National Overview

National Overview of the Vocational Education System in the UK

Change, Revolution or Chaos?

National Overview

What does Vocational Education mean in the UK context?

National Overview

The term “vocational education” or Vocational Education and Training (VET), or as it is also known Career and Technical Education (CTE) is that part of the system that prepares learners for jobs that are based in manual or practical activities, traditionally non-academic and totally related to a specific trade, occupation or vocation – hence the name.

In 2005 the UK Government began a radical overhaul of 14-19 education including VET and it is on this and the key role of Further Education Institutions such as Bicton College that the research has focused

The key element for the purposes of the project is the role of the new Diploma programme in defining the future

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Who will deliver the Diplomas and who are Genexis target Vocational Education and

Training providers?

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The Further Education sector (FE) carry the major responsibility for delivering Vocational Education and Training for the EK Government and Business community:

- there are 530 Further Education (FE) Colleges in the UK - there are 248, 000 secondary (13 +) teachers in the UK- the next slide shows the number of students currently engaged in Further Education and the their level of study

The challenge-Despite increases in the numbers in Further Education (slide 4) and a relatively massive investment of taxpayers’ money the UK is failing to keep pace with the competition in Europe in terms of the quantum of students engaged in skills learning at the benchmark age of 17yrs (slide 5). This is despite evidence of the link between skills and productivity and earnings (slide 6)

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4.11 Home students in further education1 in England: by level of course of study2, 2006/07

Percentages and thousands

Total FE

Courses leading to NVQ/GNVQ or equivalent academic qualifications students1

studying

Level 4, 5 in England

Level 1 and higher Other (=100%)

  and Entry Level 2 Level 3 education courses (thousands)

Region of study3

North East 22.2 33.8 33.2 7.3 3.4 119.1

North West 23.4 30.3 35.2 6.1 5.1 319.4

Yorkshire and The Humber 25.0 31.4 32.3 6.5 4.8 220.2

East Midlands 28.0 31.9 30.7 4.8 4.6 162.0

West Midlands 28.3 29.9 32.2 5.2 4.3 270.7

East 25.4 29.8 35.8 4.5 4.5 178.6

London 35.0 26.8 26.7 2.8 8.7 363.7

South East 22.9 27.7 38.3 4.7 6.4 297.4

South West 24.3 30.6 34.5 4.2 6.3 208.8

England4 26.6 29.7 33.0 4.9 5.7 2140.6             

1 Further education (FE) institutions only, relating to students on 1 November 2006. See Notes and Definitions.

2 Highest level of qualification aimed for by students.

3 English domiciled students only. Figures exclude those studying within England domiciled in Wales, Scotland, Northern Ireland, Channel Islands and the Isle of Man.

4 Includes those students whose region of domicile within England is unknown.

Source: Department for Children, Schools and Families

Released on Regional Snapshot 25 March 2009

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The link between skills and productivity and wealth

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How is Further Education Supervised and Controlled?

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> 2010: the Learning and Skills Councils (LSC) which were Government funded intermediary- 2010 > (as of June 2008!) Learning and Skills Council 2010 to be disbanded and instead local authorities ‘...responsible for offering all young people in their area a full menu of choices - both the new Diplomas and Apprenticeships alongside GCSEs and A levels’-The Learning and Skills Improvement Service (LSIS - formerly the Quality Improvement Agency and Centre for Excellence in Leadership) provides strategic and policy support-the Learning and Skills Network offers training and consultancy-- Lifelong Learning UK is the independent sector skills council responsible for the qualifications and standards for teachers working in - Colleges and FE providers are subject to regular inspections by Ofsted

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How is Further Education funded in the UK?

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- the Government fully funds Further Education Colleges from the public Exchequer- 2001 > 2010 Further Education funding in England has been managed by the Learning and Skills Council (LSC) - The LSC has a budget of some £13 billion and is organised on a regional basis through around 47 local councils - private training suppliers have played an increasing part in the strategy to develop the UK skills base and receive a mix of public i.e. LSC funding and ‘ ‘fees’ and other sponsorship as well as partnering government funded providers and initiatives

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What topics do Further Education Institutions teach?

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The core topics include: -Mathematics, IT, English, Sciences and increasingly Business Studies

A land based FE College such as Bicton teaches a range of specialist topics relating to: - Agriculture - Animal Science - Countryside Management & Arboriculture - Environment - Equine Studies- Horticulture- Outdoor Leisure- Education- Veterinary Nursing

The list and variety is limitless

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What is the student workload?

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-very hard to generalise- an engineering or information technology student might spend > 30 hours in formal learning-an agricultural student would spend proportionately > time on practical acquisition of knowledge and skills -FE colleges make increasing use of VLEs and other self-access learning to reduce staff costs > this is impacting ratio of taught to self-access study

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What is the teacher’s workload?

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•a full-time teacher works 35 hours per week • classes average 22 hours per week

NB moving into 2009 there is evidence of a significant increase in working hours/reduction in staffing as budgets are cut

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What qualifications do you need to teach FE?

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- > 2007 a relevant academic, trade or professional qualification, or experience in the subject you want to teach - The Award in Preparing to Teach in the Lifelong Learning Sector (PTLLS) is a short introductory course which you would do at the beginning of your teaching career.- further qualifications, depending on whether you are aiming to qualify as a 'full' or 'associate' teacher.- The Level 5 Diploma in Teaching in the Lifelong Learning Sector (DTLSS) is the minimum qualification you will need as a full teacher. It will also lead to QTLS status (Qualified Teacher, Learning and Skills). As a full teacher, you would have a full range of teaching responsibilities

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What is the challenge to the Government and FE and how are they responding?

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The vision statement from 2004

‘...the government's radical vision of how technology will be harnessed to revolutionise not just the education system but the very foundations of teaching and learning. Information and communications technology.....will become the "DNA or the combustion engine" of education

Compare with the post economic crash vision offered in 2008/9 (slide 13)

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A New National Improvement Strategy for the Learning and Skills Sector: post ‘the crash’

-government’ propose new model for high quality, inclusive public services (Cabinet Office paper, Excellence and Fairness June 2008)-Principle 1 ‘....the basis for teaching and learning programmes focusing on subject and vocational area and personalisation of learning; engagement with employers including ‘world class skills’ and the qualification and credit framework

- and the British Educational Communications and Technology Agency (BECTA) :

•promote a national system-wide e-strategy •encourage debate on barriers to success •explore the use of technology to narrow the achievement gap •drive forward educational reform •showcase exemplary practice •explore the next steps in taking the e-strategy forward

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....and developments in ICT?

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ICT skills: the government strategy:

‘ ....in addition to functional English and maths, the modern world and economy requires all young people to be competent in the use of ICT. ICT is part of the KS4 National Curriculum and has a statutory programme of study, reflected in GCSE ICT being taken by increasing numbers of students. GCSE ICT should be reviewed in a similar way to English and maths to identify a functional skills unit, building on the ICT Key Skills qualification and the ICT Skills for Life standards. For those not taking GCSE ICT, the functional unit should be available as a qualification in its own right and the KS4 programme of study should be reviewed to support this. Students should develop ICT skills across the curriculum.

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Investment in the infrastructure :

- every student in the UK now has access to a computer at their college

- all computers are linked via JANET, the government’s education and research network, to high speed broadband

-FE now offers students access to materials including tests and lectures as well as lecture notes via the VLE

-Innovations in interactive learning hardware

-Innovations in interactive and Elearning system

-Student accommodation now routinely offers internet access

- internet access in parental homes is now uniform

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and in the way FE structures its learning programmes:

‘….we will create a new system of Diplomas’

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The principles underpinning the Diploma:-‘….rationalise the existing very wide array of 3,500 vocational qualifications available to young people into much more easily recognisable and understandable Diplomas, containing both specialised material and (academic)…..available at levels 1 (foundation), 2 (GCSE) and 3 (advanced)’ (slide 29: example frameworks) - ‘….and maths…(ICT and English)..will be included in every Diploma’- ‘…..employers in the driving seat, so that they will have a key role in determining what the 'lines of learning' should be and in deciding in detail what the Diplomas should contain’ (slide 30: the range) -‘….HE institutions will…..have an important role’

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The Genexis opportunity?

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The overview indicates an environment redolent of opportunity for an innovative easy to learn system that allows teachers to create and embed learning that is rich, scaleable and adapted to the needs of individuals and which enables a shift of resources from non-productive to productive teaching activities

One important are opportunity: - a key problem facing the government is the high drop out levels among FE/Vocational learners (slide 30) - new Diploma introduced by the government places a high emphasis on improving the relevance and ability of FE to engage learners - appropriate methodologies for critical areas and topics has yet to be established

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The vision

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Finally: what do stakeholders think? Research indicates that Employers:-are dissatisfied with levels of skills particularly core/basis skills-feel that training is nor relevant to the workplace-The trainers and the FE sector do not take their views into account

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What do stakeholders think? Research indicates that students:-find it difficult to relate their training to the world of work-are exasperated at the lack of skills in Elearning and IT among teachers-Find elearning applications lack invention and fun compared with their everday experience

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What do stakeholders think?Research indicates that Teachers:- tend to either lack relevant skills in IT or are frustrated at the lack of opportunity to use them-find that more and more of their time is devoted to non-productive, non-teaching activities- find that government strategies too often lack relevance