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We welcome the announcement from the Education and Skills Funding Agency (ESFA) indicating that they have issued letters to providers affected by the ongoing Adult Education Budget tender fallout. They state their new modified run-down extension contract value and the arrangements that will apply for the period 1 November 2017 to 31 July 2018. It’s our understating that the ESFA will now bring funding up to the value of 75% of last year’s amount. Whilst not the best outcome we could have hoped for, at least it provides some level of market continuation, as well as assurance for learners that their courses will go ahead as planned.

The government has published its experimental apprenticeship service statistics to August 2017, showing apprenticeship service account registrations, and ‘commitments’ to apprenticeship starts by age, level and academic year. The data itself is striking in its insight into the new world of apprenticeships, following the launch of the Levy. It reveals that only 55% of employers have signed up to use their Levy account. This means just under half of Levy paying employers are currently writing this off as a tax, without signing up to see how much their Levy payments will get them.

NCFE partner, Learning Curve Group (LCG) raised a fantastic £9,523 for 2017 their charity of the year, Great North Air Ambulance Service (GNAAS) by hosting a Vegas-themed charity ball. Heart FM DJ, Justin Lockwood, hosted the charity ball at Hardwick Hall Hotel, Sedgefield on Friday 15 September. Over 160 guests enjoyed fabulous entertainment from glamorous dance group Encore, saxophone player Daniel Johnson, rising singing star Abi Garrido and live band Audio Cover.

The core problem with government skills policy is that it is ultimately founded on a deceit.  The claim is that employers are in the driving seat.  In practice however all it means is that government has chosen to manage a pseudo-market by manipulating employers rather than manipulating providers.  I’ve made this point before (see FE Week 22/04/14) but now some of the perverse consequences of this shift are becoming more apparent. Manipulation, or as ESFA would prefer to say ‘adjusting the incentives to employers’ is necessary because not every outcome of an unfettered market would be acceptable to government.  Since we are talking about public money (remember even the apprenticeship levy is a tax) this is right and proper.  It underlines the point however that, like bus drivers, employers may turn the wheel but they are not free to fix the destination.

As Nick Linford is right to point out in his recent blog , the non-levy tendering process has been fraught with own goals and confusion in setting out how a large amount of apprenticeship provision could be delivered. If the government is serious about its manifesto commitment to grow apprenticeships, then it’s going the right way to significantly damage the provider base that will deliver these. As the (revised) deadline for tender submissions has passed, we now enter a nervous waiting period as we see who has been successful in receiving their allocations, and indeed, if the allocations received meet the amounts tendered for.

We’re delighted to highlight the successful working relationship of Stephenson College and educational publisher and NCFE partner, Learning Curve Group (LCG). Working together, the two organisations have enjoyed a successful working relationship for over 5 years, which has had significant impact and benefits for the learners at Stephenson College. Debbie Torr, Development Manager at Stephenson College, said of the partnership: “Over the past 5 years, we’ve been able to grow and improve our offer for learners as a direct result of working alongside Learning Curve Group who provide materials to facilitate distance learning”.

Following the latest announcement from the Department for Education (DfE), we’re delighted to have strengthened our offer for schools with 19 qualifications approved in the 2019 tables. This includes the extension of our creative provision with qualifications in Craft where the flexibility of this qualification allows for the ability to cover topics such as Materials Technology, Fashion and Textiles and Food and Cookery. Alongside CACHE qualifications in Childcare and Development and new NCFE Technical Awards in Graphic Design and Interactive Media, our qualifications for schools represent a broad and comprehensive introduction to technical learning. We are responding to feedback from the DfE on the qualifications which were not successful. Although, it must be said, we have fared somewhere in the middle when comparing ourselves to the variations in success seen by other Awarding Organisations (AOs).

Today, the Association of Employers and Learning Provides (AELP) set out their recommendations for government to address as part of the apprenticeship reforms.  The 14 recommendations centre on enhancing of social mobility and broadening apprenticeships opportunities. The recommendations are timely, coming just 4 months after the implementation of the apprenticeship Levy, and after the recent iteration of the tendering process for non-levy procurement. Everyone engaged in the delivery and assessment of apprenticeships is mindful of the consequences of the ‘new world’ of levy funding.

Over the summer, the Education and Skills Funding Agency (ESFA) set out how they would fund workplace learning. In an example of how a seemingly minor piece of wording can alter delivery throughout the sector, they initially set out how they wouldn’t fund any workplace learning, relevant to a learner’s job and/or their employers business. The Funding Rules for 16/17 stated that:

Once parliament returns on 9 October, we hope to see some visible process on the Post-16 Skills Plan. What is a positive revelation, is the inclusion of independent training providers being properly referenced. The initial release of the Post-16 Skills Plan appeared to only mention college-based programmes of learning. We have since learned that this was an oversight from the Department for Education where they were making a shorthand reference to all classroom-based learning.