FE commissioner | FE Week

August is key merger month amid 17 partnerships for 2018

A partnership that was bitterly opposed by a local council, and the first university-college link-up in six years, are among four mergers set to go through on August 1. They are among 17 partnerships due to be formalised this year, despite Ofsted’s recent warning that bigger colleges are not always better. Financially stricken Epping Forest […]

Chair of college embroiled in bitter merger row resigns

The embattled chair of a London college that was at the centre of a bitter row with staff and local residents over its merger plans has dramatically resigned. Mary Curnock Cook (pictured above), chair of Kensington Chelsea College, was said to have walked out of a governors’ meeting last night after announcing she was stepping […]

Hull College boss: How I’m taking it out of intensive care

Hull College chief executive Michelle Swithenbank probably has the toughest job in FE right now. The former nurse has been charged with taking a college which has received the largest ever government bailout to any FE institution out of intensive care and back on the road to recovery. It’s a task that would challenge the […]

Atkins: Struggling colleges will still need stopgap funds

Colleges that get into financial difficulty will still need funding to “oil the wheels” once the bailout tap has been turned off, the FE commissioner has said in an exclusive interview with FE Week. Struggling colleges currently have access to the restructuring facility and exceptional financial support (EFS), but these will each be withdrawn later […]

FE commissioner recruiting new national leaders of governance

The FE commissioner is on the hunt for recruits to join his army of national leaders of governance. Serving governors or clerks from grade one or two colleges can apply for the role, which pays £300 a day for an estimated 50 days’ work a year. They will provide mentoring and support to governors at […]

Hull College’s vast debts exposed

An impoverished college which took a £54 million bailout did so after declaring a deficit of close to £13 million in a single year. The revelation emerged from Hull College’s long-delayed 2015/16 accounts, which were finally published this week following pressure from FE Week. There have widespread demands for greater transparency on the college’s dire […]

Commissioner credits improvements at college Ofsted branded ‘unsafe’

The FE Commissioner has recognised improvements at a financially challenged college that was recently branded grade four by Ofsted for delivering “unsafe” training. But Richard Atkins’ intervention summary report on Moulton College, still warned that the required changes in approach, culture and actions “need to be monitored in a more directed manner by leaders and […]

Principal departs cash-strapped Barnfield College

The principal of a cash-strapped college recently forced to seek government bailouts has stepped down just a month after it was placed in administered status. Tim Eyton-Jones is understood to have left his position at grade three Barnfield College after three years in charge. An official statement from the college confirming the news is expected […]

Hull College Group to shed over 200 staff

Hull College Group is preparing to shed up to 231 full-time jobs in an effort to balance its books. In a statement that appeared online yesterday, chief executive Michelle Swithenbank warned that “some difficult decisions have to be made” to regain stability amid longstanding financial troubles. The FE commissioner reported in February last year that […]