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What about budget?

Fundamental change must be delivered on a limited budget. Pockets of funding for all educators have disappeared in recent years – and FE institutions report that budget cuts are hitting them particularly hard.

This can make justifying any expense tricky, and we know that some colleges look to quick-fixes when it comes to tech – reporting that free software may promise a cost-effective alternative to more commercial solutions.

However, we’d warn against a cost-cutting approach to buying technology. We sometimes talk about the ‘hidden cost of free’; as colleges fail to factor in the costs of the ongoing maintenance and support as well as the up-front development needed to get the project’s true cost. Colleges find themselves on their own if something goes wrong with free software – and fixing the problem themselves may prove a bigger commitment than the lack of upfront cost justifies.

The Canvas solution

Offsetting the cost of commercial solutions are the cost savings which clever tech use can ultimately deliver. Tools like Canvas, our own Virtual Learning Environment, can ultimately save time, resources and reduce admin costs – significantly speeding up lesson creation, grading and reporting.

Moving beyond cost, if it’s used properly, and purchased to fulfil a real need, technology use can vastly enhance learning and teaching – and be particularly beneficial to college students, as they prepare for work in a technology-centric economy. Using digital content and sharing lesson plans and ideas globally with a teacher network can create engaging lessons.

New pedagogy like the flipped classroom and blended learning are powered by tech and can totally transform the learning experience. Completing rote material or ingesting lectures at home can free up classroom time for more in-depth and personalised teaching.

Tools like Canvas have the ability to immediately measure a student’s achievement on any given piece of work, look at what aspects of the teaching and learning have worked and what have not, and then adapt their instruction accordingly.

Students benefit from the more responsive teaching – and a collaborative teaching and learning environment.

However, tech adoption will only deliver the benefits it promises if it’s adopted as part of a long term, pedagogy-driven strategy – to improve teaching and learning. Together with the hidden costs of ‘free software’, looking only to short-term objectives can have a damaging effect on teacher and staff views of classroom technology. For many, all they know is the kind of software which is at best a place to store documents and at worst, an unreliable service that scuppers far too many well-laid lesson plans.

But, different is possible. We’d urge FE institutions to take the leap into tech-enabled learning – but to put student and teacher experience, and learning outcomes, firmly at the heart of their strategies.

Learn more how and why further education institutions are switching to Canvas at www.canvasvle.co.uk/fe

Case study: Career Colleges Trust – Building tomorrow’s workforce

Bev Jones, Director of Operations at the Career Colleges Trust

The Career Colleges Trust was founded in 2013 by former education secretary Lord Baker to improve vocational further education in the UK. We support a network of recognised ‘career colleges’ around the country specialising in a variety of industries from Hospitality to Digital Technology. By helping further education colleges to prepare students for their future careers in industry, we’re addressing an issue high on the agenda for academia and industry alike – the UK skills gap; where there aren’t enough skilled graduates to meet employer needs. We think that the skills shortage is stifling UK economic growth, but that greater emphasis on vocational training can go a long way to close the gap.

At the Career Colleges Trust we talk about not just a skills gap, but a fundamental skills mismatch. And we believe that it’s crucial to understand where the mismatches between the needs of employers and skills of students in FE lie. By far and away the greatest issue that employers report is around digital literacy; and their desire for tech-savvy graduates, ready to enter the working world. The pace of technology development in industry is astounding – and if we don’t help students acquire adequate digital skills in the classroom, we are limiting their chances in the world of work.

Technology use in the classroom supports a learning style which appeals to young minds. Many students in further education already use social media to question, challenge and enhance ideas in all aspects of their life. These tools can be harnessed to engage with pupils with learning, and brought into the learning environment.

We encourage our colleges to look at the technology they’ve bought, to assess how they’re using it and to check whether they really have the tools they need to support their teaching. One of the courses we provide for each of our career colleges is around the specific digital skills required in various industries, and more generally in the world of work. Delivered online, using Canvas, this checklist is a kick-starter for colleges to begin to support online learning and digital collaboration between students, teachers and businesses.

Teaching the teachers

It’s natural that lecturers or college management may be reticent to use technology in the classroom, if they’re not as comfortable with it as their students. To address this, we provide all of our Continuing Professional Development (CPD) courses for teachers online using Canvas.

This approach immerses teachers in a digital learning environment in a natural and low-pressure way, making them comfortable with the process and able to start seeing the benefits of using technology at work.

Training the teachers is key – and the intuitive and user-friendly nature of Canvas has made it the ideal tool to help. We’re keen to let teachers find their own way with the system – discovering how it can help in their own teaching.

Ultimately, we believe that using tools like Canvas can help teachers in all aspects of their work – allowing them to have a much greater sense of students’ progress, strengths and weaknesses. They can collaborate much more closely with their students, and tailor their teaching to individual needs.

Learn more how and why further education institutions are switching to Canvas at www.canvasvle.co.uk/fe

Ofsted watch: Two colleges improve to ‘good’ rating

Two FE colleges are celebrating Ofsted success this week after climbing from a grade 3 to a grade 2.

Burton and South Derbyshire College was ranked ‘good’ across the board after its inspection on September 26.

The report, published on October 20, commended the college for taking “extensive and effective steps” to improve provision, with the progress and achievement rates of learners increasing in a range of subjects including English and maths and a “significantly higher” proportion of learners and apprentices achieving their qualifications.

The college, which has two main campuses in Burton town centre and a dedicated construction academy in South Derbyshire, was also said to have strong employer partnerships which have helped to “reshape the curriculum”, while staff provide “highly effective additional support” for learners.

However, the report highlighted that there are not sufficient work-experience opportunities for learners with high needs at the college, and said too few apprentices achieve their English and maths qualifications within planned timescales.

It also said: “Most courses now match closely with employers’ specific skill requirements. Consequently, most learners develop their skills successfully and progress to employment or further learning.

“As a result of extensive support and development for teachers, the quality of teaching, learning and assessment has improved rapidly and is now good in most areas.”

The Marine Society College of the Sea has also moved up the rankings from a grade 3 to being a grade 2 across the board.

The historical college, which was founded in 1756 to encourage men and boys to join the Navy ahead of the Seven Years War and now operates within the Marine Society and Sea Cadets, offers personal and professional development to seafarers and opportunities to gain a range of accredited qualifications.

During the inspection on September 28, Ofsted found that leaders and managers had “a very clear and well-considered strategy to support seafarers to improve their education and to progress in their careers.”

Staff were found to have taken effective actions to improve the quality of teaching, learning, assessment and outcomes, and were commended for supporting and monitoring the progress of learners .

The report, published on October 19, also commended staff at the Lambeth –based college for understanding “the complexities of learning and working at sea and give good advice to learners to help them choose suitable courses.

“As a result, the number of learners who remain on their programme has improved and is high.

“Learners have high aspirations, enjoy their learning and take pride in their work. They produce work of a good standard.”

The college was also congratulated for a well-designed curriculum, although Ofsted mentioned concerns that not enough was known about how many learners progress to higher levels of learning and staff did not regularly fellow up on recommendations about improving feedback on work.

Employer provider Capita PLC retained its grade two ranking in an inspection report published on October 20.

Ofsted said the company, which delivers apprenticeship programmes, traineeships and pre-employment programmes nationwide, had introduced a range of new apprenticeship standards and developed partnerships with large corporate clients in financial and public services, leading to high-quality work placements.

The inspection on September 12 found the personal development, welfare and behaviour of learners was outstanding, but gave the company a grade 3 for its traineeship provision with a warning that too few trainees progress to apprenticeships, employment or further learning.

However, Capita was commended for its high quality and effective training both on and off the job, with the majority of apprentices learning the required skills and achieving their qualifications within the planned time frame.

Finally, both Trafford College in Altrincham and Steadfast Training Ltd in Spalding retained their grade 2 during short inspections.

Trafford College, inspected on September 27, was found to provide “a good standard of teaching, learning and assessment” in a “welcoming and safe environment”, with an increase in the proportion of students receiving higher grades.

However, the report, published on October 18, warned that the provision of maths and English at the college still required improvement.

Steadfast Training Ltd was inspected on September 27, with a report published on October 20. Ofsted found a focus on high-quality apprenticeships in health and social care had been maintained, with good links to local and regional businesses and good training and development for apprentices.

The report also commended Steadfast Training for supporting underperforming staff to either improve or leave the company, and said the proportion of apprenticeships receiving their qualifications had risen significantly.

It added: “Current learners are making good progress, enjoy their learning and appreciate the good support they receive from their tutors and assessors .”

GFE Colleges	Inspected	Published	Grade	Previous grade
Burton and South Derbyshire College	26-Sep-17	20-Oct-17	2	3
The Marine Society College of the Sea	28-Sep-17	19-Oct-17	2	3

Employer providers	Inspected	Published	Grade	Previous grade
Capita PLC	12-Sep-17	20-Oct-17	2	2

Short inspections (remains grade 2)	Inspected	Published
Steadfast Training Ltd	27-Sep-17	20-Oct-17
Trafford College	19-Sep-17	18-Oct-17

Healthy organisations need healthy leaders

The whole character of an institution is shaped by its leaders’ ethics, writes Dame Ruth Silver

Leadership and mental health are subjects close to my heart and involve questions of trust, openness, civic responsibility and ethical engagement in further education.

The issue is of current concern. In recent years, FE staff have been pushed towards a kind of economic instrumentalism, chivvied by an often bruising accountability system and a culture of constant reform which has seen central demands increase while budgets decline.

Across the education system, but particularly in schools, we have seen emerge a culture of high-stakes testing, punitive inspection and booming bureaucracy. The prevailing sense of uncertainty engendered by decades of reform is compounded by the recurrent need to merge and restructure, which is tough on staff and managers, and can leave a legacy of mistrust.

The result is a learning environment which is often inimical to thoughtful, ethical, human-centred leadership, where staff feel stressed, overworked and under pressure, and where learners lack agency in their learning.

The toll on the mental health of staff and students should be at the forefront of the sector’s thinking

The toll on the mental health of staff and students should be at the forefront of the sector’s thinking; they need to prevent pressures from being passed on to teachers and learners, and foster a culture where they remain focused on teaching and learning. We need to remember that education is an ethical practice, and not just an economic transaction.

The FETL-supported project, ‘Ethics and leadership in further education’, conducted by the University of Hull, has uncovered numerous examples of sector leaders striving to do the right thing. For many of the leaders interviewed, ethical leadership means understanding the teaching environment in their institutions, the needs of students and the issues faced by staff.

I think this is right, but it is also important that leaders consider their own mental health and take steps to ensure they understand what drives their own behaviour. This emerged from another FETL-funded project, carried out by specialists in organisational development, ‘Working well’. Leading can be a lonely business, and judgements about leadership can be unforgiving.

It is easy to forget that leaders are people too, subject to the same desires, drives and hopes as everyone else. Healthy organisations need healthy leaders, mindful of their role and relationships, and capable of cultivating their own inner worlds while remembering those of others.

This, to me, takes us to the heart of what makes for a healthy, flourishing place of work and learning. Staff need the chance to shape and lead their work, and learners need a sense of ownership and agency over their own learning. Understanding and having respect for the interiority of others is crucial. The faster the world around spins us, the more beholden it is to leaders to care for the relationships that comprise their institution.

It is easy to forget that leaders are people too

Ethical leadership is about listening, about loyalty to the primary tasks of teaching and learning, and about building better relationships with staff and students. That should be felt in everything that goes on in a college or training provider. The health of a workplace and the wellbeing of the people who comprise it is a whole-organisation issue, but it is leaders who set and carry the tone and it should be a consideration in everything they do. It is essential that they walk like a human, mindful of their role and relationships, attending to their own inner world and its impact on others, while remembering those of others.

Good leaders model the kind of behaviour that they would hope to see in a cooperative, trusting, democratic and humane place of work and learning, one which reflects education’s strong, formative role in creating and sustaining a fair, just and democratic society in which the health and goodness of people can manifest themselves.

Dame Ruth Silver is contributing to a webinar series on mental health in the FE workplace, organised by the Mental Health in Further Education Network and running throughout October.

Dame Ruth Silver is president of the Further Education Trust for Leadership

Whitehall can’t manage apprenticeship reforms alone

The reforms to apprenticeships have so far been demonstrably disastrous, says Simon Ashworth, who is pleading for a serious rethink

April 2019 will be seen as the Big Bang for the government’s apprenticeship reforms. This is when smaller non-levy-paying employers will join levy payers on the Apprenticeship Service (TAS), and when – in theory – providers should be free of what the ESFA itself describes as a “clunky” contracting system. We will find ourselves in a much more demand-driven market, where ultimately it will be employers rather than officials who determine which providers grow the most.

Nevertheless, if it is the government’s policy that all apprenticeships should be funded by the levy, then mechanisms may be required to control the growth in demand for apprenticeships from levels 2 to 7 from all employers under a finite budget. Of course if ministers are serious about driving social mobility and productivity, we should be talking about how much to increase the budget, not how we limit spending.

I say only that controls may be required because the first six months of the ‘little bang’ we’ve been experiencing since this May have exposed flaws in the design of the funding and standards reforms – and have led to the 61-per-cent fall in apprenticeship starts compared with a year ago. So if ministers don’t rectify those flaws quickly, constructing TAS models to control demand within a levy-funded budget will become an academic exercise.

For instance, the mandatory ESFA rule that 20 per cent of training under all apprenticeships must take place off the job is deterring private and public sector employers of all sizes, and in our view it is the employer-led trailblazers who should decide what the percentage should be for their particular sector.

Another significant barrier to engaging SMEs which has to be reviewed is the level of employer co-investment towards the cost of the training. AELP’s thinking is that a move towards a sliding scale of co-investment might work better; i.e. the higher the level of apprenticeship, the more the employer should contribute. Apprenticeships for 16- to 18-year-olds and at level two for all ages would require no employer contribution, which would be entirely in keeping the government’s social mobility agenda while also helping to meet Brexit skills challenges and improving productivity.

When you throw the industrial strategy into the mix, one has to consider whether the weighting of co-investment according to sector and the funding caps of standards should be part of TAS modelling as well. It may be that a combination of changes will result in the best approach to tackling the issue.

This is why in its pre-Budget submission, AELP has called for the government to conduct a full and open debate with interested stakeholders now on how growth should be managed under TAS. This will give stakeholders the opportunity to submit or comment on models that could achieve the right balance of budgeted provision and employer/state co-investment across employers of all sizes, different sectors, and apprentices of all ages and at all levels.

Given the chequered introduction of the apprenticeship reforms so far, and the two highly controversial tenders for non-levy provision, we believe the job can’t be left just to Whitehall, and we will be making our views known on what the optimum solution should look like.

The skills minister said at the Conservative conference that she was hearing two different stories from her officials and from employers/providers about how the reforms were progressing four months after they had started. The country certainly can’t afford for her or her successor to be hearing another different story four months after April 2019.

We have to be reaching an agreed approach well before then that makes everyone more comfortable and avoids again the recent fall in the start numbers that we and the Commons public accounts committee were predicting a year ago.

Above all, it must be an approach that better serves our young people’s future and enables more smaller businesses across the country to keep offering apprenticeship opportunities, especially in areas where there are few or no levy payers.

Simon Ashworth is chief policy officer at the Association of Employment and Learning Providers

End point assessment crisis – apprentices who can’t complete

End-point assessment has hit crisis point – as FE leaders warn that the first wave of learners are reaching the end of their courses without a final test in place.

FE Week has crunched the latest government stats and found 790 apprentices started on various standards in 2016/17 without an organisation in place to deliver final exams.

Added to those who began in 2014/15 and 2015/16, the total number of apprentices on courses with assessors is 1,460.

Sue Pember, the director of policy at Holex, labelled the situation “shameful”, and said she is aware of many learners who have been unable to complete.

“I am hearing that apprentices have actually finished their programme but have been unable to complete and qualify because there is no end test in place,” she told FE Week.

A representative for the AELP said he understood that this related to an “early-approved standard that still doesn’t have an EPA ready”.

Sallyann Baldry, from the Federation of Awarding Bodies, said another EPA organisation had been “very quickly contacted” after it was approved, as there were “learners waiting for assessment” – even though it had said in its submission it wouldn’t be ready until next April.

Read FE Week deputy editor Paul Offord’s view

As a result, the organisation in question has “had to work flat out to tool up far more quickly than it had originally planned”, and was now expecting to be ready in November.

The DfE declined to comment on the claims.

Stephen Wright, the FAB’s chief executive, told FE Week that if it were true that even one learner had reached the end of their apprenticeship without being able to sit a final exam, “the credibility of the whole apprenticeship system” would be “called into question”.

Teresa Frith, a senior policy manager at the AoC, said the “slower-than-anticipated progress” in finding EPA organisations was “equally frustrating for the learners, employers and colleges”, but suggested that “transition issues” such as these were inevitable in the move to standards.

A spokesperson for the Institute for Apprenticeships said that “99 per cent” of apprentices were covered by assessors.

“We actively monitor apprentices’ progress towards the stage of end-point assessment, and ensure there is coverage in place,” he said.

“Currently 99 per cent of all apprentices who are due to complete end-point assessment within the next 12 months are covered by an end-point assessment organisation.”

FE Week’s own analysis of the latest apprenticeship figures shows that the proportion of starts on standards without at least one organisation in place to deliver the EPA has fallen – from 10 per cent in 2015/16, to three per cent in 2016/17.

But because the overall numbers are up, so too is the number of apprentices on courses without assessors – from 450 who started in 2015/16, to 790 in 2016/17.

Just under a third of all approved apprenticeship standards – 61 out of 194 – have yet to find a single approved final assessment organisation, while a further 57 have only one.

At the opposite end of the spectrum, some of most popular standards have multiple assessment options – including 19 for the team leader standard, which had the third highest number of starts in 2016/17, at 1,910.

Mr Wright attributed the lack of EPA organisations for some standards to “several factors”.

Some are “so niche” that they are unlikely to “ever be financially viable”, he said, while others “have assessment strategies that are inappropriate or impractical”.

Levy cash must be used to widen access to apprenticeships

The AoC’s Teresa Frith believes that the chancellor should make tweaks to apprenticeship funding, rather than wholesale changes

Apprenticeships are an increasingly important part of the long-term plan for workforce development, enhanced productivity and social inclusion in England. The government’s reform programme is aimed at ensuring apprenticeships in England become more rigorous and more responsive to the needs of employers.

Every part of the system is being reformed and this creates a risk that numbers will fall. Although the levy and public sector targets have generated new interest, many large employers appear to be waiting until they are confident the new standards work. It will take some time for the full impact of the changes to be clear but no-one should underestimate the change and the potential for the overall impact of the programme to be diverted.

In its budget recommendation to the Treasury, the AoC recommends that the DfE should earmark up to 25 per cent of levy funds to ensure access, quality and progression. While any diversion of money away from apprenticeships is risky, there needs to be more investment in access, widening participation and progression, which are all crucial issues for social mobility. The government should consider likely shifts in behaviour and demand before agreeing to use it for broader training objectives with employment.

We need to recognise that we are trying to do two things with apprenticeships: increase productivity and boost social inclusion

Budgeting for apprenticeships is opaque, but should be watched closely. There will probably be an overall underspend in 2017-18, as it’s been the pattern for several years and because this is the first year of the new system. Larger levy-paying employers are likely to be cautious while smaller employers may have been put off by new co-financing requirements. Meanwhile colleges and providers have had to struggle with new procurement and allocation systems, both of which have made it harder to access funds.

New schemes typically run on a boom-then-bust cycle but there is an extra twist with apprenticeships because larger employers are likely to act towards the end of 2018, when their funds start being cancelled. Demand is likely to increase as employers and providers get to grips with the new system and the ESFA resolves its teething problems.

There should be a review of the rules that grant levy-paying employers control of 110 per cent of their funds. It gives larger employers the first call on training funds, and squeezes smaller employers into second place. These arrangements forced the ESFA to cut non-levy allocations this summer, and penalties if the agency overspends make it very difficult to manage the uncertainty.

The new system also transfers control over a large part of the training budget to large employers headquartered in the south-east. Putting employers in control of spending has many benefits but the economy and jobs are changing. Today’s employers are getting a larger share of training funds, but may be in sectors that will shrink in future.

They may perpetuate English training patterns which are currently biased towards level two skills in low-value service roles. It would make sense for the Treasury and DfE to scale the offer down to 75 per cent, to release funds that address failures in the training market. Money should be used to widen access by tackling both gender and ethnic disparities in key sectors. Funding should also support and incentivise progression to levels three and four, and to bolster training in regions or sectors where numbers are lower.

We need to recognise that we are trying to do two things with apprenticeships: increase productivity and boost social inclusion. While these objectives are not mutually exclusive, they do require separate thinking and treatment. There also must be more focus on better quality apprenticeships built around strong employer involvement and proper off-the-job training.

Furthermore, we need more apprentices at level three and above, in science, technology, engineering and maths (STEM) sectors. Getting to this point requires more stability and confidence for colleges and training organisations to encourage them to invest.

Teresa Frith is senior policy manager at the Association of Colleges

Colleges lose £1.2 million under controversial condition-of-funding rules

Four providers have been stripped of more than £100,000 due to the controversial English and maths condition-of-funding rule, although one is questioning the ruling.

The ESFA deducts funding from providers for students who do not achieve at least a grade C (now 4) in GCSE English and maths and then do not enrol in the subjects for their further education courses.

The original rule stated that any student who failed to enrol would be removed in full from funding allocations for the next-but-one academic year.

However, the condition was relaxed from 2016/17, with the penalty halved and only applied to providers at which more than five per cent of students did not meet the standard.

The DfE decided earlier this month to extend this five-per-cent tolerance indefinitely “in recognition of the continued efforts of institutions” to achieve the targets.

Lambeth College faced the highest deductions this year, losing out on £231,162 after it failed to meet funding conditions for 209 students in 2015/16.

“Problems in 2015/16 arose from higher recruitment numbers than planned and the need to recruit additional staff,” said a spokesperson for the college.

“For subsequent years, numbers have been closer to plan and therefore the same issue has not arisen.

“As in all colleges, any reduction in funding causes operational difficulties.”

Cornwall College had the second highest deduction total, with £211,946 removed from its allocation for 329 non-compliant learners.

Newcastle-based provider group NCG had the highest number of learners who did not meet the condition, and had £156,884 wiped from its funding for 463 students.

However, it has a total of 13,356 students, putting its proportion of non-compliant students at 3.5 per cent, well within the tolerance limit.

A spokesperson for NCG said it was “checking the figures” with the ESFA but are yet to receive a response.

A spokesperson for the DfE said it would be looking into NCG’s concerns.

“This is an exceptional case based on the merger of two colleges, where one of the colleges had been above the five-per-cent tolerance,” they said. “As a result of this merger, NCG has gained around £10 million in funding overall.

Manchester’s YMCA Training became the only independent learning provider in the top five biggest fines, losing out on £102,385, with 103 learners not meeting the funding conditions.

A fifth provider, Birmingham Metropolitan College, was deducted £97,522 for 456 non-compliant learners.

Analysis of latest 16-to-19 allocation data for this academic year revealed that in total, 19 general FE colleges were deducted £1,211,930 under the condition-of-funding rules.

A further 45 ILPs shared losses of £673,456, and 39 local authority providers were fined £377,498. No sixth-form colleges were penalised.

These figures are an improvement on last year, when £2,842,016 was deducted across 26 general FE colleges.

City of Liverpool College alone lost almost £500,000.

FE Week revealed a glaring flaw in the way the condition is calculated last year, which makes it impossible for any institution to achieve 100-per-cent compliance, and could even cost them funding.

If a learner drops out of a course after the qualifying period of 42 days, they are counted as “funded”, but if they record fewer days studying English and maths during the same period they count as not complying with the rule – even if their last day of attendance on each course is just a few days apart.

Last year, FE Week estimated that as many as 9,000 college learners across England could be affected by this failure in the system.

“All providers including colleges can ensure they are not having funding deducted by identifying those who don’t yet have English or maths GCSE grade four, and provide them with the opportunity to achieve this standard as part of their study programmes,” said a spokesperson for the DfE.

“Providers must ensure this is compliant with the specific condition of funding requirements set out in 16 to 19 condition of funding guidance.”

Cash-strapped college wastes £3m on development plans

A cash-strapped London college spent more than £3 million on plans to develop one of its sites that never came to fruition, FE Week has learned.

Lambeth College, which has been in such severe financial difficulties that the FE commissioner warned earlier this year it was “no longer sustainable” unless it merged, submitted detailed proposals to redevelop its Vauxhall site to Lambeth council in September 2016.

But the plans, which included a new skills centre, a hotel and flats, were pulled six months later.

A Freedom of Information request by FE Week has found the process cost the college £3.228 million.

This was spent on “project development and decant costs in connection with the development of the Vauxhall site” over 2015/16 and 2016/17.

“This is an ongoing project and is currently the subject of a revised bid to the London Economic Action Partnership,” it said, referring to the local enterprise partnership for London.

“The plans are to develop the whole site as an FE entity, with one third of the original scheme being retained and two thirds being revised to result in the expansion of FE facilities.”

But our questions on what the money was spent on were denied on the grounds that it would be “prejudicial to the financial viability of the ongoing project as a whole”.

Monica Box, the college’s interim principal, also refused to say where exactly the money had gone.

“Monies spent to date will support the ongoing proposals for the site which will produce a significantly higher degree of education and training usage,” she said.

“The change of plan was to facilitate more FE-based estate on the site.”

The Vauxhall campus was formerly home to the college’s construction and engineering courses, and is the second largest of Lambeth’s three sites, at 16,700 square metres.

According to the planning application submitted to the council, the proposal was for “demolition of existing college buildings and the erection of a mixed-use development of six buildings ranging from six to 26 storeys in height”.

These buildings included a “new college facility”, a hotel of “up to 184 bedrooms”, which was intended to be a training hotel, and up to 232 residential units.

Lambeth College said at the time that the existing college buildings – deemed to be “no longer fit for purpose” and failing to “meet employers’ needs” – would be replaced with “a groundbreaking education and training facility with a focus on construction, hospitality and science and technology”.

The scheme, which would have involved partnership with the construction firm Carillion, and Arlington Real Estate Ltd, was also set to “benefit from up to £22.25 million” in funding from the LEAP.

The existing site has been standing empty since it was closed in August 2016, and was recently targeted by flytippers, although the rubbish has now been cleared.

Lambeth, which was rated ‘requires improvement’ at its most recent Ofsted inspection, is planning to merge with London South Bank University, although proposals have yet to go out for consultation.

FE Week reported last month that plans for a “back door” takeover of the college by the university, through changes to its governance, had been delayed.

Sir David Collins, the former FE commissioner, reported on the college in March, based on a visit in September 2016, made after a “significant deterioration” in the college’s finances, caused by poor financial management.

FE Week asked LSBU if it was behind the withdrawal of the college’s redevelopment plans, but it declined to comment.

Lack of EPA is a disaster for apprentices and government

It is a disaster if even a single apprentice has reached what should be the end of their studies in this new wave of apprenticeship standards and finds there’s no end-point assessment.

It’s disastrous for the credibility of what we hope will become a universally revered form of training, and worse yet, crushing for the learner who has invested faith in their apprenticeship and been let down by the system.

The government has been warned: we reported in December that more than half of the approved standards still had no approved assessment organisation, and the clock was ticking down to the first learners’ completion date.

The former top skills civil servant Dr Sue Pember said at the time it was “morally wrong” to let learners even begin training without an approved awarding organisation in place.

She is now among the very senior sector figures who are saddened now that it looks like some learners really won’t be able to complete.

This isn’t good enough and simply wouldn’t happen with equivalent academic qualifications.

Part Time Variable Hours Tutor of Early Years

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