Search Results for

The following 3591 results have been found to match your search query:

‘ofsted’

Highlights from Annual Apprenticeship Conference 2021

The seventh Annual Apprenticeship Conference (AAC) was like none before – literally – as we swapped the two-day in-person event at Birmingham’s ICC for a five-day virtual conference due to Covid-19. Despite putting a stop to face-to-face events, the pandemic did not falter the occasion. Across the week, the conference had over 1,500 apprenticeship employers […]

News, Supplements, Apprenticeships, Supplement

London UTC in danger of closure just three years after opening

Another university technical college looks set to close just three years after opening. Sir Simon Milton Westminster UTC, named after the former Conservative politician, announced last week it would be pausing student recruitment from the next academic year. This is while “the UTC’s future is decided”, with chair Andrew Christie saying the “difficult but pragmatic” […]

News

Northern College faces ‘perfect storm’ and shock battle to survive

An adult residential college is facing a financial crisis that threatens its survival following a funding audit and government review.  Northern College, rated grade one by Ofsted with ‘outstanding’ financial health, is locked in a legal dispute with the Education and Skills Funding Agency following claims it has made “errors” worth £1.2 million across 2018/19 […]

News

Revealed: Thousands of level 5 management apprentices dropped-out last year

Thousands of apprentices on a new level 5 management programme have already dropped out of the course, official figures have revealed. The operations or departmental manager standard had a retention rate of just 53.5 per cent last year for 4,250 “leavers”. That means 1,980 apprentices – 47 per cent – who were due to finish […]

News

Apprenticeship quality remains ‘troubling’, says Ofsted chief

Ofsted’s chief inspector has warned the quality of apprenticeship training is still “troubling”. Following the resumption of new provider monitoring visits, Amanda Spielman today told FE Week’s Annual Apprenticeship Conference inspectors had made 100 such visits since mid-March. It was “concerning,” she said, that a third of them resulted in at least one ‘insufficient progress’ […]

News

Colleges invited to bid for £65m Strategic Development Fund pilot – but must collaborate

A new fund that aims to force college collaboration has opened for bids today. Colleges can now tender to pilot the Strategic Development Fund, which was first mooted in this year’s FE white paper and backed with £65 million. It is part of the government’s newly named “Skills Accelerator” programme, which also incorporates local skills […]

News, Skills reform

Apprenticeship provider slammed as Ofsted returns to work

The first new provider monitoring visit report since Ofsted restarted the in-person inspections has found ‘insufficient’ delivery. New provider visits resumed last month after the watchdog’s normal activity was paused at the start of the Covid-19 pandemic in March 2020. The first of these reports was published last Friday and found “too many” of the […]

News

Ofsted to visit ‘sample’ of colleges where sexual abuse has been reported

Ofsted’s review of sexual abuse will see the watchdog make on-site visits to a “sample” of colleges where abuse and violence cases have been highlighted. The review itself will not report on “individual cases”, but identification of “serious and widespread” failures in safeguarding arrangements will lead to an immediate full inspection. Ofsted has published the terms […]

News

Mental Health & Wellbeing in FE

There have been countless reports and surveys in recent years which all point to one conclusion: the world is facing a mental health crisis. And this has only been exacerbated by the Covid-19 pandemic. In March 2021, a survey of 49,000 people in English-speaking countries published by the Mental Health Million Project found almost half […]

Supplements