ESFA | FE Week

Creeping complexity has reached critical levels in FE

There is a theme across four stories in FE Week today which combined might suggest there is a critical business problem with funding rules and data requirements – complexity. Let’s look at the stories in turn. 1. ESFA finds achievement rate data ‘unreliable’. Behind the scenes the ESFA audit teams continue to grapple with providers […]

It’s FE Week wot won it: 5 month mystery of missing £300k levy ‘resolved’ by ESFA

The Education and Skills Funding Agency has finally returned £300,000 to a large high-profile employer within hours of FE Week asking for an explanation. The employer, that did not wish to be named, saw the money mysteriously disappear from their apprenticeship levy pot in November without warning or reason. After reporting the missing funds to […]

Public Accounts Committee to quiz top civil servants from DfE, ESFA and IfATE

An influential House of Commons committee will grill officials on the future affordability of the apprenticeships programme on Monday. The Public Accounts Committee will hear from the Department for Education’s permanent secretary Jonathan Slater, the Education and Skills Funding Agency chief executive Eileen Milner, the agency’s director of apprenticeships Keith Smith, and the chief executive […]

Scrap funding rule that stops providers from transferring their unspent levy, says UEL

A university has called for the scrapping of an apprenticeship funding rule that stops them from using unspent levy funds to support local businesses. The University of East London delivers apprenticeships to large employers, but after missing out on a non-levy allocation they have to turn small employers away. One solution would be to share […]

The ESFA needs to talk about sex

The ESFA has multiple categories for ethnicity – why are they unwilling to add an ‘other’ box for sex, asks Steve Hewitt Last week, Education and Skills Funding Agency released the first version of the individualised learner record (ILR) data collection specification for next academic year. Without any great expectation, I looked at the definition […]

College in £37m debt given permission to carry out banned tactical subcontracting

The Department for Education appears to have given a cash-strapped college special treatment, after it endorsed subcontracting to meet short-term funding objectives. Lambeth College, which is dependent on government bailouts, “embarked on a significant programme of subcontracting” to make up for a recruitment shortfall last year, according to its recently published 2017/18 accounts. The college […]

DfE U-turns over study programme rule change

The Education and Skills Funding Agency has U-turned on plans to bar 16- to 19-year-olds who’ve passed GCSE maths and English from following level one study programmes. The announcement today comes after the agency received feedback from a “small but significant number of providers” on the rule change, originally announced last month. “We have decided […]

ESFA seeking views on ‘long-term operation’ of apprenticeship levy

The Education and Skills Funding Agency is seeking employers’ and providers’ views on the long-term operation of the apprenticeship levy, almost two years after it was introduced. Employers can now email their “thoughts and feedback” to the agency, and it will launch a short survey in the “coming weeks”, according to today’s business update. The […]

ESFA announce changes to 16 to 19 funding rules from August 2019

Study programme learners aged 16 to 19 who’ve passed GCSE English and maths are set to be barred from level one courses from next year, the Education and Skills Funding Agency has revealed. The proposed rule change, published today, prompted the Association of Colleges to warn that the government was in danger of creating the […]