Tag: Gillian Keegan

The statement made by Gillian Keegan, the Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Education, in the House of Commons on 14 July 2021.

Today, I am pleased to announce the next stage of the Government’s reforms of post-16 qualifications at level 3 in England.

Reforming post-16 education and skills is at the heart of our plan to build back better and level up the country by ensuring that students everywhere have access to qualifications that will give them the skills to succeed. We have already improved the quality of level 3 study by reforming A-levels, redeveloping apprenticeship standards and introducing T-levels. This work is vital to the reforms and will create a coherent system in which all classroom based qualifications that sit alongside A-levels and T-levels are good quality.

These reforms build on the Skills for Jobs White Paper, which set out our ambition to improve the opportunities for young people and adults to progress into skilled employment by linking technical qualifications to employer-led occupational standards. These standards form the core of new T-levels and the reforms published today will ensure that this will also be the case for other technical qualifications on offer at level 3.

High-quality qualifications are essential to helping everyone, whatever their age, to get good jobs and realise their ambitions. Whether they want to go into skilled employment or into higher education (HE), achieving a level 3 qualification will be an important stepping stone. The system also needs to be adaptable, so that we train people for the jobs of the future.

We are grateful for the thoughtful contributions to our second-stage consultation on level 3 qualifications, and for the high level of interest in these important issues. Though our goal of a slimmed-down, higher-quality system remains the same, we have listened carefully to feedback on the range of qualifications that are needed. Our policy statement sets out where we see the value in qualifications that can be taken as part of mixed study programmes alongside A-levels, as well as the limited range of subjects where it is justified to take specialist alternatives, such as in performing and creative arts.

Our reforms are bold and will lead to significant change from the current system. We continue to be unapologetic about both the need and our commitment to raise standards in technical education, as we have already done for GCSEs, A-levels and apprenticeships. It is vital that in a fast moving and high-tech economy technical education closes the gap between what people study and the needs of employers. We are proposing to put many of these changes into law through the Skills and Post-16 Education Bill.

We will streamline and improve the quality of the level 3 system. We are strengthening the pathways to progression, creating clearly defined academic and technical routes with qualifications leading to academic study, and/or skilled employment. This clarity of purpose will allow students to see more easily how their study will help them to progress.

We will ensure that all qualifications sitting alongside A-levels and T-levels provide progression for learners, respond to the needs of employers and meet rigorous quality standards. Funding approval will be removed for technical qualifications overlapping with wave 1 and 2 T-levels from 2023, and with wave 3 and 4 T-levels from 2024. We have listened carefully to feedback on the pace of implementation of these reforms and will phase the introduction of reformed qualifications, starting with a digital pathfinder for introduction from 2023, scaling up in the following year and completing the reforms by 2025.

The Institute for Apprenticeships and Technical Education (the institute) and Ofqual will work to ensure that qualifications approved for funding are high-quality, meet the needs of employers, and stay up to date with our evolving economy. The Education and Skills Funding Agency will continue to have overall responsibility for funding decisions.

We also recognise that getting a quality offer at level 2 and below is key to making sure that students have clear lines of sight to level 3, apprenticeships, traineeships, and directly into employment. As a result, we want to improve study at level 2 and below alongside our reforms to level 3 qualifications. We are considering feedback to the call for evidence which ran from 10 November to 14 February and will consult on proposals for reform later this year.

The statement made by Gillian Keegan, the Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Education, in the House of Commons on 13 April 2021.

The FE capital transformation programme delivers the Government’s £1.5 billion commitment to upgrade the FE college and designated institutions’ estate in England. It builds on the £200 million further education capital allocation paid in September 2020 to support FE college and designated institutions to undertake immediate remedial works and provide a boost to the economy and the education system.

There are two elements to the FE capital transformation programme. The first element was announced on 21 January 2021, when we launched the open bidding fund to which all FE colleges and designated institutions can bid for larger projects to tackle their condition need and upgrade their estate. We are now announcing the second element today: we will be working in partnership with 16 colleges with some of the highest condition need in the country. High quality buildings and facilities will aid colleges in supporting their students to gain the skills they need to progress and help the economy to grow. The 16 college sites, which are spread across England, and with which we are working to develop plans are:

Beacon Centre, Blackburn College;

Lansdowne Site, Bournemouth and Poole College;

Brooksby Melton College, SMB Group;

Ashington Campus, Education Partnership North East (Northumberland College);

St Austell Campus, Cornwall College;

Houghall Campus, East Durham College;

Rochdale site, Hopwood Hall College;

Isle of Wight College;

Great Yarmouth Campus, East Coast College;

Stafford site, Newcastle and Stafford College Group;

North Lindsey College, DN College Group;

Merrist Wood College, Activate Learning;

Strode College;

Parsons Walk, Wigan and Leigh College;

Yeovil College;

Stanmore College.

The FE capital transformation programme means that colleges will be able to make strategic investment decisions which will lead to a transformation of the FE college estate, providing excellent places to learn.

This investment should be seen in the wider context of our reforms to further education. The White Paper “Skills for Jobs: Lifelong Learning for Opportunity and Growth” sets out our vision of enabling everyone to get the high-quality skills employers need in a way that suits them. The reforms set out plans to transform technical education, boost UK productivity, build back better from the coronavirus pandemic, and create a more prosperous country for all. This is an exciting moment for technical education and training and an opportunity for real change.

The comments made by Gillian Keegan, the Apprenticeship and Skills Minister, on 8 February 2021.

Coronavirus has had a huge impact on lives and livelihoods. As we build back better from the pandemic, we need to make sure people are able to take advantage of the opportunities apprenticeships provide.

Whether it’s the benefits to the individual – the chance to earn while you learn, opening up new career paths that can transform lives. Or the benefits to business giving access new talent from all backgrounds.

This National Apprenticeship Week we should celebrate the apprentices up and down the country who have been stepping up throughout the pandemic to support the national effort. I am calling on everyone to get involved in to raise awareness of all the fantastic opportunities that are out there and share their inspiring stories.

The text of the statement made by Gillian Keegan, the Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Education, in the House of Commons on 13 October 2020.

Today, I want to update both Houses on further policy developments we are making as part of our efforts to help boost productivity, ensure that businesses can find and hire the skilled workers they need, and help people to fulfil their potential. The impact of the current situation and the longer-term challenges we are likely to face have underlined the ever-present need to support all adults in gaining new skills that employers value, whether to progress in work or to boost their job prospects.

Last month, the Prime Minister visited Exeter College and set out an exciting vision to make lifelong learning a reality, announcing new opportunities to help more people to realise their talents, develop new skills and pursue their careers. With that broader vision in mind, wanting to reduce complexity in the adult skills landscape and recognising the need to work closely with a wide range of key stakeholders and experts, we are integrating the national retraining scheme into the national skills fund. The national retraining scheme will no longer continue as a separate programme but rather its work and learning will be rolled into the development of the national skills fund. This will be reflected in wider communications around the national skills fund and our broader offer for adult skills. It will include the conclusion of the trials of the Get Help to retrain service, a digital platform that helped adults identify their existing skills as well as new training options.

The findings we have gathered by testing Get help to retrain have already provided useful insights for the National Careers Service. This will help inform the further development of the National Careers Service website for people considering a change to their career.

The understanding and insights we achieved through high levels of research and comprehensive user engagement while developing the national retraining scheme have also produced a strong foundation for developing the national skills fund and other adult skills reforms. As both Houses know, the national skills fund is a long term, substantial investment of £2.5 billion—£3 billion included devolved Administrations—that will drive adult retraining and support our ambitious agenda for reform to further education.

Our engagement with employers on the national retraining scheme ensured we were better sighted on the skills they need their workers to have, as well as the need for a more flexible approach to the delivery of skills. Greater flexible provision was a clear need for both the employers and the individual. Both of these factors have been central to the design and delivery of the bootcamps announced in the Prime Minister’s speech, which are a key element of the national skills fund offer.

The bootcamps will support local regions and employers to fill in-demand digital vacancies. The impact of the covid crisis has shown that digital skills are in demand now more than ever, so these flexible initiatives will be instrumental in giving all adults the skills employers need. We are planning to expand the digital bootcamps ​to more of the country from spring 2021, and we also want to extend this model to include other technical skills training.

The Prime Minister also announced, as part of his lifetime skills guarantee, that for all adults who do not currently have an A-level equivalent, we will be fully funding their first full level 3, focusing on the valuable courses that will help them get ahead in the labour market.

Through our development of the national retraining scheme, we have also undertaken qualitative research into online training tailored for adults’ needs. Our findings have shown that online training has the ability to deliver learning at a time and pace that would fit in with the busy lives that users have. It could also reach the more remote areas of the country where users might struggle to access provision at a time that works best for them. This has informed the development of the skills toolkit, which has recently expanded to provide access to even more high-quality, free courses, to help all adults gain the confidence and skills they need to move into new jobs, potentially in completely new sectors of the jobs market.

We remain firmly committed to working with industry, workers, and providers. That is why we plan to engage extensively with these groups right across the country through the upcoming consultation on the national skills fund.

Our strong evidence base, delivered through the national retraining scheme, is summarised in a key findings paper that will be published today at:

https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/national-retraining-scheme. The paper sets out how the extensive learnings and evidence from the scheme will support our ambitious plans for levelling up across the country and help to ensure everyone can get the skills they need, at every stage of their life.

We will set out wider plans for adult skills later in the autumn and we will update the Houses in due course. In the meantime, we will engage closely with stakeholders as we continue to develop detailed plans for the national skills fund, including considering what role the fund could play in meeting more immediate needs in response to the covid-19 pandemic.

The comments made by Gillian Keegan, the Apprenticeships and Skills Minister, on 23 July 2020.

I’m delighted to announce the 20 applications that have been successful in securing funding from the College Collaboration Fund.

Now more than ever, it’s vital that colleges can support their students to gain the skills they need to progress and employers and our economy need to grow. This fund will help colleges work together, to develop cutting edge digital approaches to online learning, to overcome new challenges and continue to deliver high quality education and training for the communities they serve.

The past few months have been a challenging time for the sector, but they have gone above and beyond to support their students. This additional funding will help to support further collaborative work as we move forward. I look forward to hearing more about their progress and wish them all the best.

The text of the statement made by Gillian Keegan, the Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Education, in the House of Commons on 15 July 2020.

I am publishing today the report of the Independent Review of College Financial Oversight, conducted by Dame Mary Ney DBE.

At the heart of the report is recognition of the contribution of colleges to their local communities and economies—essential to meeting both the skills needs of business and enabling young people and adults to succeed and adapt to the changing economy. Colleges must be recognised as an integral part of each region’s growth strategy with a long-term role in raising productivity and living standards. They are vital to building skills to power our national economic recovery at this time.

The principal conclusion of the report, which I endorse, is that Government must have a strategic relationship with FE colleges. This means not just acting as a regulator, or intervening in the event of failure, but ensuring that every college is part of a coherent plan to meet local and regional need. There are many outstanding colleges, and exceptional college leaders, who are well placed to drive not just the success of their institutions, but wider prosperity working with local authorities, businesses, universities and schools.

The report supports a collaborative FE system. Colleges are critical infrastructure backed over time by substantial Government capital investment. There is a place for competition, but it is also important that colleges work together to meet need and learn from the exceptional practice that exists in the sector. Dame Mary’s report highlights how this collaborative approach has driven improvement through the Strategic College Improvement Fund, and National Leaders of FE—work that is now been taken forward through the new College Collaboration Fund and the expansion of the National Leader programmes. I endorse this approach.

The FE Commissioner has played a critical role in bringing FE practitioner expertise into Government and successfully working to strengthen the leadership and governance of colleges. I intend to maintain the role, reporting directly to Ministers as a public appointment, but strengthening alignment with the Education and Skills Funding Agency (ESFA), and placing its civil service support team there. This change will further empower and develop the ESFA’s territorial teams and enable them to draw upon practitioner expertise. There will be a regular strategic dialogue with each college board around priorities. This will reduce the perception that support is only available to colleges in trouble, and focus not just on prevention but on building success and outstanding practice.

The review also recommends further action to improve the effectiveness of the financial data collected from colleges. In February, the ESFA took the first step towards adopting a new integrated single data return, working closely with the Association of Colleges. We ​have also commissioned a July financial collection to assess the financial impact of covid-19 on the sector and individual colleges. This will enable us to continue to work with governing bodies to mitigate financial risks arising from covid-19, avoid failure and help reduce intervention, while remaining ready to act decisively when necessary. This will be supported through additional requirements for colleges to be transparent—including protection for whistleblowers—through our audit code of practice and grant conditions. Starting from 2020-21, they will require all colleges to publish their whistleblowing policy externally. We are also considering the link between the ESFA’s financial assessments and OFSTED judgements—in light of OFSTED’s plans to consider piloting of changes in schools. The report is also right to highlight the importance of funding simplification.

Inspirational leadership, overseen by strong governance, is the ultimate driving force in all our outstanding colleges—providing the structure and culture that supports outstanding teaching and develops exceptional teachers. We are investing in learning and development programmes for those in key governance and leadership roles in colleges through the Education and Training Foundation and Oxford SAID business school. We have allocated up to £4.5 million for the current financial year, which will include a new programme of learning and development for governance professionals. Dame Mary was right to highlight the importance of this role. We will also strengthen the governance guide for college corporations.

Fundamentally, Dame Mary Ney’s report demonstrates that Government must set out a long-term radical vision which places colleges where they belong—driving the success of regional economies and communities. This could not be more opportune. As we renew our economy and society following the historic challenge of covid-19, our young people and adults must have the skills to succeed. The steps we are already taking, particularly with the launch of the first wave of our new, high status T-levels this autumn, are a vital step. We must build on this to create a broad and bold strategy to elevate the role of further education and support our colleges in their vital and transformative mission. Our forthcoming White Paper will set out how we plan to do that.