What is ed lecture

Hey all! Two weeks ago we had a lecture with Nick Bennett who is the Principle of Gower College, and he talked to us about Further Education (FE) Policy in Wales. He told us a great deal of interesting facts on FE, here they are:
What's it for?

• widening access
• second chance
• cultural awareness
• civic duty
• financial support
• fulfillment of potential
• community regeneration

Support economy:

• employer engagement
• work based learning
• vocational qualifications
• knowledge exploitation
• business generation
• workforce development
• international partnership
• entrepreneurship

Together it brings: teaching and learning, equal opportunities, nnovation, welsh medium, progression, flexible, tailored and local.

College statistics:

• 2009/10 - 184,730 learners (6,866 HE, 15,790 work based learners)
• 95% from Wales
• offer 5,000 different qualifications, over 6,000 courses available in Wales, majority sit 600 courses.
• almost 2x as many 16-19 year olds in college than schools
• 68% of FE students aged over 19 / 32% under 19
• 20% of FE students full time, 80% part time
• whole FE sector receives over £350,000,000 a year from WAG
• most common courses are care/personal development e.g.: hairdressing, daycare etc and I.T.

WAG programme September 2011 (Reflects the views of the minister on education):

• improve FE and HE
• encourage further mergers and enable closer collaboration
• reform the governance of FE in Wales
• work with FE providers to establish a new strategic funding mechanism
• maintain commitment to provide financial support to lower income students
• ensure that borrowing for the cost of tuition fees for students who are Welsh remains uncharged
• establish a single strategic planning and funding body for HE
• embed the university of the head of the valleys

Improving welsh skills for employment:

• establish Jobs Growth Wales, offering training and employment
• increase apprenticeship
• introduce a successor to the skill build programme to provide routes to employment
• evaluate current post 16 basic skills activity and define policy too influence future deivery

December 2011 budget:

• raise standards of education and training provision, attainment and infrastructure across Wales
• deliver a suitably skilled workforce with high quality opportunities for all learners
• improve economic and social wellbeing and reducing inequality through education and training
• see welsh language in wales

Priorities for FE sector - from Leighton Andrews

• promote individual progression through stages of learning and into sustainable jobs
• maintain volume of learning activity at current rate
• raise standards and improve learners literacy and numeracy
• increase amount of Welsh medium / bilingual learning in support of Welsh medium education strategy (WAG)

Everything in FE sectors are under review, everything is changing e.g.: funding, courses available, fees etc. 2012 is the year of reviews (Looking at):

• national planning and funding system
• age group of 14-19 sector
• HE in FE
• Qualifications - availability, number, trusted and understood, appropriate assesments, clear progression, modules exams taken out, no more coursework, one exam at the end of 2 years.

Progression

• 1979 > 40 colleges
• 2009 > 25 colleges
• 2012 > 17 colleges
• 2020 > 10 + other configurations > merge
• 2012 > 18 FE colleges in Wales

He concluded with:

• effecient
• lacks coherance
• high quality
• lead change
• changes lives