apprenticeship | FE Week

Recipe for confusion concern as IfA seeks up to 150 expert advisers

A call for up to 150 industry experts to join new Institute for Apprenticeships advisory panels, has prompted concerns over a lack of “joined up decisions” with similar bodies planned for technical education. Adverts seeking unpaid panel members to join 15 “prestigious employer-led groups” to help shape the future of the apprenticeship programme were posted […]

£35k-a-year private school seeks £3.50-an-hour apprentice

A private school with annual fees of £35,000 has been branded “a disgrace” by one of the UK’s largest trade unions for offering a rate of just £3.50 an hour for an apprentice to tend its grounds. Cheltenham College, an independent coeducational boarding school in Gloucestershire, advertised for an ‘apprentice groundsperson’ on the gov.uk ‘Find […]

Subsidised apprentice travel plan falls off Labour manifesto

A long-term pledge to cover the cost of apprentice travel has not made it into Labour’s final general election manifesto – despite it featuring in a leaked draft version. Last week, the draft version first leaked to our sister paper FE Week, included a commitment to paying for apprentices’ travel costs, “which currently run to […]

Making sense of the 20% off-the-job apprenticeship funding rule

One of the most important apprenticeship funding rules from May is the requirement that every apprentice “spends at least 20 per cent of their time on off-the-job training”. This simple sentence actually raises a series of questions, such as how to define “their time” and “off-the-job training”. We understand the SFA will shortly publish dedicated guidance about […]

Scotland to spend less than half their levy funding on apprenticeships

The Scottish government has announced that its use of the apprenticeships levy will be more flexible than in England, funding a “range of employment measures”. Less than half of Scotland’s estimated £221m levy funding in 2017-18 will be used for apprenticeships, with the rest to be spent on a range of workforce development and pre-employment support […]

New nursing degree apprenticeship announced by Jeremy Hunt

The launch of a new nursing degree apprenticeship has been announced by health secretary Jeremy Hunt, with the aim of opening up the profession to more people. The first apprentice nurses could be working on wards from September. It is predicted by the government that once the programme is established, up to 1,000 apprentice nurses […]