ESOL | FE Week

How we updated ESOL learning to meet today’s global challenges

By adding UN sustainability goals and fusion skills into our curriculums, we’re preparing students to play their part in society

Is it time for England to revisit a national ESOL strategy?

Devolution and reform have brought change to ESOL provision but the emphasis now should be on building social and cultural capital rather than accreditation

AoC: Immigration charge on businesses should fund ESOL

£2.1 billion from employer tax should readdress decline in ESOL funding, new report recommends

A day in the life of an ESOL teacher

The role is about so much more than teaching the language

William Pickford, principal, Redbridge Institute of Adult Education

William Pickford has had an “eclectic” 25-year career in FE which has seen him opening a college on a faraway tropical island, overseeing another as it was evicted due to local authority financial mismanagement, and now, leading London’s only ‘outstanding’ council-run adult education service. Since 2021, he has been the principal of Redbridge Institute of […]

Focus on vocabulary, and you improve attainment across subjects

Staff can prevent ESOL learners from needing to stay an extra year if they get targeted vocabulary interventions early, writes Saqib Brook Vocabulary and attainment are tightly linked in education. We know this – the research proves it. As far back as 1995, Hart and Risley showed that the size of learner vocabulary related to […]

ESOL is chronically underfunded – this must change

It’s all very well the education secretary waxing lyrical about English as a second language, but without proper funding, migrants have no chance, writes Gordon Marsden Louise Casey wrote “English language is a common denominator and a strong enabler of integration,” in her opportunity and integration review in December 2016. Damian Hinds recently echoed her, […]

Leave ESOL to the experts

We are morally compelled as a nation to do our absolute best to help immigrants who struggle with speaking English, to integrate smoothly into our rich melting pot of a society. It’s such an important policy area, in terms of helping secure jobs and preventing significant numbers of people from feeling isolated. That’s why I […]

Education leaders call for co-ordinated national ESOL strategy

Two of the country’s most senior educators have called on the government to produce a coherent national strategy for teaching English to immigrants, and put a stop to wasteful competition between different ministries and departments. At present, responsibility for English as a second language is split between the Department for Education and the Department for […]