apprenticeships | FE Week

Ofqual boss urged to ‘fight’ for apprenticeship assessment watchdog role

“Stand up and fight” to become the apprenticeship assessment watchdog – that was the call to Ofqual’s boss from new Federation of Awarding Bodies chair Paul Eeles at conference today. The role has currently been laid at the door of the Skills Funding Agency, which has been slow to approve organisations to carry out new […]

SFA approve just 13% of apprentice assessment organisation applications

Organisations applying to the government’s new register of apprenticeship assessment organisations are being turned away because their plans for end-point assessment are not up to scratch, according to the new interim chief executive of the Institute for Apprenticeships, Peter Lauener. Mr Lauener (pictured above right), who is also chief executive of the Skills Funding Agency and Education […]

Parliamentary debate approved on ‘totally unacceptable’ apprenticeship cuts

A parliamentary debate on the drastic funding cuts to apprenticeships proposed by the government and exposed by FE Week has been approved by the Backbench Business Committee. David Lammy MP put his case for the debate to the committee on October 11, in a move that gives a significant boost to FE Week’s #SaveOurApprenticeships campaign against the cuts. He called for […]

London mayor Sadiq Khan calls for government rethink on apprenticeship funding rates

London mayor Sadiq Khan has added his voice to those calling on the government to rethink proposed apprenticeship funding rates that would see cuts of up to 50 per cent for young people in the most deprived areas. His concerns about the effect of such drastic cuts on social mobility and on young people in […]

Let’s make end-point assessment part of the solution, not the problem

While end-point assessments currently raise more questions than they answer, if well implemented, they could help build confidence in the apprenticeship system, says Terry Fennell Last month the DfE approved the 135th apprenticeship standard for mainstream delivery and by the end of 2016, over 3,000 apprentices will have started on one of these new programmes. […]

Apprenticeship standards without assessment organisations should not be approved for delivery

Dr Pember is absolutely right to be mad with the government for exposing apprentices to so much needless anxiety over unknown end point assessment organisations. And it is frankly absurd that a funding body is maintaining the list of approved awarding organisations, when we have a perfectly good watchdog that could and should do the […]

Marsden survives Labour party reshuffle

The “indefatigable” shadow minister for higher education, FE and skills has kept his post, following a Labour party reshuffle. Gordon Marsden has held onto the role since September 2015, when he moved over from the transport department, and was praised by Jeremy Corbyn during an exclusive interview with FE Week back in February. The Labour […]

No approved assessment organisation for over half of new apprenticeships

Almost 60 per cent of apprenticeship standards cleared so far by the government for learner starts don’t have an approved assessment organisation, a Skills Funding Agency update has today revealed. The online document showed there are only 63 standards with an approved AO to do the end point assessment. That’s out of 147 standards that […]

Management apprenticeships – solving the productivity puzzle

FE Week’s report on the “unstoppable rise of management apprenticeships”, should be a cause for celebration as opposed to concern. For far too long management training has been a blind spot for employers – with 71 per cent of firms admitting that they fail to offer management training to first-time managers. This is a huge […]