FE Reform Taking Foster Forward

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FE ReformTaking Foster Forward
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Taking Foster Forward Next phase of FE reform

• Working towards a comprehensive, strategic
  statement in the Spring
• Purpose of presentation is to
• - indicate current thinking
• highlight some key issues
• hear your views and give you a chance to help
  shape the work
• Developments reflect emerging thinking, some of
  which is at an early stage.

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Where we are now

• Success for All
• 5-year strategy
• Skills Strategy
• 14-19 reforms
• LSCs Agenda for Change

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Where are we now - FE Achievements

• Over 100,000 more 16-18s in full-time education
  since 1997
• Since 1997 over 800,000 more students have
  undertaken courses leading to qualifications
• Over one-third of HE entrants come from FE
  colleges
• Skills for Life has helped over 1 million
  adults improve their literacy and numeracy
• Apprenticeships target met 28 of young people
  starting employers recruited 176,000 in 2004/05
• Increase in college success rates now at 72
  represents additional 700,000 qualifications
  achieved
• High learner satisfaction rates

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Where do we need to get to DfES ambition

• Five Year Strategy said

Every young person to be well-equipped for
adulthood, skilled work and further learning
At 14-19 every young person has a pathway to
suit them that fits them for work, further
learning, and for life as an adult and a wide
range of activities outside school or college to
enjoy and take part in.
Employers have right skills to support success of
their businesses, individuals have skills they
need to be employable and personally
fulfilled Adult learners can get the skills
they need for success in employment because
employers are in the lead in designing and
delivering training, working with responsive
colleges.
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These goals contribute to wider Government
objectives

• Concern that UK is failing to achieve
  international potential because of skills gaps in
  workforce
• Concern that participation rates of young people
  after age 17 fall behind global competitors
• Conviction that education and skills can improve
  everyones life chances and tackle social
  exclusion

Maximising employment and productivity for
sustainable economic growth
Increasing social mobility / reducing inequality
and deprivation

• Improving public health
• Ensuring public safety
• Building social capital

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Where do we need to go existing gaps

• Those who dont succeed by age 16 (5 good
  GCSEs) less likely to succeed thereafter
• 24th in OECD league table showing proportion
  who stay on in education at age 17
• 21st in OECD in proportion of adult workforce
  skilled to Level 2
• Millions of adults lack basic literacy and
  numeracy
• We are not closing the gap fast enough at Level
  2
• We lag behind other countries on Level 3
• Productivity is lower than major competitors
  25 lower than US
• Social mobility is low
• By 2012 some two-thirds of all jobs are expected
  to be at level 3 or above
• Leitch Report will identify skills needs of the
  economy to 2020

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Foster suggested reform in the following areas
with streamlined supporting infrastructure
data, inspection, funding, roles
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The next phase of reform

• skills for employability (driving social
  mobility)
• Need to support the core purpose by supporting
  sector/subject specialisation
• Open up market to drive up quality Train to
  Gain support to bring more providers in
• To needs of learners and employers
• Workforce and leadership strategy intervention
  to tackle failure and underperformance
• New relationship with providers, clear roles and
  responsibilities of institutions

MISSION
SPECIALISATION
CHOICE AND CONTESTABILITY
RESPONSIVENESS
QUALITY AND CAPACITY
AUTONOMY AND ACCOUNTABILITY
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Mission and Purpose

• Recognition of the wide variety of important
  work done in the sector.
• New mission for FE sector to promote economic
  prosperity through its unique contribution in
  vocational education.
• Considering ways of promoting and incentivising
  the mission
• Preparing the supply-side of the sector to meet
  future demand
• Increasing the demand for and supply of HE in FE
  to ensure more locally delivered vocational HE
  programmes.
• -Which would be the most effective ways for the
  system to prioritise this vocational mission?
• - From your perspective what would it mean in
  practice?
• - What levers would incentivise you to
  prioritise this mission?

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Specialisation

• Need to support core purpose through support for
  sector/subject specialisation
• Specialisation approach covers vocational centres
  (e.g. CoVEs/ National Skills Academies), Sixth
  Form Colleges, PCDL
• Not re -inventing the wheel, looking to build
  on CoVEs and National Skills Academies to enhance
  vocational specialisation in the system.
• - How best to build on CoVEs and National Skills
  Academies? 
• - Barriers to specialisation?
• - Levers for supporting specialisation?
•        - Incentives to encourage specialisation?

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Choice and Contestability

• Considering ways of opening up the market to new
  providers to drive up quality as recommended by
  Foster
• Exploring where more choice and diversity will
  benefit learners and employers
• Commitment to collaboration.
• What are the barriers to opening up the market
  to new providers?
• What is the local requirement from your
  perspective?

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Responsiveness to learners

• Meeting individual needs of a diverse learner
  community
• Providers more responsive to the individual needs
  of learners
• Facilitating learners influence over their
  learning environment
• Increasing learner confidence and knowledge in
  navigating and getting the best out of the
  system
• Considering mechanisms that would enhance the
  influence of learners own choices on the pattern
  of provision.
• - Suggested mechanisms for ensuring provision is
  tailored to learners and is reflected in
  performance management?
• What support do you think learners will need to
  enable them to benefit from personalisation?
• What support would providers need to deliver a
  personalised service?

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Responsiveness to employers

• Sector hasnt always got a good reputation for
  responsiveness to employer needs.
• Enable system to be more strongly influenced by
  employer choices through additional mechanisms
  which build on Skills Strategy
• Enable employers to make informed choices by
  improving access to information
• Reward excellent employer engagement through new
  measures of success and new inspection
  arrangements
• Ensure best practice extends throughout the
  system, e.g. through a new programme of employer
  engagement in HE
• - What measures would work best to achieve these
  objectives and ensure that these plans support
  personalisation across the system?

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Quality and capacity building workforce reform

• Quality has improved substantially - but from
  a low base in some cases
• Workforce Strategy outlining clear expectations,
  creating a vision of the workforce for the
  future, new measures for recruitment and
  encouraging diversity
• Consultation on CPD requirement for ongoing
  licence to practise and introduction on
  compulsory qualification for newly-appointed
  Principals
• Independent review of recruitment processes for
  Chairs of FE Colleges and national campaign to
  promote governorship.
• - How to maximise impact of workforce development
  and better teaching and learning?

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Quality and capacity building incentives
performance management

• Introduction of clearer standards and measures
• New graduated strategy to tackle poor and
  underperforming provision
• Quality assurance and quality improvement roles
  clearly separated
• Self-regulation and self-improvement where
  performance
• evidence supports
• Encourage federations as means of spreading good
  practice and supporting self improvement
• Quality improvement strategy.
• -What role can excellent providers play in
  supporting wider improvement in the sector?
• -How do we incentivise coasting providers to
  improve?
• -Could the quality assurance/quality improvement
  processes be more effective?
• -How can we build more effective self-assessment
  to underpin greater self regulation?

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Autonomy and Accountability

• Selective, proportionate intervention - a
  lighter touch for better performers and further
  development of performance measures to
  demonstrate success.
• Establish a national learning model which is
  translated into agencies, colleges and
  providers plans
• Develop a New Relationship with Providers
  approach which brings together the clarification
  of roles and mission, a streamlined LSC planning
  and funding process, and greater reliance on
  self-assessment and self-regulation
• Greater simplification of the planning, funding
  and quality landscape
• Articulate refined roles for DfES and LSC to
  lighten centralised control and minimise
  duplication.
• What more to tackle bureaucracy and regulation?
• Clarity of roles - where are areas of confusion
  and overlap?
• - What can sector do to build reputation ?

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Funding and Capital

• Establish funding mechanisms that build on Agenda
  for Change, which provide a base for 14-19
  collaboration, incentivise colleges and learning
  providers to specialise and realign mission and
  create flexibility to ensure new Government
  priorities are funded
• Incentivise the change of mission and accelerate
  movement to specialisation through aligning
  capital investment with priorities and national
  and regional capital strategies
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• How far do these proposals support the renewed
  mission?
• How to balance planning-led and consumer-led
  approach?
• What are the aspects of the funding system that
  could support greater collaboration to deliver
  the 14-19 entitlement?
• What would be the most effective way of using
  capital investment to incentivise vocational
  mission and specialisation?
• What are the barriers in the current capital
  approach?

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FE Reform next steps

• Working towards a publication in the Spring which
  addresses the whole sector
• Want to hear your views on the Foster report and
  these themes. What is the likely impact?
• Is ambition right? How best to implement?
• What are you expecting from the DfES response in
  the Spring?
• Need joint-programme to work through next phase,
  involving the whole sector, Government and LSC
• Want to encourage audience members to get
  involved in the process.

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Contact us
We have set up a central email address for any
comments/suggestions/queries fe.reform_at_dfes.
gsi.gov.uk
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FE ReformTaking Foster ForwardANNEX
Background information to accompany
presentation.
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Where are we now - 14-19

• White Paper published in February
• Functional competence in literacy and numeracy
  skills for all young people
• Stretch for most able
• New entitlement for 14-19s
• Development of 14 diploma lines, working with
  SSCs and QCA
• Develop collaboration between providers in each
  local area, based on existing good practice
• Importance of information and guidance
• Implementation plan in preparation

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Where are we now - Skills

• Skills for productivity working with
  employers on demand-led approach
• 25 Sector Skills Councils now in place
• NETP being rolled out - 399m by 2007-08 -
  including Level 3 pilots in 2 regions
• Link to reformed business support service and
  regional development
• Level 2 entitlement being introduced
• Support for learners - IAG and welfare to
  workforce development
• Developing flexible, unit/credit based
  qualifications framework

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Where are we now - Success for All

• Programme launched 2002
• Success rates in colleges up from 59 to 72
• Success rates in wbl up from 36 to 46
• Inspection rate over 90 of curriculum areas
  in colleges satisfactory or better 2001-2005
• In 2004-2005 75 of wbl satisfactory or better,
  up from 58 in 2001-02
• 8 teaching and learning frameworks, supporting
  2.2m learners, 105,000 teachers, 3000
  colleges/providers
• Reform of initial teaching training, leadership
  (7,800 participants through CEL) and LLUK
  reviewing professional standards
• Streamlining of quality assurance, with new
  Quality Improvement Agency on track for launch in
  April 2006

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Where are we now - budget

• 2006-07 and 2007-08 settlement announced 31
  October
• - Since 1997 real Government funding up 50
• - Between 2004-05 and 2007-08 funding up 1.5
  billion
• - Additional capital of 350m by 2009-10
• But also tough decisions
• Priorities 16-19, apprenticeships, Skills for
  Life, Level 2, NETP reductions in other adult
• Increases in fees as part of who pays for
  what, moving towards 50 and stronger employer
  engagement
• First step in converging school/college funding
  rates
• Safeguard for personal and community
  development learning
• Agenda for Change proposals on future funding
  method

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Performance of the education system
0-11
11-19
Workforce
HE
Age stage
OECD ranking
2-6
2
3
4
7
Research output and impact

• Proportion of 4 year-olds enrolled in education

10 year old reading and literacy
18
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Survival rate on academic courses
15 year old mathematics and literacy
Post-16 participation rate
Proportion of workforce with skills above Level 2
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Global change brings risks and opportunities
Evolving Shares of Global Output (PPP)
2015
1980
Opportunities Lower cost for UK consumers and
producers and new market opportunities and
profits

• Challenges
• Low skill tradable sectors move to emerging
  economies
• and
• developing countries can match us in high-skill
  markets

Source Source IMF, Consensus Forecasts, HM
Treasury
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Projected changes in occupational structure
between now and 2012
13500
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Population with at least upper secondary
education, 2003
Source OECD, Education at a glance 2005