Issue 126 | March 2022

RUSSIAN INVASION OF UKRAINE: IMPLICATIONS FOR FE

• Gas supplies: Colleges with contracts for the supply of gas from the Russian firm Gazprom have been warned they could face harsh financial penalties if they sever their contracts early. Legal advice suggests that the Russian invasion of Ukraine would ‘not be a lawful reason to terminate a contract with Gazprom. Colleges with contracts for the supply of gas from Gazprom for several years ahead at a fixed price have also been warned that, in addition to the risk of financial penalties if they terminate their contracts early, entering into a new contract with another gas supplier will see them paying much higher charges due to current conditions in the energy market. Unions are calling for emergency funding to enable colleges to cancel their contracts with Gazprom, saying that they were ‘morally indefensible because every pound spent on heating classrooms could end up fuelling Putin’s war machine’.
• Ukrainian students in the UK: Under current government guidance, if a student is aged 18 or over and their course is at degree level, they are allowed to stay in the UK for up to 5 years. For courses below degree level, students can stay in the UK for two years. The Home Office has now announced that Ukrainian students will not have to return home if their visas run out. The Home Office has also announced visa concessions for the family members of Ukrainian students to come to the UK. 2020/21 data from the Higher Education Statistics Agency (HESA) shows that there were 870 Ukrainians studying in UK universities. The number of Ukrainian students in FE colleges is unknown but the Department for Education (DfE) has confirmed that colleges can use their 16-19 bursary fund and Adult Education Budget (AEB) allocations to support any Ukrainian FE students they may have who are facing financial hardship. On 1 March, the Association of Colleges (AoC) published an update for colleges providing advice on this and other relevant matters.
• Cyber-security: The Joint Information Services Committee (JISC) has warned FE colleges and universities to ensure that their defensive cyber security measures are in place and up to date because of the heightened threat of cyber-attacks emanating from groups in Russia. Amongst known Russian groups currently being monitored for cyber-attacks are Turla, Wizard Spider, Mummy Spider, TA505, LockBit and REvil. No cyber-attacks are known to have taken place yet. Colleges have been referred to JISC advice on cyber security measures and advice from the National Cyber Security Centre (NCSC). Most cyber-attacks on the education sector in the past have been ransomware attacks, with the sector being amongst the top five sectors subjected to these attacks, each one of which is estimated on average to cost the institutions affected around £620,000. JISC says that college IT systems are vulnerable not only from external cyber-attacks, but also through staff and students unwittingly introducing malware to college systems through, for example, logging on remotely from home from infected laptops or other devices, the use of infected data sticks, and the use of college email addresses or college computers for personal non-college related activity or to respond to email phishing scams. A copy of a report published last year by the NSCS on the increasing number of ransomware attacks on the UK education sector can be found here. NCSC guidance on how to mitigate the effect if a ransomware or other cyber-attack has been found to have taken place can be found here.

Colleges have also been alerted to the potential risks of using Kaspersky anti-virus software. Kaspersky is a Russian firm owned by Eugene Kaspersky, who is said to be a personal friend of President Putin and who has refused to condemn Russia’s military actions in Ukraine. It has been alleged that Kaspersky software could be capable of providing a ‘back door’ for mass cyber-attack and that Russia’s Federal Security Service (the former KGB) could be provided with real-time intelligence harvested from customers’ computers. The domain of the Russian Ministry of Defence is known to be hosted by Kaspersky’s infrastructure and the United States has now ordered that Kaspersky software be removed from all Federal computers. The UK government has not taken this step yet.

• WorldSkills: Following emergency meetings, the WorldSkills International and WorldSkills Europe boards have issued a joint statement suspending the membership of Russia and Belarus and barring them from taking part in the WorldSkills event in Shanghai this year and the EuroSkills event in 2023, which was scheduled to be held in St Petersburg, but which will now be held in Poland.
• Turing and Erasmus: The UK government has announced that all student Turing and residual Erasmus+ student placements involving Russia, Belarus and Ukraine have been suspended.

OFQUAL CONSULTS ON REGULATORY PROCESS FOR RESIDUAL LEVEL 3 QUALIFICATIONS AFTER REFORMS

In July 2021, the DfE published its plans to reform post-16 qualifications in England. This involved the removal of eligibility for public funding from Level 3 qualifications that duplicate or overlap with A-Levels and T-Levels, reflecting the government’s intention that from 2024 the three main post-16 qualification routes for those aged 16 achieving GCSE’s at Level 4 and above should be A-Levels, T-Levels or a Level 3 apprenticeship. Following consultations, the DfE is in the process of implementing this, although at present, there is no definitive list of the Level 3 qualifications that will have their funding removed. (Some limited information on this can be found in an update published by the DfE on 2 March). The DfE has accepted that some existing Level 3 qualifications (including some BTECs) will escape the cull, but Ofqual has warned that these will be subjected to more robust regulation. Ofqual is provisionally referring to these as ‘alternative’ Level 3 qualifications. Ofqual says that it has worked closely with the DfE and the Institute for Apprenticeships and Technical Education (IfATE) to help ensure that alternative Level 3 qualifications are of high quality and of relevance to employers. They fall into 3 main groups, as follows:

• Qualifications that are alternative to A-Levels (or will enhance them): These include the International Baccalaureate and courses with significant performance-based content not covered by A-levels (including some BTECs). Those deemed to enhance A-Levels include Extended Project qualifications.
• Qualifications that are alternatives to T-Levels: These include Level 3 qualifications that cover specific job skills in occupations not covered by T-Levels, or those that assess technical expertise which goes beyond standard occupational skills offered by T-Levels.
• Certain Level 3 courses that are specifically for adults will remain eligible for AEB funding.

On 2 March Ofqual launched a consultation on its proposals for regulating alternative Level 3 qualifications. In the consultation document, Ofqual says that regulation will be based on Ofqual’s General Conditions of Recognition, and the updated guidance on the ‘Approvals Process for Level 3 Academic and Technical Qualifications’, but with more demanding requirements. The consultation, which runs until 24 February, asks for views on such things as:

• The use of the terms ‘alternative academic qualification’ and ‘alternative technical qualification’.
• The use of a single grading scale for all alternative Level 3 qualifications, such as A* to E. Ofqual says that this would help ensure ‘greater commonality’ between these and other Level 3 qualifications but acknowledges that this may not be appropriate for all courses. Other options put forward by Ofqual include a small number of different grading scales but warned of the need to avoid a ‘proliferation’ of different scales for the same level qualification.
• The inclusion of alternative Level 3 qualifications in school and college performance tables.
• Rules on non-exam assessment of alternative qualifications, including how the differentiation of students’ attainment levels should be arrived. There is also a proposal that at least 40% of alternative academic qualifications should be assessed externally.

Meanwhile, the Education Secretary for England, Nadhim Zahawi, has written a letter to the Ofqual Chief Regulator, Jo Saxton, outlining the DfE’s expectations in respect of alternative Level 3 qualifications, affirming that they should be robust enough to be included in schools and college performance tables and re-affirming that courses will only receive public funding if they meet these expectations.

DFE ANNOUNCES REVIEW OF POST-16 VTQ QUALIFICATIONS AT LEVEL 2 AND BELOW

Having completed its review of post-16 Level 3 qualifications in England (see above), the DfE has now turned its attention to Level 2 and lower-level post-16 vocational and technical (VTQ) qualifications. These qualifications can provide a valuable progression route to higher level study or help prepare those taking them to enter the workplace. However, there around 8,000 qualifications available at these levels, many of which cover the same subject areas and this, says the DfE, can be confusing for individuals and employers.

In November 2020, the DfE called for evidence on which Level 2 and below VTQs were working well. Then, on 2 March this year, the DfE launched a consultation on proposals to ‘streamline’ these qualifications with the aim of ensuring that those approved for public funding were high quality and supported progression to work or further study. The DfE also says that it wants employers to be involved in determining this ‘to help deliver the skilled workforce the economy needs’. The consultation closes on 27 April.

EDUCATION SELECT COMMITTEE HOLDS FIRST SESSION OF ITS INQUIRY INTO THE FUTURE OF POST-16 QUALIFICATIONS

On 30 March, the House of Commons Education Select Committee’s held its first evidence session for its Inquiry into the future of post-16 qualifications. The inquiry considers how other Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) countries’ post-16 education systems compare to that in England, and what can be learnt from alternative approaches. Committee members will examine the government’s plans to simplify the post-16 qualifications landscape, along with the introduction of T-Levels and aspects of the Skills and Post-16 Education Bill including how well these plans will provide the skills and knowledge to prepare students for the workplace of the future. MPs will also consider the impact that removing most general applied qualifications will have on disadvantaged students and how to improve the take-up of apprenticeships, especially degree apprenticeships, amongst young people. The proceedings can be viewed on Parliament TV.

DFE CONFIRMS THAT RESULTS FROM EXAMS IN 2022 WILL BE PUBLISHED IN SCHOOL AND COLLEGE LEAGUE TABLES

The DfE has announced that GCSE, AS and A-Level exams, and VTQ exams and other external assessments will be resumed this summer. These will have appropriate adaptations to help ensure a fair comparison of student performance with the previous two years, when learning was disrupted by the pandemic. On 18 February the DfE confirmed that the 2022 results will be published in School and College Performance Tables, a decision that has been criticised because the differing impact of Covid over the last 2 years makes it impossible to objectively compare the performance of one school or college with another.

DFE PUBLISHES REGISTRATION PROCESS FOR DELIVERY OF T-LEVELS IN 2024

On 16 March, the DfE published details of the registration process for providers to deliver T-Levels from 2024 . This is the year in which T-Levels will become part of the mainstream offer for all students aged 16,17 and 18. All 16-19 providers currently funded to deliver 16-19 study programmes will be able to register to offer any, or all of the current 23 T-Level subjects across the 11 T-Level routes. Providers have until the end of July 2023 to register but have been encouraged to do so as early as possible. This, says the DfE, is because if they register by the end of July this year, they will be able to access help from DfE’s T-Level support team on such things as applying for capital funding. They may also be eligible to apply for up-front funding to assist with organising the additional delivery hours and extended industry placements required. Providers will need to list the T-Levels they plan to deliver, along with forecast student numbers.

ETON COLLEGE TO OPEN THREE ‘ELITE’ SIXTH FORM COLLEGES IN DEPRIVED AREAS

In the ‘Levelling up the United Kingdom’ White Paper published by the government on 2 February, it was announced that  55 Education Investment Areas (EIAs) would be established in localities where there is deemed to be educational underachievement. The government also announced its intention to establish a number of ‘elite’ sixth form colleges. These will be selective and will focus on getting young people from disadvantaged backgrounds into the most prestigious universities.

Eton College has announced that it has partnered with the Star Academies Trust and will bid for funds in the next free schools application round to establish three ‘elite’ sixth form colleges in Oldham, Dudley and Middlesbrough. The sixth form provision will be free of charge to students and Eton College says it will provide £1 million per year for each of the new colleges ‘in perpetuity’. This equates to around an extra £2,000 per year per student in addition to the £4,542 per year state funding available for 16-18 provision from next year. Although the new colleges will be highly selective, Eton and Star Academies say that the admissions policy will prioritise pupil premium students, looked after children, those who would be the first in their family to attend university and young people from particular disadvantaged postcodes. Eton also says that ‘EtonX Future Skills’ courses and other digital content on the ‘Eton Virtual Platform’ will be offered free of charge to all 11-16 partner schools in the towns the colleges will be located in, and will also host free residential ‘Eton Connect’ summer schools for year 10 students in those 11-16 schools.

AOC CALLS FOR GOVERNMENT TO ADDRESS STAFFING CRISIS IN ENGLAND’S FE COLLEGES

Building on an earlier report on staff vacancies in 2021/22 published in January, on 4 March, the AoC published a further report entitled ‘College Staff Challenges 2022’. The report says that the FE sector is currently facing the worst staff shortages for than 20 years and has more than 6,000 job vacancies, particularly in areas such as construction, engineering, health and social care, science and maths. Filling these vacancies, says the AoC, has been made more difficult because staff with specialist technical and real-life industry experience can earn much more in industry, Colleges are also in competition with schools, where average teachers’ salaries are now more than £9,000 higher than college lecturers’ salaries.

On 8 March, David Hughes, the Chief Executive of the AoC, wrote to Nadhim Zahawi, the Secretary of State for Education in England calling on the government for help to enable colleges pay their staff competitive salaries. The Chancellor’s Spring Statement (see below) suggests that it is unlikely this will be forthcoming. Mr Hughes’s letter points out that the recent cash injection for students aged 16-18 will not enable higher salaries to be paid because of spiralling costs, and the fact that the majority of FE students are age 19+ (the average age is 28) but funding for adult learners has not increased for 13 years. Meanwhile, the DfE has launched a national marketing campaign calling for more skilled workers to teach part-time in FE, alongside their current role. The DfE has also published a document encouraging people to apply for full-time and part-time teaching jobs in FE.

DFE SUBMITS EVIDENCE ON PROPOSALS FOR INCREASES IN TEACHERS’ PAY IN 2022 AND 2023

On 4 March, the DfE published its evidence to the School Teachers’ Review Body (STRB) for teachers’ pay increases in 2022 and 2023. The STRB is the independent body that makes recommendations on teachers’ pay. There is no comparable review body for FE lecturers’ pay. The DfE is proposing a rise of 16% in school teacher’s starting salaries over the period between 2021 and 2023. This honours the Conservative Party’s manifesto commitment to increase teacher starting salaries to £30,000. The proposed pay increases for more experienced teachers are lower, being 3% in 2022 and 2% 2023. This equates to an average pay award across all teacher grades of 4% in each year. Teacher unions say that with inflation rising rapidly, this would mean at least a 5% real-terms cut in salaries for more experienced teachers.

On 11 March, the Institute for Fiscal Studies (IfS) published a report entitled ‘The even longer squeeze on teacher pay’, which says that the DfE’s proposals would mean that between 2010 and 2023 there will have been a 14% real-terms pay cut for more experienced teachers. The report goes on to say that ‘Whilst there are clear pressures on school budgets… a higher average pay award of 5% for teachers in 2022 would be affordable given the £4 billion rise in core school funding in 2022/23’.

CHANCELLOR PRESENTS HIS SPRING STATEMENT

On 23 March, the Chancellor of the Exchequer, Rishi Sunak presented his Spring Statement to Parliament. Mr Sunak made it clear to those hoping to see further funding for public services, (including FE) to help with spiralling costs would be disappointed. In his speech, Mr Sunak referred to his new ‘Tax Plan’, and appeared to suggest that as part of a general review of taxation there would be a formal review of the apprentice levy. Many employers regard the apprenticeship levy as a tax and have long called for flexibility in the way in which funds collected through the levy can be used, for example, using levy funds to pay for other training courses, or to pay for other apprenticeship costs such as travel and wages. Mr Sunak appears to have considered this and in his speech said that the government would ‘look at how more flexible apprenticeship training models can be supported’, but both the Treasury and the DfE have asserted that the levy is not under formal review. Sector representatives have said that the government should ‘not go too far in providing employers with greater levy flexibilities’ and that ‘it is important that the levy should remain ring fenced to pay for apprenticeship training and assessment only’.

ESFA ANNOUNCES A NEW STRATEGIC DEVELOPMENT FUND ROUND

The Strategic Development Fund (SDF) pilot was introduced last April as part of the government’s Skills Accelerator Programme. The £65 million SDF pilot comes to and end at the end of March and will then be replaced by a new £85 million SDF programme. This was announced in Section 2 of the ESFA update published on 16 March. From 1 April colleges in England will be eligible to submit bids for a share of the new SDF funding, of which around £50 million will be for capital projects, with the remaining £35 million for revenue expenditure. As usual, there are a number of conditions attached. Bids must:

• Be supported by employers and based on an analysis of local skills needs, including the plans being developed by the Local Skills Improvement Plan (LSIP) trailblazers, Mayoral Combined Authority (MCAs) and/or Local Enterprise Partnerships (LEPs).
• Be submitted and led by a college judged by Ofsted as outstanding (grade 1) or good (grade 2) for overall effectiveness. Independent Training Providers (ITPs), sixth form colleges (SFCs), Institutes of Technology (IoTs) and universities can be included in SDF bids, and can receive a share of the funding, but they cannot be the lead body or submit bids in their own right.
• Include, or be ‘endorsed’ by, every other college within the geographic area of the college submitting the bid. In the SDF pilot it was left to employer representative bodies to determine what a local geographical area is, but this year the ESFA says that bids will need to align to MCA or LEP boundaries.
• Be submitted by 31 May.

The ESFA says that funding for successful bids will be confirmed by June and the funding must be spent by 31 March 31 next year.

ESFA ANNOUNCES EXTENSION OF ARRANGEMENTS FOR LEARNERS IN RECEIPT OF UNIVERSAL CREDIT

In March 2021, the amount of time people in receipt of Universal Credit were allowed to study on full-time work-related courses without losing their benefits was extended on a pilot basis from 8 weeks to 12 weeks. Then, in July 2021 it was extended to 16 weeks if the claimant attended a Skills Bootcamp. Shortly after, the 16-week entitlement was extended to all types of work-related training, and then on 16 March this year, it was announced that the current 16-week entitlement will be extended to the end of April 2023.

DFE ANNOUNCES REFRESH OF NLFE AND NLG TEAMS

On 17 March, the DfE announced that the National Leaders of Further Education (NLFE) team had been ‘refreshed’, with five new members replacing the five who will be standing down. The DfE has also refreshed its National Leaders of Governance (NLG) team, with two new members replacing those standing down. The work of the NLFE and NLG teams complement that of the FE Commissioner’s team as part of the DfE’s support and intervention regime for colleges, and they work with senior leaders and governors to provide mentoring and advice on the development and delivery of improvement plans.

DFE WITHDRAWS FROM FIVE ETF PROGRAMMES

The DfE is withdrawing grant funding for five Education and Training Foundation (ETF) programmes at the end of this month (March). These programmes are ‘Basic Skills’, ‘Essential Digital Skills’, ‘Practitioner Research’, ‘Advanced Practitioner’, and ‘Outstanding Teaching, Learning and Assessment’. The DfE has confirmed that ETF Centres of Excellence in Maths which will continue to be funded by DfE to March 2023.

DFE WITHDRAWS PUBLIC SECTOR APPRENTICESHIP TARGET

In 2017, a target was set for public sector bodies in England with 250 or more staff, for at least 2.3% of their staff to be apprentices. In the period since then, on average across all public sector bodies, this target has been consistently missed. The DfE appears to have accepted that the target will never be achieved and on 28 March announced that, from 31 March, the public sector apprenticeship target would be withdrawn. 

NEW REPORT SUGGESTS YOUNG PEOPLE RECEIVE MUCH MORE ADVICE ON UNIVERSITIES THAN APPRENTICESHIPS 

New research entitled ‘Paving the way to better careers guidance in schools’, which was published on 10 March by the Sutton Trust, suggests that students are four times more likely to get good quality careers guidance and advice about university courses than they are about apprenticeship programmes. The report, which was based on research in state secondary schools, found that only 10% of students aged 17 and 18 said that had received adequate information about apprenticeships, compared to 46% who said they had received adequate information about university routes. The report says that although there was a positive engagement with the Gatsby Foundation’s careers quality benchmarks, there were ‘major gaps and variations’ across different schools in respect of compliance with the DfE’s statutory requirements in respect of the Baker Clause and the work of the National Careers Service and Careers and Enterprise Company. The report concludes that the government ‘must urgently develop a new national strategy on careers education for all schools, especially those serving the poorest communities, which should be supported to offer the highest-quality provision’.

GOVERNMENT RESPONDS TO THE AUGAR REVIEW OF POST-18 EDUCATION AND FUNDING

The Post-18 review of Education and Funding in England was commissioned in February 2018 by Theresa May when she was Prime Minister. The review was chaired by Sir Philip Augar and the review became more widely known as the Auger Review. The review report was published on 30 May 2019 and made more than 60 recommendations. These included a lifelong learning loan allowance, the introduction of modular courses, an employer-focused suite of higher vocational and technical qualifications (HVTQs) and free intermediate education for ‘second chance’ adults delivered through a ‘strengthened FE college network’. On 21 January 2021, the DfE published an interim response  to the review. Then, on 24 February 2022, almost 3 years on from when the Augar Report was first published, the DfE published its final response. The details are covered in a speech made on 24 February at an event held at the Centre for Policy Studies, by Michelle Donelan, the Minister for Further and Higher Education in England.

Much of the thrust of the response appears to be driven by the spiralling cost to the taxpayer of HE tuition fee loans. The up-front outlay by government on loans for tuition fees and student maintenance is set to exceed £20 billion a year and, as of April 2021, the total outstanding student loan debt stood at £161 billion. To put this in perspective, said Ms Donelan, this is equivalent to ‘enough money to pay the entire English population’s annual council tax bill 5 times over’ adding that there are ‘150 countries whose entire GDP is smaller than the current student loan book’. She went on to say that without intervention, the figure is ‘estimated to reach over half a trillion pounds by April 2043’. She also said that the average loan debt among those who finished studying in 2020 was £45,000, but it was likely that more than three-quarters of these were unlikely to ever repay their loan fully, leaving the unpaid element to be covered by the taxpayer. The content of Ms Donelan’s speech included the following:

Student Loans:

• The repayment threshold (the level of salary at which graduates start repaying their student loan) for new borrowers starting courses from September 2023 will be set at £25,000 until 2026/27. (The current threshold is £27,295). From then on, the student loan repayment threshold will be indexed to Retail Price Index (RPI) inflation instead of average earnings.
• From September 2023, the student loan repayment term will be extended to 40 years. (Under the current system, loans are written off after 30 years). This change will apply retrospectively to existing borrowers, covering those starting university between 2012 and 2022. This change will leave some graduates facing the prospect of continuing to repay their loans until they are well into their 60s.
• From August 2023, the student loan interest rate for new borrowers will be set at the RPI. (The current interest rate to August 2022 is RPI+3%).
• The current tuition fee cap will be frozen at £9,250 for a further two years, up to and including 2024/25.

The DfE has announced that it intends to consult on these proposed reforms prior to implementation. An analysis of the proposals carried out by the Institute for Fiscal Studies (IFS) says that whereas only around a quarter of students are currently expected to repay their loans in full, under the new system more than 60% are expected to repay their loans. The IfS also says that the changes will benefit graduates who become high earners at the expense of graduates who remain low earners. Based on revised estimates since the original analysis was published, the IfS says that in the long run the proposed reforms are expected to save the taxpayer around £2.3 billion per cohort of university entrants.

Extra funding: Ms Donelan announced that additional funding would be made available for ‘high value, high cost’ courses deemed to be of ‘strategic significance in meeting the nation’s needs’. This includes:

• An extra £900 million in capital and revenue funding will be allocated for subjects that support the National Health Service (e.g. medicine, pharmacy, nursing, midwifery and dentistry).
• An extra £450 million in capital funding for science, technology, engineering and maths (STEM), and an extra £300 million in grant funding to support other high-cost, high-value subjects.
• ‘Further funding support’ for providers in rolling out higher vocational and technical and qualifications.

Ms Donelan went on to announce two further new consultations. These are as follows:

Higher Education Reform: The first consultation is on proposals for controls on student number and minimum eligibility requirements. The DfE’s aim appears to be preventing students who are not ready for university from attending by restricting their access to student finance. Options considered include:

• Requiring students to have a level 4 in GCSE maths and English and/or requiring students to have a minimum of two Es at A-level to be eligible to access student loan finance.
• An England-wide cap on student numbers and the prioritisation of degrees that meet ‘societal’ needs such as medicine, dentistry, nursing and midwifery, and ‘strategically important areas such as science, technology, engineering and maths (STEM) supported by increases in capital and revenue funding.
• Differentiating loan availability according to student age and type of course studied.
• Scrapping foundation year courses.

The Lifelong Learning Entitlement: The second consultation is on the government’s plans for a lifelong learning entitlement (LLE), which is a key pillar of the government’s plan to ‘level up’ further and higher education and boost education opportunities for those who didn’t go to university straight from school or college. LLEs will be available to fund the equivalent of four years of post-18 education (or £37,000 at current fee levels) to support students to study, train, retrain or upskill at any stage throughout their lives on flexible and modular courses in colleges or universities at Levels 4-6 (higher technical and degree level). The consultation sets out a ‘pathway to the lifelong loan entitlement, which the government wants established by 2025.

Augar recommendations that were not adopted: Amongst the recommendations not accepted by the DfE are:

• The re-introduction of maintenance grants for poorer students (although Ms Donelan did announce that £75 million would be provided for tuition fee scholarships for disadvantaged students).
• The reduction of tuition fees to a maximum of £7,500-a-year.
• Capping total loan repayments at 1.2 times the initial loan amount taken out.
• The scrapping of foundation year courses. These have been retained for now, pending the findings of the consultation on HE reform (see above).

Separately, in an updated consultation outcomes document entitled ‘Post-qualification admissions in higher education: proposed changes’ published on 24 February, the DfE confirmed that earlier proposals for a post-qualification HE admissions process (whereby university places are only offered after students’ A-Level and other results are known) will not now be implemented.

STRENGTHENED INTERVENTION POWERS FOR THE OFFICE FOR STUDENTS (OFS)

The DfE also wants to ensure that poor-quality, low-cost courses which lead to poor outcomes for students, aren’t incentivised to grow uncontrollably. As a result of earlier agreements between the OfS, the Quality Assurance Agency (in 2018) and Ofsted (in 2021), it was agreed that the QAA will continue to carry out Quality Review Visits of degree programmes on behalf of the OfS and that Ofsted will assume responsibility for inspecting degree apprenticeships at Level 6 and 7. Following a consultation held last year, on 2 March the OfS published the final version of the conditions required of all institutions offering HE courses in England which, from 1 May, all HE courses offered by HE institutions registered with the OfS must comply with. These are:

• Condition B1: All courses must be up-to-date, challenging and well delivered. They must equip students with the skills they will need to obtain well-paid graduate level jobs.
• Condition B2: All students should have access to the resources and support they need to succeed while on their courses and after graduation.
• Condition B4: Grade inflation will be bought under control by requiring universities and colleges to assess students effectively and award qualifications at a level that is credible.
• Condition B5: Grades awarded must reflect sector-wide recognised standards.

The OfS says it will intervene where QAA reviews, Ofsted inspections and other external evaluation processes provide evidence that these conditions are not being met. With reference to the missing Condition B3, on 21January, the OfS launched three further consultations that ran until 17 March to help inform what this should be (although at the time of writing no decision has been made). These consultations cover:

• A new approach to regulating student outcomes
• Amendments to the Teaching Excellence Framework (TEF)
• Constructing student outcome and experience indicators for use in OfS regulation

UUK PUBLISHES ‘FAIR ADMISSIONS CODE OF PRACTICE’

Universities have long been accustomed to setting their own quality standards, Even if the QAA announces a quality review visit the university concerned is given at least 10 weeks’ notice. Also, no lesson observations are carried out (although Ofsted inspections of degree apprenticeships are more rigorous). Perhaps to pre-empt the more intrusive aspects of the new powers the OfS has to intervene, on 7 March Universities UK (UUK), which represents university vice-chancellors, published its own ‘Fair Admissions Code of Practice’. UUK says that this was developed in partnership with GuildHE and that applicants who apply to a university that has signed up for the code will only admit students to courses, if by their prior achievements and potential, they are deemed capable of completing it. The code also says that universities should use reliable, valid and explainable methods in assessing students and awarding grades. Importantly, the code says that ‘conditional-unconditional’ offers should not be made (These are offers that guarantee applicants a place at a university, no matter what grades they achieve, as long as they commit to make the university their first choice.). The code also says that ‘unconditional offers’ should only be made in limited circumstances, such as when qualifications are already held by the applicant, or admissions decisions are informed by auditions or robust interviews. However, signing up to the code is voluntary, and compliance with the code is self-regulatory.

OFS LAUNCHES REVIEW OF ONLINE AND BLENDED LEARNING IN HE

On 17 March the OfS launched a review of blended learning. The review was prompted by concerns about the quality of the online learning provided for some students during the pandemic. Although students can now return to in-person teaching, many universities continue to deliver many of the elements of their courses online. The review will examine how universities are delivering blended learning and the extent to which the quality of teaching and learning meets student expectations and the OfS’s requirements.

GRADUATE UNDEREMPLOYMENT REMAINS HIGH

A report published by the OfS in May last year on research into students’ likelihood of finding professional level employment in the year after they graduate reveals significant differences in outcomes between different universities. Findings in the report say that less than half of graduates at 25 universities found professional employment. Following on from this, research compiled by Graduate Coach, (which describes itself as ‘the UK’s leading graduate coaching company’) says that despite the UK having ‘over a million job vacancies and a booming economy, ‘less than half of graduates get a graduate-level job, with the remainder being underemployed in jobs that do not require a degree’. These, say Graduate Coach, join an existing pool of underemployed graduates from previous years who are still looking for graduate employment. The research goes on to say that they are now also in competition with large numbers of international graduates who want to remain in the UK and apply for jobs and who can now apply for skilled worker visas. Graduate Coach says that the main reasons for the level of graduate underemployment remaining high include the following:

• There are too many graduates chasing too few graduate jobs. Graduate Coach estimates that there are around 2.3 million graduates searching for their first graduate level job.
• Competition is fierce with up to 80 applicants per graduate job vacancy, and up to 230 applicants for jobs advertised by the Times Top 1000 graduate employers.
• Academic success is no longer a differentiator to employers ‘who are looking for experienced graduates who can articulate their skills’.
• The content and delivery of university degree courses have remained largely unchanged despite the radical changes in the graduate job market, such as 70% of employers seeking graduates with advanced digital/technical/IT skills.
• 90% of graduates have non-vocational degrees and have faced the most difficulty in finding graduate level employment. With an overabundance of academically qualified applicants, employers are placing greater emphasis on making offers to the most ‘workplace-ready’ candidates equipped with a range of transferable skills and experiences.

Graduate Coach says its research was compiled from open source data available through the Higher Education Statistics Agency (HESA), the Chartered Institute of Personnel and Development (CIPD), Highfliers Research, the Times Top 1000 graduate employers and its own company data. Meanwhile, John Blake, the new Director for Fair Access and Participation at the OfS, has said that universities should stop using ‘deprived backgrounds’ as an excuse for students dropping out or failing to get decent jobs on graduating.

REPORT OF THE PAC INQUIRY INTO THE DWP KICKSTART SCHEME

In September 2020, the Department for Work and Pensions (DWP) introduced a £1.9 billion Kickstart scheme to create jobs for up to 250,000 young people. The jobs created last for six months, pay at least the minimum wage, and provide at least 25 hours a week of work. The scheme was introduced to help combat the expected surge in youth unemployment when the Covid furlough scheme came to an end. The scheme was implemented at speed and the early delivery was described as ‘chaotic’.

However, as a result of stronger than expected economic growth, more young people found jobs than was initially anticipated. As a result of this, the DWP is now forecasting that Kickstart will support around 170,000 fewer young people and cost £1.26 billion less than was envisaged. But many of the young people who were on Universal Credit at the start of the pandemic have remained on the benefit since and the DWP has been unable to explain why these young people have not moved into Kickstart jobs. This led to an inquiry being carried out by the House of Commons Public Accounts Committee (PAC), the report of which was published on 25 February. Amongst other things, the PAC report says:

• The DWP set up a scheme with good intentions but with no proper way of measuring its success.
• It was unclear what employers were expected to provide in return for the £1,500 employability support grants they received for each young person they took on through the scheme. It also allowed employers to spend money for placements with no method of recovery if the job did not last.
• Employers were frustrated by how hard it was to find suitable candidates for the jobs they created.
• The DWP neglected to put in place basic management systems expected for a £ multi-billion programme.
• The DWP could not explain the ‘shocking inequality’ as unemployment among young black people temporarily surged to 41.6% during the pandemic, from a pre-pandemic rate of 24%, while unemployment among young white people had increased from 10.1% to 12.4% over the same period.

DFE PUBLISHES ‘OPPORTUNITY FOR ALL’ WHITE PAPER

On 28 March, the DfE published a White Paper entitled ‘Opportunity for all: strong schools with great teachers for your child’. The White Paper includes a number of new policy proposals on the following:

• The school day: The length of the school week will be 32.5 hours for all mainstream state-funded schools. The DfE says that most schools already have a week at least this long. Those that don’t, will be required to have one.
• School discipline: All teachers in state-funded schools will be supported to develop their expertise in managing pupil behaviour and wellbeing through a fully funded National Professional Qualification in Behaviour and Culture. Heads will be supported to use the full range of powers available to them (for example, suspensions and exclusions), so they are more confident in doing so.
• Boosting attendance: Legislation will be introduced to create new statutory guidance on attendance. This will include a requirement for every school to publish a clear attendance policy.
• English and maths support: In addition to the earlier ‘Levelling Up’ White Paper target to raise English and maths attainment in primary schools, there is a new target to increase the national GCSE average grade in both English and maths from 4.5 in 2019 to 5 by 2030. Every child who falls behind in English or maths will have targeted high-quality support to help them recover and parents will be kept informed of, and encouraged to become involved in, their child’s progress.
• Reforming the SEND and children’s social care systems: To address the lower-than-average attainment of children with special educational needs or disabilities (SEND), £2.6 billion has been allocated to provide capital investment to support 34,000 additional specialist or alternative provision places, either in existing schools or in new specialist high needs schools.
• Excellent teachers: 500,000 teacher training and development opportunities will be funded across a range of Initial Teaching Training (ITT) and National Professional Qualifications in the period to 2024.
• Teacher recruitment and retention: To help attract and retain the best teachers, teacher starting salaries will rise to £30,000. Further financial incentives will be provided for experienced teachers to work in challenging schools. The DfE also claims that experienced teachers and leaders will receive their ‘highest pay rise in over 15 years’ (see section on teachers’ 2022 and 2023 pay awards above).
• Tutoring: The National Tutoring Programme will fund schools to embed tutoring in the school curriculum. A target of 6 million tutoring courses by 2024 has been set which, ‘when combined with tutoring programmes for young people aged 16-19 equates to around 100 million hours of tutoring’.

EDUCATION SELECT COMMITTEE CRITICISES THE DFE’S EDUCATION CATCH-UP PROGRAMME

On 8 March, the House of Commons Education Select Committee published a report entitled ‘Is the Catch-up Programme fit for purpose?’, which examines the effectiveness of the £5 billion spent so far on post-Covid education recovery strategies. Part of the report focuses on the £1 billion that has been spent on the National Tutoring Programme (NTP), which aims to provide many children as possible, and particularly disadvantaged children, with high-quality catch-up tutoring. Schools can bid for funding from the NTP, either to organise extra tutoring for disadvantaged pupils themselves, or to pay for tutoring agencies and academic mentors via the Dutch company Randstad, which was awarded the contract for providing these services. The report draws attention to the difficulties faced by schools in accessing Randstad’s services, which has resulted in most tutoring courses being delivered under the schools-led route, and recommends that unless Randstad’s performance improves its contract should be terminated. (On 15 March the DfE published a policy paper  and ad-hoc statistics which says that as of 27 February, 1,031,000 tutoring courses had been started, of which just over 114,000 courses had been started through Randstad).

GOVERNMENT PUBLISHES ‘INCLUSIVE BRITAIN’ STRATEGY IN RESPONSE TO SEWELL REPORT

In the wake of the Black Lives Matter protests last year, the Prime Minister, Boris Johnson, established a Commission to investigate race and ethnic disparities in the UK. The Commission included 11 members, 10 of whom were black and was chaired by Dr Tony Sewell CBE. Dr Sewell is head of ‘Generating Genius’, a charity which works to help talented students from black, Asian and minority ethnic backgrounds to enter careers in STEM areas. He also has extensive experience of working as a teacher in some of London’s most challenging schools. The Commission was asked to consider the state of race relations in the UK today, and to examine why so many disparities in areas such as health, policing and education persist. The Commission was supported by the Cabinet Office’s Race and Disparity Unit (RDU) which was set up in 2016 and which was able to provide the Commission with comprehensive race and ethnicity data. The Commission published the report of its findings in March last year, which became more broadly known as the Sewell Report and made a total of 24 recommendations government action. These include:

• Conducting research to identify why high performing pupils in some minority ethnic communities do at least as well, or substantially better, than white pupils in education and why proportionately more UK domiciled ethnic minority students attend university, in order to replicate this to help all young people.
• The phasing in of extended school days, starting with disadvantaged areas, as part of a ‘bold intervention into education’ following the impact of the Covid pandemic’.
• Better quality careers advice in schools for disadvantaged children from minority backgrounds.

The report has proved to be controversial and there has been substantial disagreement with many the report’s findings, particularly the contentions that:

• ‘Issues around race and racism are becoming less important and, in some cases, are not a significant factor in explaining disparities’.
• ‘There is a reluctance to acknowledge that the UK had become open and fairer from some groups’.
• Claims that the country is still ‘institutionally racist’ is not borne out by the evidence.
• Using phrases like ‘white privilege and white fragility are counterproductive and divisive’ and ‘fail to identify the real causes for disparities’.

Addressing calls for the curriculum, and particularly history, to be ‘decolonised’, the report says ‘neither the banning of white authors nor token expressions of black achievement will help to broaden young minds’. The report went on to say, ‘We want all children to reclaim their British heritage’ and teaching resources to be created that looks at the spectrum of influence of the UK, ‘particularly during the Empire period’. Reactions to the report have often been extreme, for example:

• Nottingham University has rescinded the honorary doctorate it awarded to Dr Sewell, although critics point out that other more questionable recipients (e.g. Liu Xiaoming, a former Chinese ambassador to the UK who dismissed Uighur re-education internment camps as ‘fake news’), have retained theirs.
• Equalities Minister Kemi Badenoch MP said that the report was ‘broader and more wide-ranging than any other review into race and ethnicity in this country’.
• Labour’s Shadow Equalities Minister, Taiwo Owatemi MP, said the report had ‘failed to deliver meaningful action, and let down ethnic minority communities’.
• The Black FE Leadership Group (BFELG) was highly critical of both the Sewell Report, and the government’s response and action plan (see below). In a statement, the BFELG amended the acronym for the Commission on Race and Ethnic Disparities (CRED) report to the ‘No-CRED’ report.

The government has been criticised for ‘unquestioningly’ accepting the Sewell Report’s findings and recommendations, but on 17 March published its response and action plan in a document entitled ‘Inclusive Britain’, which sets out its ‘long-term vision to address racial disparities in the UK’. The action plan includes 70 measures, many of which cover proposed changes to policing, health and education. These include:

• Greater scrutiny of police powers (such as stop and search) conducted at a local level.
• An automatic opt-in to legal advice if ethnic minorities find themselves in police custody.
• A new Office for Health Improvement and Disparities.
• A diverse panel of historians to develop a history curriculum that explores all of Britain’s historical past.
• New strategies to tackle low numbers of minority ethnic young people taking apprenticeships.
• Guidance for employers on how to measure and address the ethnicity pay gap.

CHILDREN’S COMMISSIONER REPORT ON PERSISTENT ABSENTEEISM RAISES SERIOUS SAFEGUARDING CONCERNS

On 9 March, the Children’s Commissioner for England, Dame Rachel de Souza published a report entitled ‘Where are England’s Children?’ on why so many children and young people have not fully returned to school or college after Covid national lockdowns. Some have not returned at all, leading to concerns that some teenagers who have disengaged from learning may have been recruited by criminal gangs. Local education authorities been unable to provide reliable data on this because they don’t actually know how many children are living in their area. They say they have to rely on ‘time-lagged’ data to make estimates which, they admit, are likely to be inaccurate because of factors such as migration and trafficking. Local authorities have also been unable to provide data on the number of children being home-schooled. Dame Rachel said that this was a cause for serious concern because there may be large numbers of children who have never interacted with the education system at all, including vulnerable children who may have gone missing from care, or trafficked into the UK, and others who local authorities have been unable to keep safe. She said that ‘urgent action was required to identify the children most at risk’ and that a ‘unique identifier’ should be used to help track children as they move through the education system.

AND FINALLY…

Two engineering apprentices had started their work placement in a local factory. They had already been subjected to ribbing from the other staff, such as being sent to the stores to fetch a ‘skyhook’, a ‘left-handed spanner’ a ‘long wait’ and a ‘bucket of sparks’. The factory manager decided that he would see the apprentices and talk to them about the more serious matter of work place health and safety. Wearing their safety helmets with fold down ear protectors, carrying their goggles and wearing their safety boots, they went to the manager’s office. They waited nervously in the anteroom and were told that the manager would see them separately. The first apprentice went in and was abruptly asked, ‘If you lost an eye in an industrial accident because you weren’t wearing your safety goggles, what would you be?’ The apprentice immediately answered, ‘Half blind’. The manager then asked, ‘What would you be if you lost both eyes?’ The apprentice replied, ‘Completely blind’. The manager said, ‘Good answers. Send your mate in’. On the way out the first apprentice passed the second and whispered, ‘I have absolutely no idea what that was about, but the answers to the questions are “half blind”, and “completely blind”’. ‘Thanks for that’ said the relieved second apprentice, ‘I’ll just give him the same answers as you then’. But this time the foreman asked, ‘If you lost an ear in an industrial accident because you had left your ear protectors up, what would you be?’ The second apprentice was flustered by this and without thinking said, ‘Half blind’. The foreman then asked, ‘What about if you lost both ears?’. The second apprentice nervously said, ‘Completely blind’. The foreman was mystified by this and asked, ‘How do you make that out?’ The second apprentice realised that that he had given the wrong answers, but quickly recovered and said, ‘Because my safety helmet would fall over my eyes’.

Alan Birks – March 2022

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