ITPs | FE Week

Chris Claydon, CEO, JTL

Chris Claydon has a biography better suited to James Bond than to the chief executive of a training provider for building service engineers. He has flown Apache military helicopters, briefed cabinet ministers on evacuations from the Arab Spring uprisings, and helped save lives by designing countermeasures to the roadside bombs used in Afghanistan. Oh, and […]

Brenda McLeish, chief executive, Learning Curve Group

From PA to chief executive, Brenda McLeish has risen through the ranks to run one of the country’s largest and most successful training companies, grabbing numerous awards and accolades in the process. Trading conditions in the training sector are tougher than ever, but that won’t stop the ‘purple people’ from going for growth, she tells […]

As a boss of an independent apprenticeship provider, my hands are tied

FE colleges have access to capital and bailout funding, but independent providers are largely ignored, writes Iain Elliott At HETA and GTA England we don’t do politics, just training. But we do welcome MPs of all political persuasions to visit, because it helps us inform the skills and training debate and raise awareness of what […]

The new prime providers who struck gold in the first AEB tender

There were many winners to emerge from the AEB procurement, including two new prime providers which each received more than £1 million. Top of the list of first-time primes is London-based Free to Learn, which has £2 million for November to July next year. Its chief commercial officer was bullish about the company’s ability to […]

Glacial progress exposed for colleges’ apprentice delivery

Colleges deliver just one in five apprenticeships last year, meaning virtually no progress has been made in the 18 months since they were told to get more involved by the minister at the time. This figure, based on FE Week analysis of data obtained by the Association of Employment and Learning Providers through a freedom […]

How does the directory of apprenticeship training providers work?

Last month, the government launched its directory of apprenticeship training providers, part of the raft of reforms coming in time for the introduction of the levy in May. Despite being lumbered with a seriously unsexy name, ‘Find Apprenticeship Training’ has been bigged up as the one-stop shop for any employer, large or small, which finds […]

Employers more satisfied with private training providers than colleges

Private training providers will be patting themselves on the back this week, following Skills Funding Agency research that revealed they are significantly more popular with employers than general FE colleges. Training providers scored a massive 83.9 per cent for employer satisfaction according to the results of the latest SFA employer satisfaction survey, while colleges’ rating […]