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Raising Expectations
Enabling the system to deliver
A response to the White Paper (Cm 7348) from the National Institute of Adult Continuing Education
Published: July 2008
Introduction
1. The National Institute of Adult Continuing Education (NIACE) is an independent non-governmental organisation and charity. Its corporate and individual members come from a range of places where adults learn: in further education colleges, local community settings, universities, workplaces and prisons. The ends to which NIACE activities are directed can be summarised as being to secure more, different and better opportunities for adult learners. NIACE is a leading voice in lifelong learning and represents the interests of all learners, advocating increased opportunities for adult learning and for better quality provision. It is particularly concerned to advance the interests of those who have benefited least from their initial education and training.
2. In June 2007, NIACE welcomed the reallocation of the work of the Department for Education and Skills into two new departments of state, one for Innovation, Universities and Skills (DIUS) and a second for Children Schools and Families (DCSF). The welcome was particularly warm since the first DIUS white paper (World Class Skills. Cm 7181) included a welcome focus on individuals’ ambitions and aspirations as well as employers’ skill needs. NIACE was encouraged that the change might give a stronger public policy profile for adult learning and that the price of some confusion (over responsibilities for family learning, apprenticeships and widening participation in HE) would be worth paying if the two Departments could work in partnership. However this welcome was predicated upon there being a funding system that harmonized the agendas of the two Departments – effectively ‘hiding the wiring’.
3. The publication in May 2008 of Raising Expectations: Enabling the system to deliver (Cm 7348) suggests that NIACE was too optimistic. Unless amended, we believe the paper’s proposals present a serious risk to both the breadth and depth of publicly-funded learning opportunities for adults in England.
4. In this paper NIACE sets out its concerns that proposals which may make sense for young people risk destabilising educational provision for adults. We go on however, to suggest ways in which a new system might be designed to mitigate their negative effects.
Why ‘Raising Expectations’ is bad for adult learners
5. Our main concern is that, instead of a partnership of equals between DIUS and DCSF, the Raising Expectations reforms are being dominated and driven by policy responses to the needs of young people aged 14-19. Plans to replace the Learning and Skills Council (LSC) with a Young People’s Learning Agency (YPLA) and a Skills Funding Agency (SFA) will mean greater complexity for learners and providers of learning opportunities for adults. It will also jeopardise many of the checks and balances that ensure educational policies are not developed in isolated silos.
6. Whilst recognising that it is the Prime Minister and cabinet’s prerogative to arrange the machinery of government as they see fit, NIACE fears there is not yet enough evidence of successful cross-silo working to be confident that two new agencies (and local government, too) will work together seamlessly enough for many adult learners (especially disadvantaged learners) not to become more marginalised.
7. NIACE was both surprised and shocked that Raising Expectations did not appear to assess the impact of change upon the Government’s agendas for fairness and equality.
8. Most of the content of Raising Expectations is not to do with adult learning at all yet, whether wittingly or unwittingly, it is likely to have a profound impact on lifelong learning.
9. NIACE has identified a number of risks for adult provision:
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The changes outlined in the consultation mean
that colleges of further education will be able to plan and operate in a
secure and stable environment for their younger learners (not dissimilar to
arrangements for schools and universities). With adults, however, they face an
unstable, demand-led, marketised system. Under such conditions, (and in the
light of the rapidly changing priorities of recent years) it is entirely
rational for a risk adverse college to minimise its exposure to adult learning
activities. The changes proposed simply make providing for young people a
safer bet while the market process (not least the numerous changes in adult
funding and curricula set by Government), encourages providers of all sorts to
focus on those easiest to serve. There is a real risk that provider
organisations,, seeking to create public value from learning at local level
will further concentrate on providing for learners under 19 rather than
bothering to compete for contracts for adult provision where margins are
depressed by low-overhead operators whether from the private or third sector.
NIACE believes that this could have a substantial detrimental impact upon
widening participation and improving equality and diversity in adult learning
– not least because FE colleges had, until the latest funding changes, the
proudest record of any UK educational institution in reaching and securing
under-represented groups. |
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The position of students with learning
difficulties or disabilities illustrates some of the difficulties of the
proposals: Local authorities have a responsibility for such learners until the
age of age 25 – and subregional mechanisms will allow local authorities to
place them in specialist colleges where appropriate. No such planning is to be
developed to help these learners access inclusive provision alongside other
students in a general FE college – the college’s 19+ offer will be secured at
a sub-regional level, will be demand-led and Train to Gain will dominate
demand. The transition across the pre- and post-19 boundary matters to more
groups than students with learning difficulties of course: the learning of
offenders and ex-offenders, for example, requires similarly holistic treatment
yet there is little evidence at present that consideration has been given to
how the proposed changes will impact upon other vulnerable groups. |
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Dividing the LSC also increases the danger that
decisions about capital investment will overwhelmingly be focussed upon
arrangements suitable for 14-19 year olds and that adults’ interests may
suffer without the introduction of expensive bureaucratic checks and balances.
Adult budgets will be smaller in comparison and such capital investments
underpin a great part of adult learning opportunities. Creating a new Skills
Funding Agency as a separate organisation from that for young people could
have unintended but severe consequence of reducing adult opportunities and
participation in colleges of further education, local authorities and third
sector organisations. |
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A further concern is that the key role that the
Foundation Learning Tier has for adult provision is not yet recognised within
the remit of the new Skills Funding Agency. NIACE fears that the current
overarching focus on qualification routes and employer demand will, in the
long run, inhibit the achievement of the vocational outcomes the Government
wants to put in place. By giving employers such a strong gatekeeping function
over adult funding, those learners currently outside the labour market or on
its margins will suffer most. The voice of employers is significantly
strengthened under the new arrangements whilst that of adult learners faces a
reduction. |
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Recent years have seen a massive shrinkage of
the category of work defined as ‘other further education’ yet this includes
much of the most responsive provision that has helped adults making a learning
journey from less formal learning into courses within the national
qualifications framework. Such courses include much provision (for example
foreign language learning) valued by employers. The proposed new structures
risk losing some of the flexibility and innovation that has characterised
learner-centred further education provision for adults. |
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It is not apparent that the particular circumstances facing institutions which deliver higher as well as further education (whether franchised from an HEI or as Foundation degrees) or which run access or preparatory provision for HE have been fully considered. |
10. When many of the functions of the Further Education Funding Council and Training and Enterprise Councils were reconfigured into the LSC, there was a hiatus of some three years before the new structures were ready to identify and meet the needs of marginalised minority groups of learners. Bigger issues had to be addressed first. If this pattern is not to be repeated, careful planning for the new Skills Funding Agency will be required to ensure that policy momentum is not lost. This will be a complex task – whereas the LSC had to configure itself to a national council with 47 local councils, the new SFA will need to negotiate its relationship with 150 local authorities and 26 Sector Skills Councils as well as with Regional Development Agencies, 378 colleges, Special Designated Institutions and other learning providers at the same time as it works out local regional and national arrangements.
Creating a Skills Funding Agency - making the best of a new system
11. The remit of the new SFA will be critical. NIACE believes that it is essential for the SFA to be seen to be sensitive not only to the needs of particular sectors of the economy (via SSCs) but also to individuals’ own ambitions – re-affirming the language and inclusive approach of World Class Skills and ensuring that progression routes and support are accessible to adults who want to manage their own their education (whether for vocational or other purposes) independent from their employer.
12. An important element in this would be to ensure that the SFA takes on the statutory duty of LSC to promote participation in post-compulsory learning. This is a key responsibility for effective adult engagement since for adults (whether they are employers, employers, employees or outside the labour market), motivation is a key precursor to participation.
13. It is understood that the SFA umbrella will cover:
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The National Employer Service; |
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The National Apprenticeship Service; |
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The Offenders Learning and Skills Service and |
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The Adult Advancement and Careers Service. |
NIACE believes that there is a case also for a National Learning Outreach Service (NLOS), containing the national parts of the infrastructure of informal adult learning and having a brief to secure and monitor learner participation data (in all adult learning – including sector-by-sector analysis) and promoting equality and diversity. Such an NLOS would provide a way of addressing issues of equity in terms of access, progression and achievement and offer local providers with a way of benchmarking success in their ability to reach under-represented groups of learners and a vehicle for promoting participation (see above).
14. Such a service would also have responsibility for ensuring access to educational opportunity at every level from basic education up to and including Foundation degrees and entry to HE.
15. NIACE recommends that the DIUS give consideration to establishing local and national review procedures to look at the whole education offer for adults – including first steps provision and informal learning as well as formal courses to ensure that the extent of under-representation can be identified and addressed. The current notion that the only exception to demand-led funding should be at a rarefied strategic level is unhelpful to managers of institutions and services.
16. The Adult Advancement and Careers Service has the potential to provide an inclusive mechanism for individuals to find their way into learning. Its impact will depend however on how broadly its remit is set. Although it will need to work closely with Jobcentre Plus, the service will need a distinctive, person-centred culture – closer to that of a Citizens’ Advice Bureau than a Benefits Office.
17. The development of the Foundation Learning Tier affects adults as well as 14-19 year olds and is an example of how the Raising Expectations reforms appear to have considered the needs of the young before adult learners. As proposals stand, potential adult learners who are not supported by their employers or are not in employment or on benefits appear to be marginalised unless it is assumed they will take up a Skills Account (the exact shape of which is unknown) and present themselves to providers.
18. A final precondition for success is the introduction of an element of security for providers. Here the DIUS may wish to examine the funding and procurement code agreed by the Office for the Third Sector on behalf of Government as part of the Voluntary Sector Compact. At present it seems that FE colleges could find themselves in a less secure position in terms of the security of their provision for adult learning than a voluntary organisation – and colleges are required to be massively more responsive than any school or university. Self-regulation, may help to overcome some of these difficulties – and NIACE is fully committed to supporting the Single Voice initiative but we urge that the Skills Funding Agency should be created with an built-in a formal system of ‘adult proofing’ its policies and practices.
19. These recommendations will ameliorate some, but not all of the risks the changes pose for adult learning opportunities. As the consultation highlights, the LSC has achieved a great deal and DIUS has a duty to ensure that its successes are not discarded by accident.
20. NIACE remains ready to work with the Department on any aspect of this paper or any matters affecting adult learning.
