Agenda item

Strategic Priorities for 16 - 19 (25) Education and Training for 2015/16 - Action Plan

(To receive a report which provides the Committee with an opportunity to consider the proposed action plan for post 16 education and training, as requested by the Children and Young People Scrutiny Committee at its meeting in October 2014)

Minutes:

Consideration was given to a report in relation to the Strategic Priorities for 16 – 19 (25) Education and Training for 2015/16.  It was reported that the strategic priorities for post 16 education and training for the academic year 2015/16 were approved by the Council Executive in November 2014 following the consideration and recommendation of the Children and Young People Scrutiny Committee (CYPSC) in October 2014.  The CYPSC requested that an action plan be put in place, and this was presented to the Committee for consideration.

 

Members were guided through the report and some of the points highlighted included the following:

·         To establish Lincolnshire County Council as an exemplar employer in terms of providing increasing numbers of opportunities for young people including: employment, work experience, apprenticeships, traineeships, and supported internships;

·         Explore the potential benefits to develop and implement higher and degree level apprenticeships to meet developing skills shortages and recruitment and retention issues for particular roles within the Council and its strategic partners including: registered social workers and qualified teachers and nurses;

·         To identify and use opportunities to influence key stakeholders and partners through established networks and membership of statutory and non-statutory bodies, including the Greater Lincolnshire Local Enterprise Partnership (GLLEP) and its Employment and Skills Board (ESB), to secure commitment to increasing opportunities for young people and reducing youth unemployment;

·         Identify opportunities, for example, through the work with schools to develop sector led improvement, and through other links e.g. with governing bodies, to encourage schools and other providers to collaborate to ensure continuing viability of some of the smaller providers including sixth forms and to ensure a continued appropriate curriculum for all young people throughout the county.

 

Members were provided with the opportunity to ask questions to the officers present in relation to the information contained within the report, and some of the points raised during discussion included the following:

·         It was clarified that a Level 3 qualification was equivalent to an A Level;

·         It was commented that someone could go through a Level 3 qualification fairly quickly, but it might not always equip that person for work outside of the organisation;

·         It would be beneficial to identify what skills employers were seeing, compared with the skills they needed;

·         There was a lot of work taking place nationally around apprenticeships, and new frameworks were being developed.  These new frameworks would be put in place alongside ongoing work with employers;

·         There was still a tendency for it to be mainly the larger employers that got involved in apprenticeship schemes as they had the capacity within the business to do so;

·         The strategic priorities had been presented to all groups and providers including schools, sixth forms and colleges;

·         A series of meetings were held with clusters of school sixth forms which were very well attended.  There was a need for organisations to work together in order to provide a co-ordinated offer.  There was an in principle agreement on this following discussions, along with a strategic commitment to talk to the governing bodies of schools;

·         There was concern that there could be a gap between what careers advice was given and what training was actually available.  There was an ongoing need to inform young people about available career options to enable young people to consider their employability;

·         The GLLEP and ESB had done a lot of work and there was a list of what skills needed to be addressed over the coming few years.   There was a need to ensure that one person would take the right course or training to get to where they wanted to be and to be able to be employed, however the challenges of training young people for a global economy should not be underestimated;

·         There were concerns regarding the number of children who left school without a grade 'C' in maths or English.  It was also noted that there only 5 five courses that a young person could progress to if they did not have these grades, and hairdressing was one of them.  Although they could study English and Maths as part of a higher training programme.  Study of English and Maths was a funding requirement for all post 16 education courses for those students who had not achieved GCSE English and maths at grade C or above by the time they completed key stage 4;

·         Schools would be able to purchase vocational courses, however, they would not count in league tables;

·         It was commented that zero hour contracts were having an impact on apprenticeships;

·         Members were advised that there was the University Technical College (UTC) in Lincoln which accepted students from 14 years old.  This had a more vocational focus, and there was currently a high demand for places at the moment;

·         There was a lot of work taking place around engaging with parents.

 

Members commented that they were looking forward to receiving further progress updates.

 

RESOLVED

 

            That the Committee note the action plan.

                       

Supporting documents:

 

 
 
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