The long-awaited Post-16 Education and Skills White Paper, published yesterday, provides some welcome detail on the Government’s plan to ‘build a world-leading skills system which meets the needs of employers, supports innovation, research and development, and improves people’s lives’.
Skills England
The White Paper sets out what the Government envisions Skills England’s role will be in delivering this system, providing ‘the single authoritative voice on England’s current and future skills needs’. This includes better use of data to track skills shortages and closer collaboration with devolved and strategic authorities. Edge has been clear that tackling this economic threat will require Skills England to have greater influence over the skills system, including other government departments. We also welcome wider reforms to the skills system including proposals for new skills passports, and including skills investment as a condition for government procurement.
Tackling the NEET crisis
The Government is right to call for better use of data to identify, track and share data about young people, and to provide more clarity on the role of schools in keeping young people in education until 18 – approaches we have called for in our recent research with the University of Bath. It is also good to see the Government reiterate its commitment to guarantee a job or training place for every 18 to 21-year-old on long-term benefits, but the detail on this is lacking.
Apprenticeships
While there wasn’t much new information on the Government’s plans for apprenticeships, we now know that courses funded by the Growth and Skills Levy will be called ‘apprenticeship units’ and will complement existing apprenticeships. As we warned in our Flex without Compromise report, it is vital that flexibility to the levy is managed carefully to ensure that funding is only available for quality courses, and the apprenticeship budget is not squeezed further. We look forward to further detail.
V Levels
We welcome the introduction of V levels which could be a positive step towards simplifying the post-16 landscape and offering young people more flexible, high-quality routes. In particular the ability to ‘mix and match’ academic and technical qualifications is very welcome. It’s vital, however, that schools and colleges are fully supported and brought on board amid wider ongoing policy change, and that V Levels maintain strong employer relevance and are seen as equal to A Levels. In particular, the replacement of applied general qualifications needs to be carefully managed to ensure a smooth transition for providers and learners
A more integrated tertiary system
It’s good to see further detail on the Prime Minister’s announcement on closer alignment between further and higher education, in particular the proposals to map progression from Level 4 technical courses directly into university. Challenges remain in how to effectively govern a sector which is facing a scarcity of resources. Our recent report, Tertiary pathways in practice, considers whether current regulatory approaches are the most appropriate to enable the system as a whole to efficiently achieve regional and national priorities
Further Education
Among the many announcements in the White Paper to improve further education, we welcome in particular the proposal to ‘embed industry exchange into in-service professional development’ to enable FE lecturers to stay up to date on the latest industry standards. There is a lot the Government can learn here from Edge’s teacher externship programme, which paired teachers with local businesses to see how their subject is applied in the real world.
Overall, it's good to see that many of these reforms reflect Edge's advice and programmes we've supported over the years.