeholder groups need to look to this important work, and build upon it, to create the very best technical education and training, with an embedded, relevant, and ever-developing maths component.

Paul Glaister is professor of mathematics at the University of Reading

London’s biggest college group just got bigger

London’s biggest college group has spread itself even further across the capital with another merger, and it is looking at yet more growth with an institute of technology.

The Capital City College Group formed in August 2016 when City and Islington College merged with Westminster Kingsway College, rated grade one and two respectively. It also includes Capital City College Training, which was launched by CCCG earlier this year and provides around 100 apprenticeship programmes to organisations located in London.

The group has expanded again today, merging with the grade two-rated College of Haringey, Enfield and North East London.

It’s chief executive Andy Wilson (pictured) spoke enthusiastically about the long-term security economies of scale will provide members of the mega-college, which is expected to teach 37,000 students each year, employ 1,700 staff and spend an annual budget approaching £110 million.

“We are all very excited to be bringing together three of London’s most successful colleges to create a technical education and training powerhouse and a regional college for the city,” he said.

“It will transform its FE sector by delivering exceptional benefits to local communities and businesses. I think we’re creating something that will really help future-proof FE for this region.”

He also revealed details of a planned new institute of technology specialising in life sciences.

The government called on providers to register an interest in launching an IoTs last month.

Much like the ill-fated Centres of Vocational Excellence (CoVE) scheme for colleges launched during the days of the Learning and Skills Council, it is expected that funding for new equipment will come with IoT plaques and IoT kite-marks for websites and email signatures.

“We would be creating an entity which is an institute of technology, based at its own site, and that’s more exciting than just a CoVE kite mark,” Mr Wilson told FE Week.

He thinks it will be a scheme worth investing time and effort into, due to local employer demand for life sciences, and the prestige that will come with the IoT brand.

“It is going to get publicity behind it. It’s going to have more brand value with employers which do want to see something different. It will have some profile, and we have got Middlesex University as a partner,” he continued.

“If you also look at what is going on nearby at King’s Cross at the moment, around the Francis Crick Institute, there is a life sciences cluster developing there. It includes things like Cancer Research UK, medical technology, pharmacy, health sciences. Our sites are close to that.”

He added that with CONEL joining the group, CCCG’s IoT could reach into the Stansted/Cambridge corridor, in which there is another grouping of life sciences organisations.

CCCG will not be alone in pursuing IoT status, as almost half – 17 out of 37 – of the area reviews ended with the colleges involved expressing an interest in developing an IoT.

It is not clear, though, how many of these have turned into actual bids to the DfE’s recent call for proposals to establish the new institutes.

 

Off-the-job training rule hangs over AELP autumn conference

The government must urgently address employer resistance to the minimum off-the-job training apprenticeship rule, the AELP has said ahead of its autumn conference.

This is one of many actions that the association is asking for, to foster a “more flexible” approach to the apprenticeship reforms and make them a success – and something that apprenticeships minister Anne Milton has herself said she wants to implement.

According to the AELP, it must be a “top priority” to recognise the challenges employers face with the new rule that specifies off-the-job training must amount to “20 per cent of the apprentice’s contracted employment hours across the whole apprenticeship”.

A spokesperson claimed employers in both the private and public sectors, including NHS Trusts, can’t afford an apprentice who is “non-productive” for one day every week in order to meet this criterion.

Nor, it is claimed, can they afford the “cost of staff backfill to cover their absence when there are many other appropriate flexible and effective ways of delivering knowledge, skills and behaviours required”.

Anne Milton

AELP also denies that this much off-the-job training is required to ensure the quality of teaching on apprenticeships is sufficiently high, and that learning time isn’t swallowed up by work requirements.

Two large levy-paying employers – Health Education England and Grafton Merchanting GB – are expected to voice their concerns about the 20-per-cent rule at today’s AELP autumn conference in Manchester.

The AELP has been demanding widespread changes throughout the year, asking particularly for more detailed guidance on how the rule will work in practice.

The Department for Education published additional guidance in June, but the AELP said employers believe the rule “limits their participation, engagement and appetite to fully embrace apprenticeships”.

Today’s conference, sponsored by City & Guilds, is taking place just two weeks after official government statistics revealed a 61-per-cent slump in apprenticeship starts compared with a year ago.

The AELP said the collapse is due to how the government funds the apprenticeships of smaller employers who don’t pay the levy.

“A disastrous procurement exercise, which had to be scrapped by the incoming minister, and a requirement for small businesses to make a financial contribution towards the cost of the training, have led to huge falls in starts among SMEs across the country, including in the many areas where levy payers don’t operate,” a spokesperson said.

Earlier this month, at the Conservative party conference, Ms Milton admitted that the apprenticeships system would not work “unless there is flexibility in it”, and said she was “flabbergasted” that several big businesses had told her they were unaware of the new reforms.

Mark Dawe

“The skills minister has said that she has heard two different stories about how the reforms are going but encouragingly she has also said that she is very willing to listen to those who are experiencing their impact on the ground,” said AELP boss Mark Dawe.

“Many of these people will be at our conference today and AELP will be calling for urgent action so that providers can work with their local employers to get things moving again.”

In the AELP’s view, the government needs to “remove disincentives for employers to recruit young apprentices, halt the decline in apprenticeship opportunities at levels two and three, guarantee a minimum £1 billion budget for the apprenticeships of non-levy paying SMEs, allow flexibility between on and off the job training, and review the co-investment requirement for non-levy payers”.

And after FE Week revealed the £200 million underspend in the adult education budget this year, the AELP’s chairman Martin Dunford will say in his opening remarks at the conference that whether the AEB is devolved or not, the government, the combined authorities and the LEPs should “start a transition to full commissioning of publicly funded skills programmes”.

Speakers at the autumn conference include Keith Smith from the ESFA, Anthony Chalmers from the DfE, and Chris Jones from Ofsted, among many other sector leaders. They will debate on improving quality, the T-level reforms, overcoming barriers to social mobility and English devolution of skills programmes.

FE Week is media partner and will be reporting live from the conference.