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Manifestos - missing the point?

Blog posted: Andrew Gladstone-Heighton, Policy Leader, Tuesday 30 May 2017.

The general election has come at an interesting time.

The uncertainty of Brexit, weakened wage growth and the need to upskill our domestic skills base are just some of the challenges that we currently face as a nation. Amid all of this, education reform is once again a high profile item in the various major parties’ manifestos.

It is reassuring that all parties are looking into addressing skills gaps, through a variety of methods - something that has been revisited by various governments over the years. Our hope is that this time, the elected government will look into supporting our current skills base (still weighted heavily towards the services sector), as well as incentivising the future economy, as we look towards leaving the European Union.

Across all manifestos, we see a welcome commitment to apprenticeship uptake, in one form or another. Apprenticeships have been proven time and again to provide increased wage and productivity returns for the employers who take them on.

However, as has been outlined many times in the press, employers create apprenticeships, not governments. Therefore, perhaps a more effective strategy would be for Government to invest in businesses to provide increased opportunities to take on apprentices. Arguably the apprenticeship levy was created with this intention but in practice we can foresee this funding being used to reskill existing employers. Measuring apprenticeship starts does not take into account the longer term jobs created, or those apprentices who simply didn’t complete.

It’s also worth noting that none of the manifestos seem to address one of the key operational concerns we keep hearing about apprenticeships; the lack of qualifications or a transferrable record of skills and behaviours acquired. We are currently discussing the importance of qualifications as part of apprenticeship achievement with the Institute for Apprenticeships, and we will continue this work with whichever government is in place on 9 June.

Ultimately, a large amount of the future skills base of the economy is currently in schools settings throughout this country. We’d welcome any measures which would increase the range of options available to learners in these settings, whether that is through safeguarding and reforming the funding available for schools, widening the curriculum with teacher involvement, or providing opportunities for broader enrichment opportunities in schools.

It is this learner engagement piece that I think is missing. Too often, the learner has significant curriculum changes brought in through government reforms, with minimum measurement of impact, beyond the pupil’s immediate progression destination.

At NCFE, we call upon and look forward to working with Government after 8 June to create meaningful and fulfilling opportunities for success for learners of all ages so that they can empower themselves and enrich our society.

Join the NCFE policy team for a webinar on 1 June at 12pm discussing this topic and the upcoming general election. Sign up here.

 

Channel website: https://www.ncfe.org.uk/

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