DIUS FE and Skills e-Newsletter

Audience: FE college principals/governors, independent providers, school sixth forms, local authorities, voluntary providers and national partners/stakeholders

Congratulations to all those who were recognised in the 2008 New Year honours for their services to further education and skills. They are:

CBE
Dr Christine Braddock - Principal, Matthew Boulton College, Birmingham
Richard Handover - Lately Chair, Adult Learning Inspectorate
Stella Mbubaegbu - Principal and Chief Executive, Highbury College, Portsmouth and Chair, Black Leadership Initiative

OBE
Roger Begy - Chair, Learning and Skills Council, Lincolnshire and Rutland
David Cragg - Regional Director, Learning and Skills Council, West Midlands
Amir Kabal JP - Member, Learning and Skills Council, National Equality and Diversity Sub-Committee
David Kendall - Principal, Derwen Independent Specialist College, Shropshire
Heather Maxwell - Principal, South Devon College
Christopher Rivington - Team Leader, Learning and Skills Council Relationship Management Team, DIUS

MBE
Robert Bright - Council Member and Director, Skillfast UK
Talat Javed - Lately Teacher of Urdu, South Birmingham College
Kenneth Melsom JP - Chair of the Corporation, Hastings College
Lt Col Martin Rose (retd) - Assistant Director for Army Development, Basic Skills Agency at NIACE
Veronica Wootten - Trustee, Birmingham Royal Institution for the Blind and Chair of Governors, Queen Alexandra College, Birmingham

And also to 3 other people in the FE system who were recognised for services in other areas:

CBE
Philip Williamson (financial services) - (Chair of Investors in people UK)
Claire Ighodaro (business) - (LSC National Council)

OBE
Daniel Carrigan (health and safety) - (formerly Member of LSC Adult Learning Committee)

For a step by step guide to making a nomination, please visit the UK Honours website.

• UK Honours

Audience: Local authorities and their partners, LSC, local partnership teams

On January 4th John Denham, Secretary of State for Innovation, Universities and Skills, announced a three month consultation focusing ESOL on community cohesion. The consultation is seeking views on how ESOL priorities could reflect indicative national priorities but with local areas taking the responsibility for targeting funding in response to local community cohesion needs.

The Government is committed to promoting community cohesion and integration and good English language skills have a vital role to play in this work.

Since 2001, spending on ESOL has trebled and over two million people have been helped to improve their language skills. Recent reforms are already ensuring that those who can afford to pay for English classes do so and are encouraging employers to take more responsibility for funding training for economic migrants in their workforces.

• ESOL consultation

Audience: : College principals, HR managers

Following extensive consultation and participation from employers, individuals, partners and stakeholders from across the FE sector, Lifelong Learning UK has published the first ever FE Workforce Strategy. The document will be launched officially at the end of January and will be a catalyst for FE workforce development over the next five years. Work has started on production of the Strategy Implementation Plan, which will be published in March. This plan will capture key commitments and activities that will be delivered to realise the ambitions of the Strategy.

The Strategy supports the further professionalisation of the FE workforce and builds on the FE reforms launched in September 2007. These require new teachers to hold Qualified Teachers Learning and Skills status; all teachers to be professionally registered with the Institute for Learning; and teachers to maintain their professional standing through undertaking a minimum of thirty hours CPD per year.

For further information about the FE Workforce Strategy and the FE Reforms visit the Lifelong Learning UK (LLUK) website www.lluk.org.uk. For more information about minimum amounts of annual CPD and professional registration with the Institute for Learning (IfL) visit the IfL website www.ifl.ac.uk.

• Lifelong learning
• Institute for learning

Audience: : FE Colleges and providers

It is full speed ahead for the LSC’s Skills Campaign as 2008 begins with the re-airing of the highly successful Skills Campaign and Train to Gain television and radio adverts designed to encourage people to invest in their skills NOW.

Since its launch in July 2007, the LSC’s Skills Campaign has been hugely effective at raising awareness of the need to up-skill before 2020 in order for our workforce and economy to stay competitive.

The Train to Gain service is just one of the many ways in which the LSC is helping employers and learners to redress the skills gap.

Apprenticeships are continuing to grow more popular with over two hundred apprenticeships available across eighty industry sectors. The 5th Annual Apprenticeship Awards was launched in December. Nominations are needed by 29th February. Be sure to get yours in quickly!

Visit the Campaign Resources Site or call the Skills Helpline on 0800 011 30 30.

• In our hands – LSC
• Train to gain
• Apprenticeship Awards
• LSC campaign resources site

Audience: Skills for life practitioners, teachers, support staff and anyone with an interest in mathematics or numeracy

Numeracy is one of our biggest challenges if we are to achieve our aim that by 2020, 95% of adults will have functional literacy and numeracy skills as a minimum. An estimated 6.8 million adults are currently below entry level three numeracy compared with 5.2 million adults below level one literacy. This is not acceptable for today's economy let alone the economy of the future and has implications for society as a whole.

Following the publication of World Class Skills DIUS has commissioned the National Centre for Excellence in the Teaching of Mathematics (NCETM) to lead on the development of a national post-16 numeracy strategy: Numeracy for Employability. The strategy will consult widely and set out what needs to be done through our partners to tackle the numeracy challenge from all angles.

The NCETM has set up a web-page to outline thinking so far and to encourage practitioners to put forward their views to help inform the development and implementation of the strategy. There is still time to contribute to the debate and anyone who would like to do so is invited to log on to the NCETM website.

• Numeracy for employability

Audience: FE college principals and senior managers, WBL Chief Execs and senior managers, Heads of service and senior managers in PCDL and OLASS

The technology exemplar network has been jointly developed by LSC and Becta in direct response to provider feedback. It aims to:

• create a prestigious and highly respected exemplar status for providers
• improve the use of learner focused technology and levels of e-maturity in the FE sector and promote effective practice
• establish a national network of peer support and build peer support skills
• have a positive impact on the quality of provision and the learner experience.

The Network is all about sharing experience and discussing the issues. A small number of providers who are advanced in their journey to e-maturity will act as ‘hosts’, working with other members. All will be expected to proactively communicate across the Network and share their aspirations, issues, learning points and areas for development.

All participating organisations will be eligible to claim grants for participation in the Network and to support their e-maturity development programmes.

• Technology exemplar network

Audience: FE college principals and senior managers, WBL Chief Execs and senior managers, Heads of service and senior managers in PCDL and OLASS

On 15 January Becta launched ‘Next Generation Learning’, a three-year national campaign to promote the benefits of technology in education and learning. Technology has revolutionised everything in the past twenty years - from online shopping to text messaging. Why shouldn’t it also make the learning experience even better?

Becta wants to enlist the support of colleges, providers and schools in the Next Generation Learning campaign, to help meet the anticipated demand for better use of technology.

The campaign, which is supported by Ministers Bill Rammell and Jim Knight, will drive up demand for the effective use of technology among learners, parents, teaching and training staff and employers over the next few years. It’s not about having more computers available, but rather about using technologies effectively and innovatively - as so many colleges, providers and schools already do - to help learners of all ages realise their potential and employers achieve their business goals.

• Next generation learning campaign

Audience: FE college principals/governors, independent providers, school sixth forms, local authorities, voluntary providers and national partners/stakeholders

DIUS is undertaking a variety of consultations on its policies and is planning a range of further consultative work over the coming months. The table below lists some of the events coming up and approximate timings for them. For further information on live consultations, please go to the consultation page on the DIUS website.

• DIUS consultations timetable

Audience: Most people working in FE, college principals, anyone with an interest in informal adult learning, voluntary and community groups, local authorities, broadcasters and media

The enormous expansion of formal education over the past ten years has in turn fuelled an even greater expansion in informal adult learning. The dramatic growth of the educated classes, and substantial increases over the years in leisure time, have combined to become key drivers of unprecedented levels of demand. This type of learning covers everything from dance to Dadaism and is flourishing in a variety of formats, from podcasting to personal tuition. There is a growing diversity of providers, across the public, private and voluntary sectors, and a range of funding sources, from the individual private pocket to different arms of Government.

We want a big national debate about the way ahead for informal adult learning. We invite all of you who have an interest in informal adult learning, in whatever capacity or setting, to take part in a consultation so that we can pave the way towards a Green Paper and a new informal adult learning movement for the 21st century.

To view, download and respond to the consultation, please visit the adult learning consultation website:

The consultation runs from 15 January to 4 April 2008.

• Adult learning consultation website

Audience: FE College principals, independent providers, school sixth forms, voluntary providers, teachers

The Prime Minister’s Global Fellowships announced last week present an invaluable opportunity for us to nurture the talent and enterprise of our young people through international exposure to different cultures and their economies.

This six week Fellowship is different from most international Fellowships schemes in that it is open to a younger age group than usual, 18 and 19 year olds, and it is looking for young enterprising individuals with initiative, not necessarily strong academic ability.

The Fellowships are designed to create a better understanding of what kinds of skills young people will need in order to contribute to and compete in the global labour market. Global British businesses will host the young people for part of their time overseas, enabling them to experience the reality of the working environment of a global company. When they return they will act as global reporters on what they have witnessed and raise awareness of the need to innovate and compete.

• Global gateway

Audience: All with an interest in skills and employment, people working in skills for life, college staff, union learning reps, employers, voluntary organisations who work with the unemployed.

Employability Skills programme was rolled out nationally by LSC and JCP from 1st August 2007 and has been developed specifically to meet the needs of Jobcentre Plus customers. It has been developed jointly between DWP, DIUS, LSC and JCP and enables customers to gain nationally approved Skills for Life and employability qualifications based on the skills, behaviours and attitudes that employers are seeking.

The programme offers a flexible package of learning to enhance individuals’ prospect for sustainable work, including progression in work thus improving life chance for individuals and their families.

Training is offered on either full-time or part-time basis depending on the outcome of the assessment and taking into account the individuals needs and preferences for learning.

The programme aims to help Jobcentre Plus customers enhance their employability skills, gain a recognised basic skills and employability qualification, secure and sustain employment and ensure that their learning journey continues once they gain employment.

• Update 23 Autumn 2007
• LSC employability skills programme

Audience: FE principals, independent providers, specialist colleges, six form colleges, voluntary providers and national partners/stakeholders

There is still time to help shape and steer the new sector owned organisation by taking part in the consultation on how improvement services should be commissioned and provided for the FE sector. The joint DIUS/CEL/QIA consultation may be accessed from the DIUS website.

Informal feedback indicates the consultation has been well received by the sector. Progress continues with an Interim Board being legally formed on Tuesday 8 January 2008. Members of the Interim Board, who have been nominated by the Single Voice and from the existing boards of the Quality Improvement Agency and Centre for Excellence in Leadership, are Nick Abercrombie, Neil Bates, Sue Dutton, Sandy Hewitt, Graham Hoyle, Ann Limb, Stella Mbubaegbu and John Taylor. Stella Mbubaegbu, Principal of Highbury College, has been elected as the Chair. The Interim Board will now be able to oversee the formation of the new organisation, taking account of the response to the consultation.

Deadline for comments is Friday 25 January 2008

• FE improvement consultation

Audience: FE college principals and training providers

Please remember to use our stakeholder groups to let us have your views on FE policy and reform. Members of the various groups will be happy to feed in your thoughts and ideas. You will find the members of the groups listed here.

• Stakeholder groups