Managerial Cultures in UK Further and Vocational Education: Transforming Techno-Rationalism into Collaboration 3031044428, 9783031044427

Table of contents :
Contents
List of Tables
1: Introduction
The Chapters
Research
Leadership, Management, and Administration
Technical Rational Environment
Identity and Funding
References
2: The Trouble with Further Education
What Is the Further Education Sector?
A History of Further Education
Lifelong Learning
Determining the Curriculum
International Perspectives
Germany
The USA
Funding
Conclusion
References
3: The Policy Conundrum
Introduction
Philosophical Approaches to Educational Structures, Systems, and Processes
Management and Leadership Formation into This Approach
Pedagogic Leadership
The Current Situation
Neoliberalism Remains all Pervading
The Context of COVID-19: A Legislative Case Study
How Does This Impact on Social Mobility?
Re-thinking the Value and Purpose of Education: Responses to a Range of Government Edicts
Research from Insiders and Outsiders
Changing Practices
Prescription for Success
The Impact
Conclusion
References
4: It’s the Economy Stupid!
How Managerialism Came About
Incorporation
Benchmarking and Target Setting
Ofsted
Validating Bodies
Higher Education Provision
Other Bodies
Further Education Commissioner
The Market Place
The Student as a Customer (or Consumer)
Human Resource Departments
Unintended or Unforeseen Consequences
Conclusion
References
5: Alternative Approaches to Educational Evaluation and Improvement Through Collaboration
Experiences
What Did the Case Studies Reveal?
Measuring Education and the Impact of Technical-Rational Approaches
Student Involvement in FE
Student Governors
Students and Quality Assurance
Access and Participation Plans
Involvement in Curriculum Design
Joint Tutor/Student Research and Scholarship
Technical-Rational Education Reform
Other Ways of ‘Seeing’
Working Democratically to Improve Outcomes
Alternatives to Technical-Rational Approaches
Comprehending Complexity
Creating Progressive Leadership Cultures
Conclusion
References
6: Who has the power? What those at the chalk face can teach us
Introduction
The Demand for Higher-Level Skills
Advancing the Fair Access Agenda
The Potential of FE Colleges
Recent Record
Current Progression Trends
The Attractions of Employment
Awareness, Understanding, and Confidence
Recognising Success
Effective Practices
Centrally Organised Initiatives
Subject-Level Support
Discussion
The Role of Subject Tutors
Variations in Practice
The Case for Wider Adoption
The Need for New Approaches
Conclusion
References
7: Collaboration: Developing Common Languages?
Why Do Colleges Offer HE Programmes?
What Difficulties Do Colleges Face in Offering HE Programmes?
The Student Experience
The Staff Experience
The Employer Experience
The Differences
Collaboration
Uni Connect and Widening Participation
The Future HE Role of Colleges
Level 4 and 5 Qualifications: The Way Forward?
Conclusion
References
8: The Impact on FE Managers: Research Findings
What Does the Research Suggest?
Leadership Approaches
Potential Next Steps
How the Further Education World Is Seen and Measured
Some Cause for Hope?
Potential Indicators
Other Challenges and Findings
Models
References
9: So What Happens Now?
The Future?
Positives
Negatives
Remedies
Tactics for Implementation
References
Glossary
Index

Citation preview

Managerial Cultures in UK Further and Vocational Education Transforming Techno-Rationalism into Collaboration John Baldwin · Neil Raven Robin Webber-Jones

Managerial Cultures in UK Further and Vocational Education

John Baldwin •  Neil Raven Robin Webber - Jones

Managerial Cultures in UK Further and Vocational Education Transforming Techno-Rationalism into Collaboration

John Baldwin New College Stamford Stamford, UK Robin Webber - Jones University of Derby Derby, UK

Neil Raven School of Education University of Bristol Bristol, UK

ISBN 978-3-031-04442-7    ISBN 978-3-031-04443-4 (eBook) https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-04443-4 © The Editor(s) (if applicable) and The Author(s), under exclusive licence to Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2022 This work is subject to copyright. All rights are solely and exclusively licensed by the Publisher, whether the whole or part of the material is concerned, specifically the rights of translation, reprinting, reuse of illustrations, recitation, broadcasting, reproduction on microfilms or in any other physical way, and transmission or information storage and retrieval, electronic adaptation, computer software, or by similar or dissimilar methodology now known or hereafter developed. The use of general descriptive names, registered names, trademarks, service marks, etc. in this publication does not imply, even in the absence of a specific statement, that such names are exempt from the relevant protective laws and regulations and therefore free for general use. The publisher, the authors and the editors are safe to assume that the advice and information in this book are believed to be true and accurate at the date of publication. Neither the publisher nor the authors or the editors give a warranty, expressed or implied, with respect to the material contained herein or for any errors or omissions that may have been made. The publisher remains neutral with regard to jurisdictional claims in published maps and institutional affiliations. Cover illustration: © Alex Linch shutterstock.com This Palgrave Macmillan imprint is published by the registered company Springer Nature Switzerland AG. The registered company address is: Gewerbestrasse 11, 6330 Cham, Switzerland

Contents

1 Introduction  1 2 The Trouble with Further Education 13 3 The Policy Conundrum 37 4 It’s the Economy Stupid! 69 5 Alternative Approaches to Educational Evaluation and Improvement Through Collaboration 99 6 Who has the power? What those at the chalk face can teach us125 7 Collaboration: Developing Common Languages?145 8 The Impact on FE Managers: Research Findings177

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9 So What Happens Now?205 Glossary219 Index223

List of Tables

Table 1.1 Table 2.1 Table 2.2 Table 4.1 Table 6.1 Table 7.1 Table 7.2 Table 7.3 Table 7.4 Table 7.5 Table 7.6 Table 9.1 Table 9.2

The differences between managers and leaders Types of further education college Percentage of 16- to 18-year-old students by institution Practical manifestations of NPM reform and their ideological roots Summary of key practices Numbers of full-time students on higher education courses Number of part-time students on higher education courses Mean headline fee income of population by provider and qualification type (rounded to nearest £10) Average class size at universities by subject for 2012/2013 The number of students at a range of universities, FE colleges, and alternative providers in 2019/2020 Comparison between aspects of universities and FE colleges Key components of the Skills and Post-16 Education Bill Levels of impact

8 14 14 72 135 146 147 149 150 150 161 208 213

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1 Introduction

This book has been many years in the making. Collectively, the authors have worked in further education (FE) and skills for over 65 years. These experiences have been mainly in management and leadership roles. We have had countless conversations about the impact that the policies of various governments have had on the sector and what, in turn, this has meant for managers. This book is unique as it is an attempt to crystallise those discussions, to reflect on those conversations, and to explore where further education emerged from and consider where it may be going. The book explores, perhaps for the first time, how policy has led to structures which are built on a managerial and market-led approach and celebrates where collaboration has worked. It attempts to authentically capture the impact of encounters with policy that FE managers have had, through their stories, reflections, and experiences. While there is an emerging body of literature (see Orr 2020; Coffield 2011; Hodson et al. 2014) on senior leadership in further education, or on further education finding its place in the world, little has been written on the day-to-day impact that policy has had and the managerial responses to it. This is where this book seeks to place itself. The aim is for the research contained herein to shine a light on the trials and human costs that have been, and are being, experienced by the sector, as well as the opportunities it has to triumph. We believe that FE has the potential to © The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2022 J. Baldwin et al., Managerial Cultures in UK Further and Vocational Education, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-04443-4_1

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make a much greater contribution to education and training as a central player rather than the current peripheral role, particularly in relation to higher education (HE). The book builds on the research-­informed practice approaches that were developed by Gregson et al. (2015), and which are increasingly being adopted in further education, but considers this from the perspective of leaders and managers. Whilst it is aimed at a wide readership, some terms and concepts may not be familiar to all. The glossary is a good reference point to remind the reader of key definitions and how they are being used here.

The Chapters The book has the following structure, to guide the reader through our approach. Chapter 2 seeks to define what further education is, and how legislation and government perspectives have shaped it. It puts further education in context and provides a history of how the FE sector has evolved from the nineteenth-century mechanics’ institutes. In describing that history, we start to see how the distinct role of colleges has emerged and how this has constantly changed with government whim, and that the route that the sector has taken has often been driven by funding, or the lack of it. In affording a wider context, a comparison is made between the FE sector in the UK and in other countries. This book focuses almost exclusively on the English further education sector. Chapter 3 explores the impact of policy in greater depth, looking at the perception the current government has about the role of FE and the type of curriculum that should be offered. We suggest that, philosophically, FE is not providing the best form of knowledge and skills that it could, as it is driven by economic pressures. We start to discuss the impact this has on FE managers and the styles of management they are forced to adopt. We also discuss how this impacts on social mobility and how colleges could play a much greater role in enhancing outcomes and prospects for students, particularly in its potential to facilitate progression to higher education.

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Chapter 4 discusses how successive English governments since the 1970s have imposed a managerial and neoliberal philosophy of operation on FE colleges. It looks at how this affects the way that colleges are structured, how managers are forced to behave, and the power that is given to different departments in colleges. We demonstrate that although colleges are technically independent organisations, they are hidebound by legislation and government diktat. As a result, colleges are not able to offer the education and training their managers and tutors would like to provide. Chapter 5 begins to explore the remedies for the situations that colleges find themselves in and considers alternative approaches to managing colleges that have the potential to provide better outcomes for students. It describes research that we have undertaken in how FE managers could better manage. It looks at how students and other stakeholders can be more involved in the design of the curriculum and in the running of colleges. The chapter also describes how the culture of colleges can be changed to provide a better experience for all. Chapter 6 examines in more detail the role that FE colleges can play in improving social mobility and fair access to higher education. It opens by recognising that FE colleges are significant recruiters of students from disadvantaged backgrounds, including those pursuing qualifications required for university entry. Yet, HE progression rates remain comparatively low. It then describes research undertaken by us on things could change, and how the life chances of these young people, as well as older learners, could be improved if some of the shackles imposed on colleges were to be removed. Chapter 7 focuses entirely on the role that FE colleges could play in improving social mobility by expanding their ability to offer appropriate higher education courses and training. It examines the difficulties and constraints imposed on college when trying to provide higher education and training programmes and the expectation in the UK that higher education is mainly about three-year bachelor’s degrees. Building on the research described in Chap. 6, it suggests ways that FE colleges could help those from more deprived backgrounds to flourish. Chapter 8 starts to offer some democratic and pragmatic responses to the challenges of the time, while the future of FE continues to be debated. It examines in more detail the research described in Chap. 5, which is key

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to understanding the problems that colleges face and how lessons learned could enable colleges to provide much better education and training. Chapter 9 opens by summarising the challenges that FE colleges face before offering a prescription for the changes that need to take place to ensure that the sector is able to provide the best service for its students, industry, the economy, and the communities it serves. The book does not offer a single remedy to the phenomenon discussed. As practitioners and researchers, the authors recognise that the issues being grappled with are complex and have emerged over many decades, through many political struggles, and through national and international structures. Most critically, the book attempts to understand that education, and therefore, by its very nature, educational leadership, is a complex and multi-disciplinary process. Consequently, to suggest a universal solution to complex problems would be to diminish the professionalism and freedom that educators need in order to shape the lives of millions of people every year. As this book also explores, further education engages in a range of different activities and for a wide range of different groups, so one solution cannot suit all situations. This book sets the scene on how educational improvement and its evaluation could be considered, and how managerial and neoliberal approaches shape current practices and could influence future ones.

Research Throughout this book we will make reference to research that we have carried out and research by others. In addition to considering the challenges of these approaches, the book uses the authors’ ‘insider insights’ to consider how things could change. In further education contexts, it is hard to see how research (which has generally been conducted by individuals external to the sector) can or should be the main vehicle for informing policy governing the sector. Wider groups, including Local Enterprise Partnerships (LEPs), the Confederation of British Industry (CBI), and others, have influenced policy. However, there is little empirical evidence to suggest that the actual impact of such policies (however

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well-intentioned) upon those who have to instigate these policies is positive. Furthermore, in other contexts the use of research evidence seems scant. As Raven (2017) cites, in 2002 Landry worked with policy makers to establish how research influenced some of their practices. However, only 8 per cent said that research fully influenced their work, and a further 38 per cent said that it might occasionally impact upon their work. Of course, not all policy decisions will necessarily be ‘researched’, nor do the findings of all research studies agree or correlate. If they did then governments who are responsible for the implementation of policies would face a much simpler job. In addition, problems of policy implementation are further compounded when policy is born out of ideology. For example, in legislation passed by consecutive Labour and Conservative Governments from 1997 onwards, which has contributed to the rise of neoliberal education policy and structures. Bearing in mind the managerial and neoliberal climate in which colleges are forced to operate, each of the chapters will consider the impact this is having on how they are led and managed, and what this means for their students and those who work in them, and how this impinges on competitors, the UK economy, and society in general. While Ofsted, the Teaching Excellence and Outcomes Framework (TEF), and other inspection and audit regimes do not always create the necessary space, this book starts with the approach of the impact that managerialism and neoliberalism are having on colleges to present ideas. Gray (2017, 41) when conducting research into exam boards said that ‘we decided that expert insiders would be the best source of knowledge’ as opposed to looking at raw data and outcomes to start with. She goes on to argue that such an approach allows ‘participants’ reports to be scrutinized’. Zembylas (2003, 220) states that ‘insider research cannot involve objective observation and analysis; it is instead an encounter between individual choices and cultural tools employed in a particular institutional context’. While this can be argued in all social science research, insider research ‘cannot but be situated in the researcher’s own organisational, political experience and context’. Far from being a problem, the position of objectivity means the insider-researcher gives authenticity to the research by being reflective and reflexive:

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Reflexivity suggests that researchers should acknowledge and disclose their own selves in the research, seeking to understand their part in, or influence on, the research. Rather than trying to eliminate researcher effects (which is impossible as researchers are part of the world they are investigating) researchers should hold themselves up to the light. (Cohen 2017, 303)

We are not alone in taking such an approach to researching and considering the wider education sector. When undertaking the ‘Examination Standards Project’ researchers from the Institute of Education (IOE) decided that the case study methodology was the most relevant for exploring the system of educational standards in many different countries as this ‘allowed each case to show in its own contextual conditions, and allowed multiple units of analysis for each one’ (Yin 2014, 50). Further, case study research would be the preferred method, compared to others in situations where (1) the main research questions are ‘how’ or ‘why’ questions, (2) the researcher has no control over behavioural events, and (3) the focus of the study is a contemporary (as opposed to an entirely historical) phenomenon (Yin 2014, 2). As Sikes and Potts (2008) note, insider-researchers are ‘proper’ members of the community they are researching. Gray (2017) argues that this allows insider-researchers to consider their work as that of the reflective practitioner (Dewey 1933; Stenhouse 1975; Schön 1983). In Dewey’s 1933 book How We Think, he articulated how this thought process has educational value, characterising this as conscious reasoned, sceptical, and logical: Active, persistent and careful consideration of any belief or supposed form of knowledge in the light of the grounds that support it, and the further conclusion to which it tends, constitutes reflective thought. (Dewey 1933, 6)

One of the central reasons for adopting a ‘narrative inquiry’ approach is its flexibility. McDonald (1996, 72) recalls how randomised controlled trials were the ‘gold standard’ of social science research but acknowledges that this is increasingly diminishing as other approaches allow greater flexibility to researchers. He argues that they came with a very determined fixed design, with a ‘hallmark of pre-specification’ (McDonald

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1996, 73). However, he points out that, carried out in a real-world setting, they require researchers to know in advance what to look for, in order to prove or disprove a point or a particular theoretical framework. The same approach also demands extensive pilot work to explore what is feasible. Hammersley (2000) puts together a defence of ‘qualitative design’. Such designs come from a range of theoretical positions which as Anastas (2004 and Anastas and MacDonald 1994) suggests requires some flexibility.

Leadership, Management, and Administration Throughout this book frequent reference will be made to the terms, ‘leadership, ‘management’, and ‘administration’ concerning the roles that some people play in organisations. Unfortunately, in the literature these terms are sometimes used interchangeably, and there are no agreed definitions. Connolly et al. (2019) suggest that the expression management is often used in relationship to hierarchical power and derives from the Weberian concept of bureaucracy. In an educational context, they suggest that a manager is responsible for some part of an education system. They argue that the distinction between management and administration is one of level. A person higher in the organisation is likely to be a manager and one lower is more likely to be an administrator. However, Bush (2019) points out that in Australia and the USA the expression administrator is used instead of manager. Connolly et al. (2019) indicate that the term ‘educational leadership’ is used in two ways. First, by usage in England what was previously a head teacher has now become the school leader. Second, it is used as a reference to somebody who leads and thus someone who influences and motivates others—often because they are charismatic. Bennis (1989) produced the following table to illustrate the distinction between managers and leaders. It is now a little dated but illustrates the essence of the differences (Table 1.1). However, much of this is just semantics because most people in middle or senior roles in schools and colleges will undertake leading, managing, and administrative tasks as part of their role. In fact, the concept of distributed leadership means that

An M

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Table 1.1  The differences between managers and leaders The manager

The leader

Administers Is a copy Maintains Focuses on systems Relies on control Short-range view Asks how and when Eye on the bottom line Imitates Accepts the status quo Obeys orders without question Does things right Is trained Managers operate within the culture

Innovates Is an original Develops Focuses on people Inspires trust Long-range view Asks what and why Eye on horizon Originates Challenges the status quo Obeys when appropriate but thinks Does the right thing Learns Leaders create the culture

Source: Bennis (1989)

anybody who works in a school or college can take on a leadership role when required (Lumby 2017).

Technical Rational Environment The book’s main theme is the impact of top-down strategies to imposing policy and practices on the FE sector, and it suggests some more pragmatic and democratic approaches which should benefit the sector in the longer term. Indeed, it is argued that technical-rational approaches to the development, implementation, and evaluation of education policy— from the top-down and through the measurement of outcomes—have put education leaders into positions where they have to make decisions and exercise judgement in complex and unfolding situations. Moreover, this is often in contexts where financial pressures and imperatives to meet targets and demonstrate outcomes often take precedence over the protection and maintenance of desirable educational values. Specifically, values based on enabling students to have a fulfilled life rather than merely learning how to acquire employment-based skills or knowledge. These are the kind of values that Dewey (1916), Dunne (2015), Carr (1995),

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and Sarason (1996), amongst others referenced in this study, argue could be implemented to ensure more sustained, pragmatic, and democratic ways of working. It is this technical-rational approach that has resulted in programmes of training and development for leaders being mainly focused on operational activities, financial management, and the manipulation of data. A consequence of this is that many enduring issues facing education leaders and their teams remain unresolved with considerable cost to individuals, institutions, and the sector at large. Their work indicates that these approaches have existed for some time as FE and the skills sector have become increasingly preoccupied with marketing at the expense of students’ learning. It appears that a key challenge in accepting top-down, technical-­ rational approaches to educational management is an assumption that the impact of policy can, is, or should be clearly and immediately evident, and that it manifests itself as a clearly observable event and a measurable outcome. This assumption fails to recognise that impact is often part of a process of change and that there can be outcomes of educational policy which are not intended. Furthermore, practices are complex processes, and the context that they operate in can also be difficult to observe. Indeed, some aspects of education such as enthusiastic, empathetic, and charismatic teaching are almost impossible to quantify.

Identity and Funding Indeed, further education and skills sector remains, at the time of writing, chronically underfunded (Orr 2020). Over half of the further education colleges (FECs) have had to receive additional government support or risk becoming insolvent. As a consequence, there are an increased number of inspection and regulatory bodies which ‘measure’ the activity and impact of the sector. These include – but are not limited to – the Office for Standards in Education (Ofsted), the Office of FE Commissioner, the Office for Students (OfS), the Education Skills Funding Agency (ESFA), the Institute for Apprenticeships and Technical Education (IFATE), The Office for Qualifications (Ofqual), the Quality Assurance Agency (QAA), as well as support agencies such as the

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Education Training Foundation (ETF), and the further education Trust for Leadership (FETL). All of these, along with ensuring the requirements of awarding organisations are met, are proving costly – both financially and for the humans involved. Indeed, Baroness Wolf, who led a significant reform of the structure of education for 16- to 18-year-olds in 2011, has commented that too much public money is being spent on ensuring that the demands of these inspections and audit regimes are being met, rather than having funding meet from line teaching and learning activity. This is while reforms in higher education from 2012 have resulted in an average £5000 funding gap per student between further and higher education. Exley (2020, 124) asks if ‘there has ever been a golden age for FE’. He then explores how a range of policy drivers (‘from Leitch to Lingfield’) have attempted to map one out but all have failed. While Boris Johnson, as Prime Minister, increased the base rate of funding for 16- to 18-year-­ olds with a £400 million cash injection in 2021, it did not cover the 12 per cent real-terms cut for 16- to 18-year-old funding in FE (which already has less public funding than sixth-form colleges) between 2010/2011 and 2018/2019. Indeed, it made up less than 7 per cent of that cut. Moreover, adult learning suffered bigger cuts. Removing apprenticeship income, student numbers dropped from 4.4 million to 1.5 million between 2009/2010 and 2018/2019. All of this resulted in a 9 percentage point reduction in roles in the sector (or 12,000 FTEs). The Principal of East Coast College in 2019 said: There are too many old thinking college principals who refer to the glory days of freedom from LEA control, higher pay and promises of autonomy that have never truly materialised. Incorporation has failed to protect the security of colleges, of staff and students. It has failed to protect continued investment, it has failed to protect high standards, it has failed to protect support from those in high government since 1992.

As Exley (2020) says ‘colleges many have won their freedom – but the cost has been profound’. Yet, as we will argue, the challenges FE colleges face are far from insurmountable, but it will need a significant change of attitude, outlook, and philosophy.

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References Anastas, J.W. 2004. Quality in qualitative evaluation: Issues and possible answers. Research on Social Work Practice: Sage. Anastas, J.W., & MacDonald, M. 1994. Research design for social work and the human services. New York: Lexington Books. Bennis, W. 1989. On becoming a leader. London: Prentice Hall. Bush, T. 2019. Distinguishing between educational leadership and management: Compatible or incompatible constructs? Educational Management Administration and Leadership 47: 4. Carr, W. 1995. Education and democracy: Confronting the post-modern challenge. Journal of the Philosophy of Education 29 (1): 75–91. Coffield, F. 2011. Pedagogy, power and change in vocational education. London: Institute of Education, University of London. Cohen, et al. 2017. Research methods in education. London: Routledge. Connolly, M., C. James, and M. Fertig. 2019. The difference between educational management and educational leadership and the importance of educational responsibility. Educational Management Administration and Leadership 47 (4): 504–519. Dewey, J. 1916. Democracy and education: An introduction to the philosophy of education. New York: Macmillan. ———. 1933. How we think: A restatement of the relation of reflective thinking to the educative process. Chicago: Henry Regnery. Dunne, W. 2015. Public policy analysis. London: Routledge. Exley, S. 2020. Blame or betterment?: Regulation and intervention in further education, Further Education Trust for Leadership. Gray, L. 2017. Overcoming political and organisational barriers to international practitioner collaboration on national examination research: Guidelines for insider researchers working in exam boards and other public organisations, AQA. Gregson, N., et al. 2015. Interrogating the circular economy: The moral economy of resource recovery in the EU. Economy and Society 44 (2): 218–243. Hammersley, M. 2000. The relevance of qualitative research. Oxford Review of Education 26: 3–4. Hodson, et al. 2014, February. Neoliberalism at work. Social Currents 1 (1): 91–108. McDonald, L. 1996. The early origins of the social sciences. McGill-Queen’s Press. Orr, K. 2020. A future for the further education sector in England. Journal of Education and Work 33: 7–8.

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Raven, N. 2017. “Challenges and opportunities for widening participation: The practitioners” perspective. In Widening participation in the context of economic and social change, ed. S.  Broadhead, M.  Hill, A.  Hudson, C.  McGlynn, S. McKendry, N. Raven, D. Sims, and T. Ward, 269–293. London: Forum for Access and Continuing Education. Sarason. 1996. The predictable failure of education reform. San Francisco: Jossey-Bass. Schön, D.A. 1983. The reflective practitioner: How professionals think in action. New York: Basic Books. Sikes, P., and A. Potts. 2008. Researching education from the inside investigations from within. Routledge. Stenhouse, L. 1975. An introduction to curriculum Research and Development. London: Heinemann. Yin, R.K. 2014. Case study research design and methods. 5th ed. Thousand Oaks: Sage. Zembylas, M. 2003. Emotions and teacher identity: A post-structural perspective. Teachers and Teaching 9: 3.

2 The Trouble with Further Education

This chapter sets the scene by describing what further education is and its history. It places English FE into an international perspective, provides an introduction to the problems that colleges currently face and offers some of the background to our research.

What Is the Further Education Sector? Further education colleges are represented by the Association of Colleges (AoC), and each year the AoC produces an overview of the main facts and figures relating to the colleges in England. Most of the following is taken from the most recent of these reports (AoC 2021). Everybody knows about schools because they attended at least one, and most people in England know about universities because they have a high profile and feature regularly in the news. However, fewer people know about further education colleges. At the time of writing, there were 234 colleges in England, which vary enormously in size and focus, as summarised in Table 2.1. In 2019/2020, 1.7 million people were educated or trained in FE colleges. Of these, some one million were adults over the age of 18, about 652,000 were 16- to 18-year-old students, and 10,500 were aged 14 or © The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2022 J. Baldwin et al., Managerial Cultures in UK Further and Vocational Education, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-04443-4_2

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Table 2.1  Types of further education college Type

Number

General further education colleges Sixth-form colleges Art and design and performing arts colleges Land-based colleges Institutions of adult learning

163 47 2 12 10

Source: AOC (2021, 2)

Table 2.2  Percentage of 16- to 18-year-old students by institution Type

Percentage

FE and sixth-form colleges All state-funded schools Higher education institutions Not in education or employment Employment Independent schools Apprenticeships Other education or training Special schools

34 25 12 7 7 5 5 5 1

Source: AOC (2021, 14)

15, with the average age of an FE student being 28. Moreover, FE colleges, along with sixth-form colleges, are responsible for the education of more than one in three 16- to 18-year-olds, as illustrated in Table 2.2. Colleges deliver a very large and diverse range of qualifications, and they include: • • • •

150,000 students of age 16–18 taking A levels. 198,000 students retaking GCSE Maths and/or English. 579,000 students taking STEM subjects. 55,000 students of age 16–18 undertook an apprenticeship based at a college. • 118,000 people are undertaking higher education courses at English FE colleges (AOC 2021, 9).

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Whilst these qualifications run from entry level to master’s degrees, most are vocational, job related (including Business and Technical Education Councils [BTECs] and the new T [technical] levels), rather than academic (such as A levels). Most 16- to 18-old students studying with colleges are full time, whilst most older students attend colleges on a part-time basis. Adults (defined as those aged 19 and above) may be studying for a qualification or can be taking part in adult and community learning courses. Adult and community learning courses do not necessarily lead to a qualification, are usually delivered on a part-time basis, and cover such subjects as yoga, healthy cooking, and introductory computer courses (Education and Training Foundation, 2020). Moreover, colleges are also large employers (employ some 105,000 full-time equivalent staff of whom 50,000 are teachers), and spenders, with the total college income in 2019/2020 exceeding £6 billion (AOC 2021, 27).

A History of Further Education Trying to define further education is no easy task. Even the authors of this book, who have accumulated more than six decades of experience working in and with the sector between them, have had several debates about what further education colleges do, how they interact with other ‘types’ of provider (such as universities or independent training providers), and what their relationship to the state is. This has also been a problem for researchers and legislators. The history of education in England, certainly since the Academies Act of 2010, has been one of all-pervading competition, which has, in turn, led to managerial approaches (such as those used in manufacturing, where there are things like ‘line management’) being deployed across the sector. Yet, a study of the history of further education reveals that neoliberal (market-orientated) approaches were in place before the Further and Higher Education Act of 1992. This will be discussed in much more detail in Chap. 3. Each of the four nations of the UK have their own funding and systems for further education. For instance, Scottish FE colleges work much closer with their local authorities, and both Scottish and Welsh colleges have higher percentages of HE

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students than in England. Although the characteristics of the systems and further education colleges are similar there are some differences. Thus, this book focuses on English further education. The 1992 Act is a pivotal juncture in the development of further education in England. However, it is worth considering what led to this moment. The origins of further education colleges sprang from the mechanics’ institutes created in the early nineteenth century by industrialists to provide training in technical subjects for working men. At this time, the state did not believe that its role was to provide technical training for working people (Green 1995). The state only became involved with the Technical Instruction Act of 1889, when the government realised that to compete with other European nations state involvement was needed. Under the auspices of this act, local committees were formed to create institutions that could provide technical education. The funding for this enterprise derived from a whisky tax. The next development arose from the Education Act 1902, which created Local Education Authorities (LEAs). These were tasked with administering schooling including technical education, but the law was permissive and thus led to a wide variation in provision. The Education Act of 1944 created a formal further education sector responsible for providing adequate full- and part-time provision for post-school age students, and a shift began from evening study into full-time study. However, the adequacy of provision differed markedly depending upon each LEA’s priorities and preferences, and much depended on the nature of each college’s links with employers (Waitt 1980, 402). Much of the provision involved training craft and technician apprentices. After the Second World War, employers started to recognise the need for technical training, but there was austerity and LEAs had little money to invest in technical colleges. In the later 1950s, as the economy started to grow, technical colleges began to expand to meet the needs of local businesses, including the provision of apprenticeship training (Waitt 1980). However, it was not until the 1960s that Industrial Training Boards were established with the remit of developing training policies for individual industries and creating syllabuses and qualifications (Industrial Training Act 1964). By the 1970s, the country’s strong industrial base was in decline, and with it apprenticeships. Consequently, colleges moved

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away from traditional part-time craft courses into providing more fulltime courses, including A levels, and particularly Business Education Council (BEC) and Technical Education Council (TEC) qualifications, which provided a national curriculum and approach to assessment for vocational qualifications (Doughty 2015). By the 1980s, more young people were staying in education beyond the age of 16, as employers increasingly expected them to have more advanced vocational skills, and to reflect their wider role and broader offer, colleges began to change their titles from being technical colleges to further education colleges (Smithers and Robinson 1993). The government was starting to appreciate the growing economic importance of FE colleges (Simmons 2008). In 1986, the government introduced National Vocational Qualifications (NVQs). These competed with the traditional craft qualifications by providing more practical activities in courses which had previously been more theory based. The government began to intervene more until the Further and Higher Education Act 1992 took FE colleges out of LEA control and enabled them to become ‘independent’ incorporated bodies. At the same time, polytechnics were also taken out of LEA control and became universities (subsequently, distinguished as post-92 universities. Goldstone 2019). The implications of this are explored in Chap. 3. Following the 1992 Act, in April 1993 all further education colleges (a significant part of the FE sector) became ‘independent’ incorporated bodies. This meant that FECs were no longer funded by local authorities but by the further education Funding Council (FEFC), a form of quasi-­ autonomous non-governmental organisation (QUANGO). Many of the roles that had been carried out by LEAs now had to be carried out by colleges. Consequently, they began to employ accountants, personnel officers, estate managers, and payroll staff. In some cases, these people became members of their college’s senior management team and replaced the established roles and responsibilities of posts previously held by heads of departments with more academic backgrounds (Baldwin 2003). Prior to incorporation, heads of department in colleges of FE were mainly concerned with academic issues, educational values, and matters of curriculum design. Following incorporation, they became more occupied with commercial concerns and the financial imperatives of the ‘bottom line’. At the same time as ‘incorporation’ took place, the Further Education

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Funding Council (FEFC) introduced a raft of controls, audits, and internal and external inspection regimes to govern the work of FE colleges (Doughty 2015). Funding for each student was reduced. FE providers were expected to compete with neighbouring schools and sixth forms for their students. Whilst financial penalties were incurred for under-­ recruitment or poor student results, FE colleges and other providers would be rewarded for setting high targets and then meeting them. Support staff had to be employed, but no extra funding was provided to pay them. Moreover, governing bodies were led by employers. Consequently, colleges began to use the language and practices of the market, with newly established marketing departments developing institutional logos, branding image (McTavish 2003). Senior college managers had to become familiar with accounting practices and procedures, with many college principals became chief executives overnight (Baldwin 2003). Jephcote (1996) suggests that these developments resulted in a drastic shift in the culture of FE colleges, away from being provider led to client led (i.e. there was a rise in a more market-driven, neoliberal approach to education where college managers became more concerned with competition and the balance sheet!). Consequently, the language and values of business, commerce, and accountants not only came to dominate the educational discourse but also began to shape practice across the sector. For a long time reform in FE has been piecemeal with ideas building on ideas, and there has been no clear sense of the role of FE as it bridges the space between school(!) and traditional higher education, is a servant of employers, and also plays a critical role in developing the life chances of millions of young people. This culture in FE persisted throughout the time of the New Labour Government (1997 to 2010). Chris Woodhead, Her Majesty’s Chief Inspector and head of the Office for Standards in Education (Ofsted), resigned in November 2000 and went off to write articles for the Daily Telegraph newspaper, in which he vigorously criticised New Labour’s education policies. Some saw his departure as ‘the final lifting of a deadweight on morale and hope’ (Roberts, 2010). During this time, there were a significant number of changes to further education. For example, in its report Entry to Leading Universities, the Sutton Trust (Atherton

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2000), an educational charity, showed that the 7 per cent of children who attended private schools took 39 per cent of the places at top universities and that private school pupils were 25 times more likely to gain a place than those at state schools in poor areas. This led to the Chancellor of the Exchequer, Gordon Brown, to launch an outspoken attack on ‘old school tie’ elitism at Oxford and Cambridge (The Guardian, 26 May 2000); and the Higher Education Minister, Margaret Hodge, admitted that New Labour had so far failed to widen access to higher education and that government targets must, in future, ‘include a commitment to ensuring that proportionately more students came from low income group families’ (The Guardian 24 June 2002). However, like Estelle Morris (who was Secretary of State for Education between 2001 and 2002), Hodge denied that tuition fees were discouraging applications from students from poorer backgrounds. It was pointed out to her that Scotland, with no upfront tuition fees, had already achieved a participation rate of 50 per cent. She replied that making such a comparison was ‘far too simplistic and misleading’ (The Guardian, 24 June 2002). This led to a raft of proposed changes to the 14–19 curriculum. In February 2002, Estelle Morris published the green paper Extending Opportunities, Raising Standards (DfES 2002), which set out her proposals, including ‘a new structure for the National Curriculum at Key Stage 4’ (which, typically, relates to the education of 14- to 16-year-olds): We intend to develop more vocational qualifications and new hybrid qualifications that combine traditional general subjects with their vocational applications. We will ensure that new qualifications are robust and high-­ quality. We intend to call all GCSEs and A levels by a subject title, without any vocational label. We propose to enable the most able students to demonstrate a greater depth of understanding at advanced level through introducing more demanding questions into A2 papers, leading to a new distinction grade for the higher achievers. The new generation of Modern Apprenticeships will form an important part of a 14-19 vocational pathway. (DfES 2002, 20)

The green paper was followed by ‘one of the most extensive consultation exercises ever mounted by the Education Department’ (Chitty 2009,

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187), which included 58 regional 14–19 workshops and resulted in thousands of written responses. The result of ‘all this frenetic activity’ (Chitty 2009, 188) was the publication in January 2003 of another consultation document, 14-19: Opportunity and Excellence, in which Charles Clarke, Morris’ successor, set out his proposals. The government also planned ‘three reforms to address the weakness of vocational education’ (DfES 2003b, 7): • ‘In addition to the eight vocational GCSE subjects, new hybrid GCSEs would allow students to study on either academic or applied tracks, depending on their preference and aptitude. • ‘Modern Apprenticeships would be improved and expanded’. • GCSEs or A Levels would no longer be described as ‘vocational’ or ‘academic’. ‘Status matters, and engineering should have equal status with mathematics or art and design’ (DfES 2003b, 7). A new working group, chaired by former Chief Inspector of Schools, Mike Tomlinson, was appointed to ‘examine how developments in vocational education, assessment and the qualifications framework could contribute to the successful and lasting transformation of 14-19 learning’ (DfES 2003b, 7). In their report, 14-19 Curriculum and Qualifications Reform, submitted to Charles Clarke on 18 October 2004, the DfE-commissioned Working Group for 14–19 Reform identified the following problems (Tomlinson 2004, 4): • The low level of post-16 participation in education • Poor skill levels in ‘functional mathematics, literacy and communication and ICT’ (information and communications technology) • The low status of vocational courses and qualifications • The lack of challenge, especially for ‘top performers’ • Exam overload • The complexity and lack of transparency in the web of academic and vocational qualifications The report recommended (Tomlinson 2004, 6 and 12):

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• Introducing a compulsory ‘core’ consisting of ‘functional’ subjects (maths, ICT, and communication skills) and ‘wider activities’ such as work experience, paid jobs, voluntary work, and family responsibilities • Replacing coursework with a single extended project • Replacing GCSEs, A Levels, and vocational qualifications with a new single modular diploma at four levels: –– Entry (equivalent to pre-GCSEs) –– Foundation (equivalent to GCSEs at grades D–G, foundation GNVQ, level 1 NVQ) –– Intermediate (equivalent to GCSE A*–C, intermediate GNVQ, level 2 NVQ) –– Advanced (equivalent to GCE and VCE AS and A level, level 3 NVQ) (Tomlinson 2004, 7) • Cutting the number of exams • Stretching the most able students with tougher additional A Level papers (Tomlinson 2004, 90) • Providing students with transcripts of their achievements The committee said many of its proposals would take at least a decade to implement fully, although some could be introduced more quickly (Tomlinson 2004, 14). As Gillard (2018) indicated, Tomlinson’s recommendations were supported by the chief inspector David Bell and by the head of the Qualifications and Curriculum Authority, Dr Ken Boston. Writing in The Guardian (21 February 2005), Barry Sheerman, Chair of the Common’s Education Select Committee, argued that the government’s decision would be ‘the most significant for education’ during Tony Blair’s premiership. However, members of the business community argued that the cost and disruption of reform would outweigh any long-term benefits. It was also clear that Blair was less than enthusiastic about the proposals. Clarke presented the Tomlinson Report to the House of Commons on 18 October 2004. He began by thanking the working group and commending their report ‘wholeheartedly’. He went on:

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I am determined that any evolution of the system must increase public confidence in the system. My approach will therefore build on all that is good in the current system, including the real and great strengths of A-levels and GCSEs. The Tomlinson report rightly confirms the place in the system of A-levels and GCSEs, which it seeks to build on and which will stay as the building blocks of any new system. (Hansard, House of Commons 18 October 2004 Cols, 644-645)

Tony Blair was not present for the debate but at a meeting of the Confederation of British Industry in Birmingham that evening said: The purpose of reform will be to improve upon the existing system, not replace it ... GCSEs and A Levels will stay, so will externally marked exams. Reform will serve to strengthen the existing system where it is inadequate, and there will be greater challenge at the top for those on track to Higher Education. There will also be a sharper focus on the basics of literacy and numeracy and ICT. And there will also be improved vocational provision. (quoted in The Guardian 19 October, 2004)

Although Tomlinson was rejected, the report did lead to a 2005 white paper on 14–19 education and skills, which kept the essence of what Blair said, and led to a watered-down version of the Tomlinson reforms being introduced with FE colleges and schools working together to deliver sector-specific education and training. However, as soon as the Conservative/Liberal coalition government took office in 2010, these reforms were rejected and, with it, the millions of pounds that had been spent on improving partnership working. As one person articulated, ‘were spent for nothing’ (reference). The White Paper The Future of Higher Education was published in January 2003, after 18 months of media speculation, four postponed launches, and a number of well-informed ‘leaked’ stories about serious differences of opinion within the Blair’s Cabinet (Chitty 2009, 206). It declared that: There is no easy, painless way to put our universities and student finance system on a sustainable basis. If we duck the difficult decisions needed, the

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risk of decline will increase and students and the country at large will suffer”. (Department for Education and Sciences, 2003, 5)

It proposed measures to (DfES 2003, 5): • Bring major improvements to the funding of research and knowledge transfer, boost world class excellence, and strengthen the work of universities in supporting the regional economies. • Improve and reward excellent teaching. • Enable more people to enter higher education, benefiting both individuals and the economy’s need for higher-level skills. • Support those from disadvantaged backgrounds by restoring grants, helping with fee costs, and abolishing up-front tuition fees for all students. This will support our programme for increasing attainment and aspiration. • Allow universities to secure a contribution of between £0 and £3000 per year to the cost of each course—paid fairly when graduates are in work linked to their ability to pay • Give universities long-term financial certainty by helping them build up endowment funds Following on from the White Paper, in April 2003, the DfES published Widening participation in higher education. This green paper set out proposals for the creation and remit of the Office for Fair Access, whose main role would be ‘to exercise judgements in ensuring that universities are taking the actions they see as necessary to achieve their widening participation ambitions if they introduce variable tuition fees’ (DfES 2003a, 21). In 2004, the bill was passed into law, by a five-vote majority (reference).

Lifelong Learning Gillard (2018) has undertaken extensive work to understand the history of education. He states that despite the various initiatives overseen by David Blunkett (former Education and Employment Secretary, Home

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Secretary, and Work and Pensions Secretary) the provision of adult education and lifelong learning under the first New Labour administration (dates) had ‘not been one of undiluted success’ (Chitty 2009, 230): In October 2001, Estelle Morris announced that Individual Learning Accounts were to be suspended as a result of growing concerns about fraud: 300 providers were being investigated by the police). Eighteen months later, figures published in The Observer (8 June 2003) showed that, between 1998 and 2002, £663m had been spent on adult education and skills initiatives, but the number of people enrolling on adult education courses had fallen from 1,115,000 to 1,042,000. There had also been a decline in the number of adult males undertaking Modern Apprenticeships - from 188,300 to 151,400.

Faced by these setbacks, the DfES (and three other government departments) published a policy paper 21st Century Skills: Realising Our Potential (July 2003), which effectively relaunched the government’s national skills strategy, the aim of which was to ensure that employers have the right skills to support the success of their businesses, and individuals have the skills they need to be both employable and personally fulfilled (DfES 2003b, 11). Employers would be given ‘greater choice and control over the publicly-funded training they receive’, and individuals who did not have basic employability skills would be guaranteed free tuition (DfES 2003b, 13). The qualifications framework would be reformed to make it ‘more flexible and responsive to the needs of employers and learners’ (DfES 2003b, 14). Modern apprenticeships would be strengthened and extended, and the funding arrangements for adult learning and skills would be reformed ‘to give training providers stronger incentives to work with employers while reducing bureaucracy’ (DfES 2003b, 14). To ensure that government and ‘delivery agencies’ worked together efficiently, a national Skills Alliance would be formed, bringing together the key government departments with employer and union representatives as a new social partnership and linking the key delivery agencies in a concerted drive to raise skills (DfES 2003b, 15).

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Determining the Curriculum Over successive years, there has been a debate about who should control and determine the curriculum offered by FE. Increasingly, large employers have begun to dictate the curriculum offered by colleges. A most recent example can be seen in the recent developments of the Trailblazers (groups of employers coming together to devise apprenticeship curriculum without education providers in the room) as part of current and ongoing apprenticeship and technical education reform (references). Sector providers, including a range of private training organisations, chased recruitment numbers and competed to demonstrate improved ‘outcomes’—the new basis upon which their funding was to be determined. These outcomes are now published and publicly available in Qualification Achievement Rate (QAR) reports. This competition for income led some providers to become expansionist in outlook and outcome, both in terms of the subjects offered and in the location of some of the delivery. Many FE colleges started to work outside of their local region (references). For example, the Newcastle College Group currently leads and manages a range of FE colleges across a geographical area from London to Newcastle. In turn, this new funding regime led to a range of course and qualification types being offered, often funded through different formulae, with different performance measures attached. Indeed, in one period between 2005 and 2015 there were five changes to the sector funding methodology and seven changes to funding bodies. By comparison, higher education institutions had been through one change of funding body in the previous 30 years. This constant change not only placed demands of data and support functions, but also challenged providers to consider their mission and vision in relation to the language, values, and practices of the market. The market-led approach to funding meant that providers were rewarded for having high student volumes. Senior managers in the FE sector faced with increasingly rapid changes in policy and funding were confronted with the challenges of ‘keeping the lights on’ (i.e. how to survive in a tight fiscal and economic climate and still meet the demands of the external measures set). This required the adoption of different values

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and practices to those which had previously characterised the sector and what it stands for, including widening participation in education, social inclusion, and educational practices which celebrated and valued vocational education in its fullest sense (not just the acquisition of narrow sets of skills often to meet the needs of a single employer). Reading a range of mission statements and strategies from FE colleges can reveal how they respond to demand, the local area needs, and how they fit into a wider educational ecosystem. Thus, the actual mission for each college can vary. Lingfield (2012) suggests that there are at least five main aims or associated segments of the FE sector: • Remedial (re-addressing the shortcomings of schooling) • Community (offering lifelong learning opportunities to local people with benefits to their health, longevity, and wellbeing as well as continuing education) • Vocational (teaching occupational skills) • Academic courses (such as A Levels) • Higher education studies These could result in five separate inspection regimes in the current climate, along with a range of funding and audit regimes, all of which need to be administered. Since 2016, the use of the word ‘vocational’ appears to be declining. This may be because it is a ‘loaded’ word (in as much as ‘vocational’ is often considered to be inferior to ‘academic’ qualifications). It may also be because of the political emphasis placed by the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development on ‘higher professional and technical qualifications’. Indeed, since the publication of the OECD report, the Association of Colleges has ceased to use the word ‘vocational’ when describing the FE sector, replacing it with ‘professional’ and ‘technical’. This message of higher-level professional and technical qualifications was echoed in Nick Bowles’ letter to the sector (when he was Minister for Skills) after the 2015 Comprehensive Spending Review. With the letter came a further change to the funding of adult education. This reflected the ‘Dual Mandate’ consultation, which the Department of Business, Industry and Sciences published in March 2015, when Vince

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Cable was the Secretary of State. The paper tried to establish, for the first time, the purpose of the FE sector and gave colleges a steer towards doing higher-level skills and community engagement (since the paper Individual Learning Record data shows little movement in the number of higher-­ level qualifications colleges are providing). Such a ‘Dual Mandate’ approach begins to move colleges towards concepts of curriculum being considered more thematically and less along the lines of the pursuit of qualifications for economic purposes. The idea of a ‘Dual Mandate’ opens a simple question about what someone at a ‘higher level’ is all about. Perhaps this is the kind of desirable education Biesta suggests: one where education allows people to keep discovering and there is a coherent approach to curriculum development. We also need to go further to examine the evidence to reveal if/how the changed and changing policy context has altered the behaviour of managers. The Dual Mandate acknowledged that ‘higher level vocational training has fallen through the gap between our FE and HE systems relative to other countries’ and ‘where we need to be’ (Department for Industry University and Science 2008, 7). According to the OECD, currently fewer than 10 per cent of the adult population aged between 20 and 45 in the UK have professional education and training qualifications. This compares to over 15 per cent in the US and 20 per cent in Germany. According to the UK Commission for Employability and Skills (UKCES 2010) by 2020 half of all employment was set to be in higher skilled roles. The 2010 skills strategy states ‘we are currently weak in the vital intermediate technical skills that are increasingly important as jobs become more highly skilled and technological change accelerates’ (Dept for Business, Innovation and skills 2010, 4). The Skills Commission (2011) found that ‘the UK currently has 1,069,000 technicians operating in Science, Technology, Engineering and Maths (STEM), which accounts for 3.7 per cent of the workforce’. The Department for Industry, University and Science (DIUS) report of 2008 states that ‘university is not just for young people’ and that it should equally be accessed by working adults. In some occupations there are some learning pathways that are already very straightforward for higherlevel progression. For example, HE progression rates, as cited in the government data release in 2017 (reference), from advanced apprenticeships in some areas are high (e.g. 50 per cent for accounting) but somewhat lower

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in others (for instance, 19 per cent in business admin and child care). The OECD has argued that there will be growth in technical and professional roles which will increase the need for qualifications at levels 4 and 5. These are very different from things like the Programme for International Student Assessment (PISA) tables, and they create further links to the skills agenda and economic growth.

International Perspectives Comparisons can be made between the English approach to skills training and that taken by other countries. Two countries which have dissimilar systems but which are worth considering are Germany and the USA because of the longevity in their skills systems. Germany because it has been admired in the past as being very successful and the USA because of the many similarities it has with the English systems. As could be seen from the earlier discussion in this chapter, the approach since the eighteenth century in England has been piecemeal and largely driven by economic needs. It was not until after the Second World War that the English government became fully involved in the further education sector, and the role of employers in skills training declined. Apprenticeships as a method of training have risen and declined, but more recently since modern apprenticeships were announced in 2004, they have staged a resurgence (Mirza-Davies 2015).

Germany In England and in Germany there has been a clear separation between academic and vocational education, but in England vocational education is focused on developing purely practical skills and theoretical knowledge in crafts. Germany has a well-established dual apprenticeship training system, which has been the dominant route for over a century since the Craft Act 1897 (Kratz 1990). In this form of training, as well as developing the vocational skill and knowledge of the learner referred to as Berufliche Tüchtigkeit, there is also Berufliche Mündigkeit, which is

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concerned with developing the maturity of the employee and training them to critically analyse their professional identity and be aware of taking social responsibility in society (Haasler 2020). The dual apprenticeship training route is aimed at developing not only the learner’s vocational knowledge and skill but also their social and ethical competences. Moreover, while at school German children can opt to take a pre-­ vocational route which prepares them for joining the dual vocational system after leaving school. In 2017, about 45 per cent of young people enrolled on these pre-vocational programmes although this varies across the 16 federal states. (The Edge Foundation 2018). Most of those taking this route are normally at work on the job for three days a week and undertaking vocational training at a vocational school or in their employers’ training school for the other two days. These two days are spent learning skills and knowledge relevant to the vocational route chosen, but also young people continue with general education subjects such as German, mathematics, and social studies (Deissinger 2015). This form of training takes between two to four years depending upon the trade or craft and culminates with a certificate issued by a chamber of industry and commerce or a chamber of crafts and trades. There are about 330 government-­ recognised occupations which are based on training regulations created by employer organisations – craft chambers and chambers of industry and commerce, trade unions, and the government. The practical training provided by each employer must meet the strict curricula stipulated by the regulations and provide general training for that craft rather than individual employer-focused training. Thus, making it easy for an employee to move between employers (Deissinger 2015). This German dual model has been successful because it is founded on stable occupations, a well-functioning economy, and little unemployment. However, since 2018, with occupations becoming more complex and fluid, economic problems internationally, and a difficult labour market in Germany with an influx of immigrants and a perceived lowering of standards in schools, the dual model has started to decline in popularity and importance. Thus, more young people (about 25 per cent and mainly female) are now attending vocational schools for two or three years on full-time courses before they enter the labour market (Haasler 2020). Young people need to be 18 before they enter this training, whereas a

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15-year-old can join the dual apprenticeship route. Deissinger (2015, 565) argues that it would be difficult to introduce the German system in England because the German dual apprenticeship is based on a ‘non-­ economic’ perspective and is more concerned with the needs of the individual student in contrast with England, where the vocational training system is partly based on the choice of the young person but the qualifications are designed to meet the perceived needs of the economy.

The USA Another comparison between vocational training in England can be made with the USA. In America, the expression ‘going to college’ means going to university for a four-year degree programme. For young people, vocational education can take place at high school, where most students take at least one vocational subject although most of the curriculum is academic, or at a vocational school, after leaving high school, normally at the age of 18 (Kriesman and Stange 2019). Most vocational or trade schools are private and charge fees, but they are becoming increasingly popular. The number of students attending trade schools rose from 9.6 million in 1999 to 16 million in 2014 (St. Espirit 2019). However, much of the vocational provision is piecemeal and differs from state to state and city to city and is often provided where there is a particular demand or need. For instance, in New York, Career and Technical Education High Schools have been established to meet the demand for vocational qualified young people and some specialise such as the Aviation High School and the High School for Art and Design (CRPE-Heyward 2019). In some instances, young people can attend community colleges although the main role of these colleges is to offer vocational two-year associate degrees, similar to higher national diploma (HND) or foundation degrees in England with an option to top up to a graduate degree for a further two years. In 2015 about 46 per cent of undergraduates were taking two-year courses at a community college. This compares with less than 10 per cent of students taking a two-year HND or Foundation Degree in FE colleges in England. However, the success rates at community colleges for two-year courses are very low at about 13 per cent,

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whereas the success rate for those who take full four-year degrees at universities is about 60 per cent. A higher proportion of students from lowincome families and black and Hispanic backgrounds enrol at community colleges. About 65 per cent of students attend part-time, and the average age of attendees is 29. Most full-time students live at home, while they are taking their associate degrees. Fees at community colleges are on average about $3347 a year compared with an average cost of $9139 per year at university in the USA (Vlasova 2020). There are many similarities between higher education delivered in community colleges in the USA and further education colleges in England. However, dropout rates are lower in England - about 24 per cent in 2017/2018 (HESA 2018). Moreover, whilst the disparity in fee levels is not as wide, the proportion of the total population of HE students is much lower in FE colleges. This subject will be explored further in Chap. 6.

Funding The impact of the approaches to skills education, and the introduction of international perspectives, has supported the lobbying for reform which, in itself, has led to further challenges. In the past 10 years there have been reviews and changes to the structure of full-time learning for 16- to 18-year-olds, including how maths, English, and work experience are measured and embedded; significant changes to apprenticeship funding; delivery and assessment; changes to courses involving re-training and supporting the unemployed; changes to funding for adult learning; and changes for providers that engage in activity within higher education. Part of this has been fuelled by closer working relationships with other government structures, such as Local Enterprise Partnerships (which were set up to change Regional Development Agencies, references needed), the Confederation of British Industry (CBI), and other agencies engaged in delivering the government’s industrial strategy. All of this has created yet further layers of complication for delivering the parts of the education and skills sector that FE colleges lead on. It has created further

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layers of complexity in inspection regimes, and it has made it increasingly difficult for further education to define itself. The Augar Review (2019) into post 18 education (launched after the 2017 General Election, where there was a ground swell of opinion against high fees in higher education, references needed) provided a view on what the identity for further education could be in relation to higher education and offered potential solutions to the challenges of inspection and funding. However, following further changes to government (in the wake of the General Election in 2019) these reforms have not been taken forward. The outbreak of the COVID-19 pandemic has resulted in greater emphasis of the role further education could take in re-training adults who have been made redundant through lifelong learning accounts (a key component of Augar and more recently the influential think tank – Policy Exchange). However, it is noteworthy that there have been in excess of 22 per cent real-terms cut in adult learning funding since 2010. The cost of this, as Exley (2020) says, continues to have an impact. The Independent Review of College Financial Oversight by Dame Mary Ney, conducted in October 2019 and published in July 2020 (DfE 2020), highlighted some systemic issues within the further education sector. She pointed to the current framework of funding and accountability leading to around 10 funding streams for the sector, an inspection regime of around 50 colleges per year (around 80 per cent of which are graded ‘good’ or better by the Office for Standards in Education; Ofsted), and highlighted the precarious nature of the sector which leads to frequent cashflow issues. In 2013, the FE Commissioner Office was established to provide independent advice to ministers on college financial security, and between 2015 and 2019 undertook a series of area-based reviews for the sector, which led to 57 mergers (with 46 of these receiving financial support). Dame Ney concludes that there ‘needs to be a shift in emphasis in promoting the strategic role of the sector’ (DfE 2020). At the time the report was published the government committed to launching a Further Education White Paper, and Dame Ney called for a ‘national strategic vision’ for the sector along with ‘local planning’. This mantra has been taken up by the commission looking at the future of colleges (2020). This has begun by the issuing of a paper on the importance of ‘place’ and the ‘civic role’ of further education.

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Conclusion The role of further education, how to evaluate it and how to fund it, has been the subject of a series of changes and challenges over the years. This has led to complex and evolving structures. These structures have cut to the core of the identity and purpose of further education and, consequently, have led to the variety of funding, inspection, regulation, and other regimes that affect the sector. In order to understand the current circumstances and structures that the FE sector operates in, it is important to appreciate its past and how it came to be the way it is. This involves considering how external social, economic, and political forces have influenced local decisions at different junctures in the evolution of the sector. Post-16 education has undergone significant change in recent years. The sector has always been large and varied. However, there has been a wave of policy initiatives which signal complex political, ideological, and cultural forces now operating across the sector at national and local levels. In setting the scene of how this came to be, Chap. 3 explores how further education is measured and understood by stakeholders, philosophers, and state-actors.

References Association of Colleges. 2021. College key facts. Association of Colleges. Atherton, G. 2000. Room at the top, access and success at leading universities around the world. The Sutton Trust. Augar, P. 2019. Independent panel report to the review of Post-18 education and funding. Department for Education. Baldwin, J. 2003. The management styles of further education managers during rapid and extensive change. A case study, Unpublished PhD Thesis, Nottingham University. Chitty, C. 2009. Education policy in Britain. London: Palgrave Macmillan. Deissinger, T. 2015. The German dual vocational education and training system as ‘good practice’? Local Economy 30 (5): 557–567. Department for Business, Innovation and Skills. 2010. Skills for sustainable growth, https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/skills-­for-­sustainable-­ growth-­strategy-­document.

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Department for Education. 2020. FE Choices learner satisfaction survey guidance. Department for Education. https://explore-education-statistics.service.gov.uk/ find-statistics/further-education-and-skills/2020-21. Accessed 19 May 2022. Department for Education and Skills. 2002. 14-19 extending opportunities, raising standards, https://dera.ioe.ac.uk/4502/7/14-­19-­extending-­opportunities-­ raising-­standards_Redacted.pdf. ———. 2003a. The future of higher education. Fifth report of session 2002–03, https://publications.parliament.uk/pa/cm200203/cmselect/cmeduski/ 425/425.pdf. ———. 2003b. Widening participation in higher education, http://www.educationengland.org.uk/documents/pdfs/2003-­widening-­participation-­he.pdf. ———. 2003c. 21st century skills: Realising our potential. https://www.gov.uk/ government/publications/21st-­c entury-­s kills-­r ealising-­o ur-­p otential-­ individuals-­employers-­nation. Doughty, R. 2015. 70 years of change and challenge in FE colleges - 1945-1992. Association of Colleges (11 September), https://www.aocjobs.com/ blog/76-­years-­of-­change-­and-­challenge-­in-­fe-­colleges-­1945-­2021. Exley, S. 2020. Blame or betterment?: Regulation and intervention in further education, Further Education Trust for Leadership. Gillard, D. 2018. Education in England: A History http://www.educationengland.org.uk/history/chapter17.html. Goldstone, R. 2019. The origins of further education in England and Wales. London: BERA. Green, A. 1995. Technical education and state formation in nineteenth–century England and France. History of Education 24 (2): 123–139. Haasler, M.S.R. 2020. The German system of vocational education and training: Challenges of gender, academisation and the integration of low-­achieving youth. Transfer 26 (1): 57–71. Heyward, G. 2019. Schools lead the way but the system must change: Rethinking career and technical education. Seattle: The Centre on Reinventing Public Education. Higher Education Statistics Agency. 2018. Higher education student statistics: Alternative providers, 2016/17 – Summary. HESA. https://www.hesa.ac. uk/news/16-01-2020/sb255-higher-education-student-statistics. Accessed 19 May 2022. Jephcote, M. 1996. Principals’ responses to incorporation: A window on their culture. Journal of Further and Higher Education 20 (2): 33–48.

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Kratz, A. 1990. A comparison of the vocational training system of Britain and West Germany as experienced by minimum-age school leavers. Birmingham: Aston University. Kreisman, D., and K. Stange. 2019. Depth over breadth. Education Next 19 (4): 1–3. Lingfield. R. 2012, Professionalism in Further Education Final Report of the Independent Review Panel, Department for Education, https://www.gov.uk/ government/publications/professionalism-­in-­further-­education-­final-­report-­ of-­the-­independent-­review-­panel. McTavish, D. 2003. Aspects of public sector management. A case study of further education, ten years from the passage of the further and higher education act. Educational Management and Administration 31 (2): 175–187. Mirza-Davies, J. 2015. A short history of apprenticeships in England: From medieval craft guilds to the twenty-first century. House of Commons Library. Roberts, A. 2010. The incredible human journey. London: AandC Black. Simmons, R. 2008. Golden years? Further education colleges under local authority control. Journal of Further and Higher Education. 32 (4): 359–371. Smithers, A., and P. Robinson. 1993. Centre for Education and Employment Research. Project Report, June 2004 Exley in ‘Caliban’s Dance’ Ed Orr, et al, 2020. Trentham Books http://www.educationengland.org.uk/documents/ pdfs/2004-tomlinson-report.pdf May 2022 St.Espirit, M. 2019. The stigma of choosing trade school over College. The Atlantic. The Edge Foundation. 2018. Debating the first principles of English vocational education. Edge Foundation. Tomlinson, Mike. 2004. 14–19 curriculum and qualifications reform: Final report of the Working Group on 14–19 Reform. http://www.educationengland.org.uk/ documents/pdfs/2004-tomlinson-report.pdf. Accessed 19 May 2022. UK Commission for Employability and Skills. 2010. Annual Report, https:// www.gov.uk/government/publications/uk-­commission-­for-­employment-­ and-­skills-­annual-­report-­2009-­to-­2010. Vlasova, H. 2020. Community college statistics - 2020 (by the Facts & Figures). Admissionsly. Waitt, I. 1980. College administration. London: The National Association of Teachers in Further and Higher Education.

3 The Policy Conundrum

Introduction The values with which managers come to work in the further education and skills sector can sometimes jar with the way in which successive governments want to ‘measure’ the impact and value of what education is. Chapter 2 highlighted the long-standing challenges that FE has had with not having a clear definition of its role or clear funding methodology. Neither a technical-rational perspective or a more formative approach may match the ambitions of students who may engage in education to support their self-development, to re-train, or to develop new approaches to their work (or all of these). The challenge, then, comes in how standards are interpreted in the moment, and how a sense of vision for education, that can transcend these perspectives, can be developed. Moreover, part of the challenge is that work by people such as Doyle and Harris (1986), Orr (2017), and Petrie (2020), articulate the strains in the sector but not propose broad systemic responses to improvement rooted in the current or a potential future policy paradigm. The sense of direction articulated in the literature is accurate, but the impact remains to be seen and taken seriously through peer-review processes, ministerial edicts, or otherwise. The research is often conducted by those from outside the sector rather than from within. However, in recent times this has given over © The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2022 J. Baldwin et al., Managerial Cultures in UK Further and Vocational Education, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-04443-4_3

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to practitioners within the sector turning to research with the aim of improving their practice. For example, Gregson et  al. (2020) present research from the Education Training Foundation (ETF) on how standards are developed and understood. This has to be taken in the context of successive governments, who return to the inspection and assessment types that do not take into account the context that FE operates in. Indeed, as Keep (2018, 43) argues, ‘the other issue for FE that looms ever larger is a flawed and inadequate model of accountability’. The very nature of assessment in FE is problematic: Examinations standards, what they mean and they are measured, are often assumed to be unproblematic ….very different approaches are used around the World. (Opposs and Baird 2020, 2)

It is these assessments that lead to the standards (detailed in Chap. 2) reporting which begin to inform inspection regimes.

 hilosophical Approaches to Educational P Structures, Systems, and Processes There is a counterargument to such approaches to inspecting further education based on the measures that have already been discussed in Chap. 2. While Aristotle focused much of his later writing on the ‘good’ life, his early work focused on trying to define the ‘essence’ of an object (ref ). Much of Chap. 2 was focused on exploring the ‘essence’ of the FE sector and how this is hard to define. This is partly because its financial insecurity (which, as we have argued, is a consequence of technical-rational approaches to educational evaluation and improvement) has meant that the sector has morphed into many things as it tries to satisfy its varied audiences. Moreover, the FE and skills sector transcends a number of government departments which means that it has to adapt and change quickly to meet the vagaries and demands of sometimes conflicting government policies and ministers.

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However, as Fielding et al. (2005) and many others have highlighted, it takes time to bring about real and deep change in an education system. This stands in stark contrast to a technical-rational world view which assumes that change can be brought about by people at the top simply telling people at the bottom what to do. The technical-rational world view implies that pace of change can be rapid. Indeed, in FE there are many occasions where there has been a misunderstanding of the nature of leadership practice and there has not been sufficient emphasis on the interactions that managers have with others. Moreover, the range of policies surrounding the education system that consecutive governments seem to bring out can shift the ground on which institutions stand quite quickly (refs). Successive government policies in the past ten years assert that to ensure that individuals are able to experience a high-quality and respected system of tertiary education with both vocational and academic options, we need, as a country, to have a vision we can work towards. However, as a manager having to balance all the competing priorities, the lack of joined-up policy around this strikes us as difficult to achieve. Moreover, with such a centralised control, it is difficult for those that manage managers to develop skilled managers, and teachers need to take actions based on good decisions arrived at democratically in context and with a clear sense of purpose, in our experience. These challenges of undemocratic approaches and the challenge of the technical rationale have existed for some time in education. Dewey (1916) asserts that education should be about supporting individuals and communities to lead a ‘fulfilled life’. However, again, a technical-rational approach to educational evaluation and improvement does not always support this. ‘In-vogue’ words are often used in the FE, college HE, and HE sectors to try to encapsulate what the sector should be ‘about’. The words and phrases that appear in many reports and research documents which circulate in the sector claim to inform ‘curriculum planning’, and they will often include claims that particular activities improve ‘employability’ and ‘widen participation’. Indeed, in a basic count of seven such papers through 2020 these phrases featured in over 50 per cent of the documents. While many bodies provide various interesting definitions of all these activities, it can be difficult to see how those definitions can lead

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to anything tangible until we acknowledge that they are challenging to enact, complex to understand, and mean different things in different contexts. For example, what ‘employability’ and an ‘employability’ strategy might look like in central London may be different to rural Lincolnshire. However, the broad target set for a student undertaking the same T Level in each context is the same. In Good Education in an Age of Measurement (2010), Biesta considers the phenomenon that in the last 20 years preoccupations with the ways in which education is measured have increased. He asserts that the focus on educational measuring is not something that resides wholly in the UK.  Biesta (2010, 11) asks, ‘are we indeed measuring something we value’ or simply valuing what is easy to measure? He concludes that we are valuing what we can easily measure and that, in this way, the measure is becoming the element of value. At this point he argues that language gains increasing importance. Often measures of education are described in terms of ‘effectiveness’ which is, in itself, an instrumental value. Whether or not the outcomes of such a process of measurement are desirable is an entirely different matter. Biesta (2010, page needed) argues that we need ‘ultimate’ values (values that establish us as collaborative, caring, democratically empowered citizens) rather than ‘instrumental’ values (such as those that focus on financial gain at the expense of others) and that the quest for ‘effective’ educational practice is, therefore, not enough. In a similar vein, Dunne (2005) reminds us that often in education legislation there is a significant lack of philosophy that would focus on achieving ultimate values. Dunne (2005, 11) asserts that upholding these values allows the other elements of leadership, such as ‘strategic planning’, to gain traction. He then seeks to frame the practice of education as a moral, ethical, and democratic activity which requires those engaged in it to exercise good judgement based on a strong theoretical underpinning. However, he charts how legislation and the technical-rational perspective can prevent such approaches taking place in practice. For example, Dunne discusses a proposed education green paper in the Irish Republic in relation to the ‘wider social and economic mix’ (2005, 145). The approach he highlights, and that the Irish government has taken, reflects the way HE has been positioned within England; the full marketisation of higher education demonstrates that the idea of loans for study

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is that they yield some form of economic return. As Dunne (2005, 67) says, ‘in our understanding and practice of education we must situate it realistically within some wider sense of where social and economic change is taking place and what it will require of our pupils if they are to negotiate it in ways satisfactory and enhancing to themselves and to society’. Fielding (2005) emphasises how the language we use to describe educational policy and its aspirations matters a great deal because it influences how and how well we can identify and distinguish between levels of change in education and most importantly because the same language signifies the relays of power and control at work in the framing of notions of ‘social justice’ and a ‘better’ society. Fielding challenges current approaches to assessing the ‘impact’ of education in England and draws attention to their deeper ontological and epistemological roots in the seventeenth- and eighteenth-century mechanical world views. Fielding (ibid) also notes how the technical-rational approach to education reform, coupled with a ‘fatuous’ and ‘hectoring’ form of language – that is, the language of ‘performance’ - has come to pervade the discourse of educational policy in England through notions of ‘impact’ and outcomes. Biesta and Burbules (2003), and Biesta (2007), show how Dewey offers a different way to think about knowledge and the real (based on experience), which is very different from the technical-rational world view. Through an accessible and vivid account of Dewey’s pragmatic philosophy, Biesta and Burbles (2003) illustrate how Dewey’s work provides a way of approaching educational research which not only is humane but also manages to avoid the polarising pitfalls of positivism, post-­positivism, and postmodernism. If higher education is to be re-imagined post COVID-19, and if those charged with being guardians of such an important sector (as demonstarted by the scientific discoveries during the COVID-19 pandemic), then new ways of working need to be discovered. Higher education has demonstrated that by working collaboratively things vital to society (such as finding a vaccine or designing new ventilators) swifter and better solutions to problems can be found. New ways will be more pragmatic, democratic, and, potentially, collaborative, drawing on the best from the sector and recognising that the market may not always know best.

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 anagement and Leadership Formation into M This Approach Already, we have noted some of the challenges of achieving the internal goods of educational leadership because of technical-rational approaches which pervade the sector. McLaughlin (Commission on Adult Vocational Teaching and Learning, 2013) argues that everything seems reduced to a ‘value neutrality’ with respect to education. Winch argues that while the journey of the philosophy of education has been profound in FE it is perhaps not yet fully understood. Winch describes the journey of philosophy as one from where the learner is at the centre of everything to one which recognises the complexity in the situation; he is arguing that the prevailing discourse in FE has been ‘learner centred’ or ‘student first’ (giving echoes of Miliband’s ‘personalised learning’) but it is shifting to one of articulating values, purpose, sector, and institutional approach. White (2010) describes philosophy as breaking concepts down and sharing them in their relationship to other actions. We are not just concerned with the meaning of beliefs but also with their justification and truth. In 1982, White said he was concerned that philosophy was a mere classification. He set out to outline what he saw the aims of an education to be. As such philosophical approaches emerge, there may be an opportunity to tackle the technical-rational with a more democratic response. A technical-rational world view would assume that effective leadership is related to high levels of command and control. However, there is an alternative to approaches to educational evaluation and improvement and education leadership based upon technical-rational world views and high levels of top-down command and control. Coffield (2014) challenges us to consider ways in which we can create ‘powerful, democratic, professionals’. In Beyond Bulimic Learning (2014), he proposes six responses to issues of the exercise of power in FE. He calls those involved in educational leadership to encourage and enable teachers to be able to gain a secure and growing knowledge of their subject, guiding learning to desirable outcomes and provide feedback that helps learners to progress. He also notes how realising these responses in practice can guide learning to desirable outcomes, provide feedback that helps learners to progress,

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are alive to the emotional aspects of learning, and can offer convincing evidence that their learners have learnt from engaging in learning activities with their tutors. Coffield (2014) argues that educators can no longer confine their role to improving teaching, learning, and assessment; and instead he claims that there needs to be a debate which unpacks how power is exercised. As power is about a pattern of relationships, Coffield draws attention to how technical-rational approaches to educational evaluation and education leadership can be as linear an experience as much as it is top down. Sachs claims that the role of the teacher should be expanded to include contributing to the school life, to the school system, and to students beyond those which are taught. While all these arguments make sense is isolation and in theory, they are often easier to describe on paper than to enact in practice in the many contexts of FE. This may be because government policy and inspection regimes (and the interpretation of them) can have different meanings for different people. It may also be because of how professional and personal relationships have developed against the backdrop of these activities. Sennett (2012) observes that there is an inverse relationship between competence and hierarchy; individuals in organisations may lose their ability to challenge assumptions and find new ways of working either to protect their position or because external policies and inspection regimes dictate certain types of behaviour. Coffield (2014) argues that there are two co-existing models of leadership. Firstly, a professional model where staff, teachers, and managers wish to be treated as members of the same profession. The second is a management model where senior management teams run the arguments and unions protect the interest of their members. Coffield’s arguments remain polemic. According to Coffield (2014), for a model of trust to work it has to become a two-way process where managers and teachers work collaboratively. While Sennett (2012) contests that communities are easy to set up, co-operation is hard to achieve because ‘co-operation involves learning to live with people who think differently’. He takes the view of Malcom Gladwell (ref ) that it takes over 10,000 hours to become skilful at something and says the same is true of cooperation. As few of us have that sort of time to devote to such mastery, Sennett suggests

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‘short-cuts’ and leaders can become key catalysts in supporting these. Coffield argues that it is these kinds of short-cuts which prevent the technical-rational from being challenged. The Leadership Foundation for HE (now part of Advance HE, ref. needed) refers to the ‘school and college’ sector when examining the strengths and pitfalls of leadership in higher education. They highlight the ‘difficulties in identifying priority organisational goals from the plethora of perspectives, weighing their relative importance, finding measures of achievement and methods to accurately attribute the cause of success to leadership and not wholly or partly to other factors’ (Lumby 2012, 9). They conclude that there is recognition that ‘leaders may be differently effective, that is they may have more success in some areas of activity than others, or at different points of their tenure’ (2012, 13). There is an acceptance that success depends on the level of challenge and on the effectiveness of overcoming that challenge. The Leadership Foundation would, therefore, describe an effective leader as achieving more than that might be expected in the light of its starting point. Indeed, the claim that leadership is very important in ‘…education, has become something of a mantra’ (Lumby and Foskett 2005). Many suggest that this is because it is the easiest way to achieve things like good quality teaching and learning, and excellent research. However, much of the literature suggests that it is ‘more nuanced than that’. Guiver tells us that achieving ‘simplicity’ is hard fought. He says to have things at the point where they are straightforward and understood and everyone is able to see the direction of travel that this does not come without considerable anguish. Firstly, we have to recognise ourselves. To do this we need to carefully analyse ourselves and explore the constituent parts and reflect on how those parts fit together and cause certain actions. We then need to think about what these actions say about us and how they contribute to what is important. Corrie gives us a very simple exercise to start to think about this. She says that we should write down on separate pieces of paper the five non-material things we value most. We should then ask ourselves what we have done in the past 24 hours to live these values. There is then a game she encourages where people decide which of the five are of least importance and remove that

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value. They continue to do this until they are left with the most important things to them. In 80 per cent of cases I have witnessed (and I have played this with over 400 individuals) ‘family’ ends up being the most important value. This then brings us on to the role of leadership, relationships, and happiness, and to consider these in the context of technical-rational approaches within further education. How do the values that leaders have themselves and for the sector ‘play out’? The earliest discussions around decision making and ways of working can be found in Ancient Greece through the work of those writing about ethics. Virtue ethics begins not with ‘what is the right thing to do?’ but ‘what is the best way to live?’. This approach was described by the Ancient Greeks as ‘eudaimonia’ or ‘good human life’, which can be translated as ‘happiness’, and to do this, one needs to be able to reason the situation an individual is in. Aristotle identifies practical reasoning as leading to a ‘final end’, which is posed for its own sake and for the sake of nothing else (ref ). However, he acknowledges that, because of events and other external challenges, what starts out as being the ‘final end’ does not always remain static. There is debate in educational settings as to whether the ‘final end’ is ‘to be the best we can be’. The concept itself makes sense, despite its lack of detailed argument; multiple ‘final ends’ could conflict with each other, and practical reasoning could not settle the conflict. Moreover, there is a debate whether or not policy and inspection regimes allow for that ‘single’ final ends or automatically lead to a position of multiple final ends. Central to Virtue Ethics are concepts that are “excellences of character, fairness, courage and self-control”. Virtue Ethics focuses on how these things can encourage people to leave ‘good lives’. It is worthwhile spending time considering how leaders in higher education institutions enact these values and inculcate others into spaces where they can enact these virtues. Grosch (2000) argues that ‘right action’ can be understood only in relation to the virtues. Attached to this, however, is debate, expressed by Zyl and others, on how precisely the virtues can be defined. Schmidtz (cited Dunne 2005, 17) says ‘virtue ethics tell us that what is right is to be a certain kind of person - a person of virtue; courageous, modest, honest, even-handed, industrious...a

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virtuous person will express his or her virtue through action’ (Dunne 2005, 11). Therefore, it could be that what Biesta, Dunne, Ryle, Coffield, and others are calling for are leaders who are virtuous, with a real sense of wanting to achieve the good life for those around them. Perhaps they are saying that managers should seek happiness first and positive external Qualification Achievement Rate reports later.

Pedagogic Leadership The tendency of educational development to proceed by reaction from one thing to another, to adopt for one year, or for a term of seven years, this or that new study or method of teaching, and then as abruptly to swing over to some new educational gospel … would be impossible if teachers were adequately moved by their own independent intelligence.

Arguably, Dewey’s observation is as true today as it was in 1904. Every education reform brings new challenges. For example, between 2017 and 2021 further education (FE) colleges in England had to contend with an array of policy reforms including the introduction of the Office for Students, a changed higher education (HE) regulatory regime, a new Office for Standards in Education (Ofsted) inspection framework. Ofsted (2021) changes to minimum quality standards (i.e. those performance measures used by evaluation and funding agencies which determine the thresholds outcomes cannot go below) and the implementation of technical education reforms amongst others! The challenge facing leaders across the sector has been to work out how to successfully navigate all these changes in the contexts of their own institutions. This is no mean feat as it involves constantly designing and redesigning curriculum provision, and re-aligning pedagogic practice to these and a range of other political and policy directives—such as the introduction of the Industrial Strategy, Brexit, and Technical Education (to name a few) while remaining true to enduring educational values and maintaining high standards. Dewey’s Laboratory School (1896–1904) in Chicago set out to test different conditions in which those involved in education could work together to solve educational problems and improve the educational

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experiences of learners, in the interest of enhancing both their lives and life chances. Dewey sounds a cautionary note where he reminds us that ‘by means of achievement and mental tests carried on from the central office, of a steadily issuing stream of dictated typewritten communications, of minute and explicit syllabi of instruction, the teacher is reduced to a living phonograph’. In recent times, a number of approaches to quality improvement in the Further Adult and Vocational Education (FAVE) system in England, of which FE plays a very significant part, have been introduced, including a rise in the establishment of institutions charged with responsibility for measures of quality assurance. Audit regimes exist around all of these, and consequences are grave for those teachers and education leaders whose practice is measured in terms of high stakes standardised tests (such as GCSEs, A Levels, and tests that now exist in vocational qualifications all of which go into making league tables) the effects of which Cunningham in Fielding et al. traces to a ‘diminished professionalization of teachers’. Atherston (2017, 65) describes how China is revered in the West for its performance in the PISA (Programme for International Student Assessment) and other International measures of educational success/attainment, yet he questions whether or not we should seek to emulate them. This is not a new argument. The detrimental impact that such approaches have on relationships between teachers and education leaders is well documented in the work of the above authors among others. However, politicians are very aware that moving closer towards topping these league tables plays out well in the polls for governments seeking re-election (Biesta 2010, 15). This is evidenced in the number of guidance documents proclaiming the virtues of league tables and other similar means of measuring the quality of education, while allowing unqualified individuals to teach in mainstream education and, despite purporting to reduce bureaucracy, effectively increasing workloads. This chapter argues that approaches to educational improvement and evaluation are not only indicative of further attempts to de-professionalise teaching but also eroding democratic approaches to decision making. In turn, legislation such as the Technical Education Act is changing the very nature of leadership in the further education sector, turning it away from more inclusive and democratic cultures and moving

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it ever closer towards a culture of command and control, involving practitioners across the sector working pragmatically and democratically.

The Current Situation The FAVE and FE sectors traditionally attract people who have specific skills and experiences in their vocational area, and who use their expertise to work cooperatively with others, either to bring them into their profession or to lead teams of other professionals in the sector. The policy changes generally referred to above have led to modifications in the approaches employed to develop leadership and management of the sector. Sennett (2003, 17), drawing on the Auden poem ‘Sext’, describes how craftsmanship and mastery are needed to develop a vocation: You need not to see what someone is doing to know of his vocation, you only have to watch his eyes: a cook mixing a sauce, a surgeon making a primary incision, a clerk completing a bill of landing, wear the same rapt expression, forgetting themselves in a function.

Having held leadership and research roles in further education for a number of years, we have seen capable individuals being unable to fulfil the craft of education and good practice in education leadership (that is ‘to make a ‘thing’ well’ – in this case the craft and practice of leadership) due to the impact of the kinds of legislation and prevailing philosophies and culture detailed above. Furthermore, we have not seen many leadership development programmes which focus on the mastery of the craft and practice of education leadership (by mastery Sennett (2003) argues this is the demonstration or embodiment of a practice to others). The question, then, becomes one surrounding which structures prevent education leaders from demonstrating mastery of their craft.

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In view of the above, there clearly needs to be consideration of what these issues mean for the practice of leading teaching and learning, and then how leaders in the sector can inculcate these practices in the people they lead. If there is an assumption that FE and College Higher Education (CHE) involve the notion of ‘vocational’ mastery, then it could be argued that the type of leadership the sector requires is ‘pedagogic’. In 2013 the 157 Group of Colleges (now known as the Collab Group 2022) developed a Think Piece (authored by Bill Lucas and Guy Claxton) on ‘Pedagogic Leadership’. The paper draws on the work of the Commission on Adult Vocational Teaching and Learning, which started to carve a notion of vocational pedagogy. In the paper four elements are proposed that make the essence of pedagogic leadership: creating a climate for ‘outstanding’ learning; a focus on the science, craft, and art of vocational pedagogy; the creation of a culture where teachers, employers, and leaders learn together; and a focus on making the necessary changes to improve learning. The authors offer seven steps to creating a vocational pedagogy that can apply equally in Vocational Education and Training (VET), College Higher Education (CHE), or HE. First, the goal must be agreed. Secondly, the desired outcomes from the educational experience must be articulated. Thirdly, the nature of the subject must be reflected on to support learners to ‘become’ in a particular vocational role. Fourth, a range of vocational learning methods should be explored. Fifth there needs to be an understanding of learners and their prior learning needs. Sixth there has to be a realistic consideration of the vocational setting. Seventh there needs to be a consideration of the dimensions of learning. Lucas et  al. (2013, 9) propose a triangle that details the ‘signature pedagogies’ of a particular vocation which resembles Biesta’s spheres of education. The dimensions of vocation learning cover various elements including attitudes towards learning and the proximity of the learner to the teacher, which are useful to consider how learners engage in the learning process. While the notion of a vocational pedagogy seems a positive development for VET, these steps may not be ‘deep’ enough to contain the full extent of College Higher Education (CHE). For example, notions of scholarship, and Boyer’s four areas of activities in relation to this (1990), could be mapped into them.

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Neoliberalism Remains all Pervading Freedon argues that ‘the most prominent misrepresentations of liberalism have been the introduction of the term ‘neoliberalism’ ’. He goes on to explain that ‘neoliberals tend to view the world as an immense and potentially unencumbered global market’, which focuses on the exchange of goods for profit. Marginson (2017, 12) describes education as a part of self-formation. Drawing comparators in international education, he argues that (as Zhao and Biesta 2011: 3 have) this self-­ determination is part of the Confucian practice of ‘self-cultivation’. He argues that while this has often been an aspiration of those in education in Eastern cultures, in the West, neoliberal approaches have taken over education, and this has changed the emphasis and perhaps caused the conditions of the education acts and diametric opposites posed between educational philosophers and law makers. This leads to consideration of how ‘value’ is placed in Western education. Traditionally, judgement has been made in the form of exams, and increasingly through T-Levels and BTEC, exams are considered the Gold Standard. How this approach and how neoliberal policies have been implemented need consideration.

 he Context of COVID-19: A Legislative T Case Study The COVID-19 pandemic, which emerged from early 2020, has clearly affected the world in which we live. It has also had an impact on the way FE operates, how its leaders manage, and what the sector might be expected to do in the future. Indeed, during the time of the COVID-19 crisis many of our routines have had to change. The authors of this book have an interest in both further and higher education, and as practitioners with considerable experience of working in post-compulsory education, we have seen a range of reports on how colleges of higher education (CHE) have been affected during this time. This can be seen through the context on one piece of legislation – the Higher Education Research Act

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(HERA) 2017. It is a piece of legislation designed to bring competition and technical-rational approaches to higher education (in this sense, as this chapter demonstrates it could be called neoliberal); however, studies have shown it might not provide the most useful structures when responding to the COVID-19 pandemic. HERA makes space for a range of different types of providers to enter the HE market. Our research has considered it from the perspective of teaching, learning, and working in smaller HE providers, rather than in research-intensive higher education (HE) contexts, which for many years has tended to receive most attention. Phillip Augar during his review into higher education explored ways to address this lack of parity between the university and further education. Interestingly, this review was launched at a further education College by Teressa May when she was the prime minister, but the government response to it was delayed by the pandemic, which meant that the disparities he highlighted continued. There is a weekly podcast on HE that the authors of the book often listen to, and in a recent edition, the main topic that the guests on the podcast were discussing was how the COVID crisis, and the likely drop in student numbers (e.g. polling by Universities UK suggested in May 2020 that only around 86 per cent of domestic students would take up places at universities if there was a relative amount of ‘normal’ contact, but there would be an 86 per cent drop in much higher-fee-paying international students references) and accompanying fall in income, was leading to the potential for a number of long-established Higher Education Institutions (HEIs) to go bankrupt and of which HERA in itself appears unable to mitigate against. There were debates about ideas that had been put forward to introduce student number caps and to finance struggling institutions. However, many commentators on the programme argued that the solutions presented would assume that institutions would carry on as they always had and that they were not really focusing on changing partnership approaches to their activity. Any change to current or future legislation could have a significant impact on CHE and could change the nature of the role colleges have in HE in the future. Indeed, to respond to the crisis the Office for Students (OfS), the regulator for HE in England

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issued a consultation on adding additional regulatory conditions in relation to managing the crises and bolstering the financial resilience of the HE sector. There are contrasts to such technical-rational approaches, which are approaches that Scott (ref ) and others would argue are ways in which the state attempts to control activity and measure quality through lists, through tick-sheets, and through quantitative measuring. In other episodes of the podcast, and in lots of sectoral writing, it is evident that there is already a genuine change in working practices between education providers, student unions, and the public. There have been changes to create more collegiate ways of working and attempts to develop new approaches in challenging circumstances. What has been evident across all aspects of society is that the coronavirus epidemic will change how we work. Moreover, it is clear that there are deep political choices that the virus will leave us with as a society. These will range from how (and will) government allow people to live in dignity when there is an increased debt, higher pressure on jobs, when people have lost loved ones, and where social distancing - at least for a short period of time - needs to be maintained, to what kind of working practices we choose to adopt. It may also provide a fresh look at whether or not neoliberal approaches will remain all pervasive in education. In 2021, a White Paper for Further Education keeps being trailed, perhaps as a way to implement the Augar review. So how might the White Paper deal with colleges continuing to ‘serve the most vulnerable groups in society … ensuring the workforce has the skills needed for the local economy to prosper’? How might ideas of social mobility be taken into account? How do higher-level skills affect this? How might the college sector learn from the broader higher education community sector, pragmatically and democratically, and how might they collaborate on such ideas? Some of the ideas for this may be sown in ideas that have been trailed in the period from 2015 to 2018 by the Department for Education.

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How Does This Impact on Social Mobility? Chapter 2 demonstrated the boundaries between FE and school and traditional university. It also articulated how FE colleges are seen as places where a higher-level skills agenda might be enacted. Additionally, as Augar (2019) has highlighted, it is a place where this can be achieved using lower funding rates. While it has been said that education cannot compensate for society (Bernstein 1971a, b), teachers and others aspire to create opportunities for their students to contribute to the meritocratic ideal and the social mobility to which most contemporary societies subscribe. However, the challenge of creating such opportunities through education is not to be underestimated. International comparison shows that health, social, and educational problems are closely related to inequality within wealthy countries as shown in OECD reports (2013). These relative positions are measured regularly by international agencies and draw upon data within each country on issues such as social relations, life expectancy, mental health, obesity, and, not least, educational performance. In the case of the UK, there was a substantial rise in inequality during the 1980s, and in recent years the incomes of top earners have continued to increase far more than lower-paid workers (Sibieta 2011). Economists debate factors such as changes in employment opportunities, returns from high-level skills and education, regional differences, and demographic patterns to explain the increasing polarisation of rich and poor in the UK. The direct consequences of government policies on tax and benefits may moderate such structural factors, but the UK’s recent experience is of a low level of intergenerational mobility (Bynner and Parsons 2006). In other words, the circumstances of parents tend to be reproduced for their children. Longitudinal studies of cohorts of children who are now adults have shown that social mobility has stalled and there is a very strong correlation between the social group and income level of a child’s family and his/ her subsequent own position (Bynner and Parsons 2006). Bourdieu (1977) argues that overall social status is significantly affected by three forms of capital, each of which can be transferred from one generation to another. Economic capital concerns access to material assets. Social

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capital focuses on relationships in the family, community, or wider society, which offer contacts, networks, and support. Cultural capital relates to the understanding, knowledge, and capabilities of individuals to act within particular social settings. The seeds of difference are sown in the ways in which young children are brought up. Reay (2000) illuminates how mothers in different circumstances deploy emotional capital to support their children, and she suggests that generational reserves are built up over time. Atherston (2017), Baldwin et al. (2019), and others have written at length about the negative impact social mobility performance measures have on the FE sector. Not because they disagree with concepts of social mobility, but because they believe the post 16 measures are too narrow. The four key measures set by the Social Mobility Commission (ref ) currently reaffirm the test scores of Level 3 students and legitimise conditions of funding and other policies and have a narrow view of what a ‘selective’ university might be. This adds to the challenge of performativity and ensures that higher education institutions and further education Institutions do not work closely together. FE colleges are often overlooked as providers of post-18 education (Institute of Education 2017; Hill 2015; Callender 2017; Davy 2016). Yet, in drawing on evidence from a recent report by the Education and Training Foundation (2017), Martin (2017) argues that FE colleges ‘play an integral role in making higher education (HE) courses accessible to hundreds of thousands of learners’. Moreover, amongst those embarking on HE programmes delivered by colleges are significant numbers of students from traditionally underrepresented backgrounds. Indeed, a study by the Learning and Skills Improvement Service (Widdowson and King 2013, 6) suggests that those on HE programmes in FE colleges ‘are more likely to be older, to study part-time and to come from areas with low rates of participation in higher education than students in higher education institutions’. Gicheva and Petrie (2018) found that students whose parents worked in routine or manual occupations were twice as likely to enter HE having studied at least one vocational subject compared with those whose parents worked in higher managerial or professional roles. Similarly, Cockburn (2006) suggests that FE students who progress on to HE are more likely to be

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local and living with their families, not looking for a lifestyle change, studying vocational rather than academic programmes, career focused, and sensitive to financial matters (the Higher Education Policy Institute (HEPI) has since begun to use the term ‘commuter students’ to describe students with these characteristics). This means that the leadership of this provision is critical if FE colleges are going to fulfil part of the contested social mobility purpose of the sector. From an ontological perspective, we cannot take reality to be objective, nor singular, and need to accept that multiple realities are constructed by individuals (Coe et al. 2017, 16). However, as managers working in HE collectively we have seen that there are a potential striking number of flaws in relation to the legislation to develop a coherent set of practices that focus on achieving the goals of good education. One particular role of the OfS contained in HERA (as previously discussed) is to improve social mobility by ensuring that universities and FE colleges encourage students from underrepresented groups to enter higher education and ensure that they do well. If an HE provider wishes to charge more than the basic tuition fee of £6250, it must produce an Access and Participation Plan for the OfS indicating how it will spend some of the extra money gained on. • Increasing the number of students from underrepresented groups to access HE • Providing support for students from those groups to ensure that they do not drop out from their HE course • Ensuring that they achieve good degrees • Ensuring that they obtain ‘good’ jobs after they graduate These plans were provided annually, but in the last round this was changed to five-year plans, and the OfS provides a template for these plans which it suggests providers should use (OfS 2019). All providers do. The OfS also provides data for providers to use including a ‘dashboard’ of graphs showing comparisons between the provider and all the other providers. The template and associated guidance also suggest the format and content of the plans. The ‘Guidance’ is 54 pages long, and the ‘Advice on how to prepare an access and participation plan’ is 52 pages

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long. The Guidance (OfS 2019) suggests that the plan should begin with an assessment of the provider’s performance in relation to the whole student lifecycle, that is, access, success, and progression against the following groups of underrepresented students: • Those from areas with lower higher education participation or from lower household income • Those from Black, Asian, or minority ethnic backgrounds • Mature students • Disabled students • Care leavers The provider should then indicate, as a result of this analysis, what strategic aims, objectives, and targets they will set. Then how they will deliver and develop their strategic aims, objectives, and targets, and finally what investment the provider will make in closing the gap between their performance and the performance of the sector as a whole. The proportion of the extra income they have gained by charging a higher tuition fee that will be invested is at the discretion of the institution, and they must indicate how this extra income will be spent over the next five years. However, if the OfS does not accept what the provider has proposed, they will not be able to charge the higher fee for the coming year. Most universities charge a tuition fee of £9250 for undergraduate courses and thus gain an extra £3000 from each student. This process of producing access and participation plans began in 2019. Prior to that HE providers produced an access plan for the Office for Fair Access, which was a very much shorter and less complex document and gave the provider much more discretion in the content of the plan and the areas they were expected to concentrate on to improve access and participation at their institution. The new procedure is much more bureaucratic, takes a more technical-rational approach, and makes no distinction between the type of institution, for example, FE college or university, the number of students who study at the provider, or the types of programmes that are offered. This will be explored in more detail in Chap. 7.

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 e-thinking the Value and Purpose R of Education: Responses to a Range of Government Edicts In relation to the Skills and Post-16 Education White Paper and Commission reports, it is worth considering if HERA and this approach to social mobility promotes higher level skills and is really fit for purpose in a further education college environment. Dewey (1933, 26) counters the arguments that the purpose of education is to serve the economy where he takes a view that education is ‘the supreme art’ and ‘fundamental to social progress and reform’. He argues, education establishments should become like society. Thus, there is an opportunity to perhaps think about changes to HERA, and indeed any other form of education legislation, to start to create the kind of country and economy we might want to see in the future. Sarason (1996) highlights how education reform can become effectively locked into a cycle of failure where, ‘the more things change the more they remain the same, or (even get) worse’ (1996, 8) in such circumstances and situations the illusion of change, in the form of activity (or perhaps more accurately hyperactivity), masquerades as change itself. It is evident that leaders in FE genuinely feel that this is the case. The work of Sarason (1996, 8) is presented here not by way of idle pessimism but rather as an alert to the dangers of ‘missing the point’ and ‘ignoring the obvious’ in education reform and the suffering of consequences and costs of overlooking the potential of other ways of seeing impact which may be capable of taking these relationships into account. Dunne (2005, 23) underscores how technical-rational approaches to educational evaluation and improvement are fundamentally flawed, which draws attention to the ways in which practice is developed from the ground up by its insiders where he describes the development of practice in terms of: A coherently and invariably complex set of activities and tasks that has evolved cooperatively and cumulatively over time. It is alive in the community that are its insiders (i.e. genuine practitioners) and it stays alive

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only so long as they sustain a commitment to creatively develop and extend it – sometimes by shifts which may at the time seem dramatic or even subversive. Central to any such practice are standards of excellence, themselves subject to development and redefinition, which demand responsiveness from those who are, or trying to become practitioners.

Research from Insiders and Outsiders This then brings us to the questions around what good, educationally sound solutions to this might be. One of the interesting aspects of international responses to COVID-19 is the need to think differently, to collaborate differently, and to work towards a more optimistic and dignified view of the future. Sennett (2012, 65) describes this as ‘the fragile balance’. He observes: Mutual cooperation and competition can combine. The undertow of competition is aggression and anger, sentiments which are hard-wired into human beings. Rehearsals, conversations, coalitions, communities or workshops can countervail against this destructive pull, because the impulse for goodwill is also imprinted in our genes.

First, there are things that the Office for Students should be praised for. Notably, where they have adopted mutually cooperative and peer-­ review approaches. That said, some of the positive expansive approaches emerged from the days of the Higher Education Funding Council for England (HEFCE). If one takes, for example, the implementation of a subject-level Teaching Experience Framework (TEF), of course, there are a range of debates that rage around the efficacy of technical-rational approaches to quality improvement and quality enhancement. However, in this context there were two years of high levels of investment to test, discuss, and debate approaches, and peer-review methods. If this is compared to the approach that other inspection methods take, it is evident that a more longitudinal and democratic approach to finding ways of measuring the quality of education was taken than in some other inspection regimes (despite the scepticism of some HEIs).

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There has also been an attempt to get joined up. Mainly in widening participation and notably with the National Collaborative Outreach Programme (now known as Uni Connect, OfS 2022) and DfE measures in access and participation plans. However, here the tactics deployed by OfS have resulted in practitioners often expressing less than dignified thoughts (we think about various off-the-record discussions we have had with colleagues in this respect). It has led to organisations such as WONKHE, being able to frequently challenge unclear and woolly approaches written by the Regulator who seems to be omnipresent when policy and procedures are being developed and enacted. Therefore, what could be placed central to any framework could be an emphasis on practitioners in the sector articulating what is valuable and what needs to be developed, and to place emphasis on that. While the language of the market may be useful, COVID-19 has emphasised the language of collaboration, cooperation, problem solving, problem finding, and critique. When such approaches are put in place, it may be that the sector does not need to seek bail-outs but could move to a strong ecosystem across post-18 learning where the development of knowledge, skills, and behaviours is seen as critical to serve society as well as the economy.

Changing Practices While Fielding assessment of policy nomenclature may be accurate, further education simply copying higher education will mean that it continues to be in the shadows if some of the suggestions from Augar (2019) or the Department for Education Review of Level 4 and 5 Technical Education are to be put in place. The questions for further education in relation to this are thus: does HERA help or hinder that learning? Does the marketised approach of the Act recognise that, as Dewey said in ‘Democracy in Education’ (1916), ‘education is life’ and thus allow higher education (in taught contexts) to allow us to access all facets of life? The knowledge and skills we teach people, how we build curiosity, what we value are all brought to bear by educators, and technical-­rational approaches of funding and inspection should not

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hinder that. The pandemic has shown that the world needs experts, and it has realised it needs them (subsequent governments from 2010 have diminished the role of the ‘expert’ – but that is for another book). Scientists, doctors, nurses, designers, creative experiences, retail workers, drivers, public servants, and many more. All experts in their own right. All of these experts need expert teachers, working in democratic and open structures, espousing high standards, to inspire future generations of experts. Thus, an insistence on adopting technical-rational approaches to widening participation disadvantages major suppliers of higher education programmes. Therefore, our call to action must not squander the lessons learnt from COVID-19 and to ensure that all those that have lost their lives as a result of the pandemic have not done so in vain. Our action must be to support education, experts, and others to express their opinions, to engage in intellectual tussle, and to be trusted to develop systems based on values rather than league tables. Assuming that this is done then there are a number of things that could take place.

Prescription for Success First, as well as ‘levelling up’ poorer and richer regions, there needs to be ‘levelling up’ in education. Levelling up is a much-used term by politicians of the day to relate to closing geographically centred poverty gaps. This means that either HERA needs to pay greater and more specific emphasis on the role further education could play or it needs to not apply to FE. If it continues to apply then FE should be able to be funded in the type of ‘applied research’ articulated by Boyer, and HEIs should have clear guidelines about fees, funding, and partnership arrangements. Moreover, as everything level 4 and above is regulated by HERA (but not all inspected using the Ongoing Conditions or Registration), it should be to reduce the cost and burden of inspection regimes to colleges. There have been rumblings (e.g. in FE Week) about bringing colleges into the

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control of devolved government (as this has already happened in respect of some aspects of adult funding in some locations, refs to underpin this claim). While pragmatic and democratic principles often go hand in hand, ensuring that the structures that monitor activity understand models of social mobility and create the conditions for incremental improvement, not based on political whim, or perceived ‘quick win’ will be critical if educational practitioners are to be taken seriously in decision making. Second, and linked to the above, there needs to be a clear debate about how educational effectiveness is being judged, beyond simple metrics of the market or student satisfaction (neither of which truly represent the complexity in exercising good educational judgement). Measures of absolute and social mobility need to be broader and better understood. Tackling these issues needs appropriate funding and a research culture to establish what makes effective transference of Good Practice (in the same way the Centre for Transforming Access and Student Outcomes in Higher Education (TASO) is taking on issues relating to access and participation plans – mainly in HEIs) for the OfS. Established peer-review practices should become the norm. Third, within the spirit of the above, more pragmatic and democratic approaches and understanding may help to provide and sustain a system, rather than relying on power relationships of inspection bodies and awarding bodies. Finally, the report/review/sector/FE needs to acknowledge that these are inherently complex themes. Experts, leaders, and the sector need time to explore them and continue to make impact. This will involve money and time. Dewey wrote in 1916, Lacan developed ideas about changing subjectivity in the early 1960s, and none of this has yet percolated into further education. There is an opportunity to do this if there is a careful and considered evaluation of previous policy imperatives. Clearly, these are only a starting point to a potential approach, but they provide a clear way of being able to respond to whatever the White Paper says, based on evidence, and based on the experiences of those working within the sector.

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The Impact The creation of HERA, the Social Mobility Commission, and other approaches are just examples of legislation and devices that have been used to develop further education. They are part of a long list of things that have affected the sector (as Chap. 2 indicated). Since 1992, colleges have become businesses, principals became CEOs, and colleges entered the marketplace in a ‘climate of entrepreneurialism’ (Smith et al. 2017, 55). The Further and Higher Education Act 1992, which brought about incorporation, also made changes to governing bodies of FE colleges. Colleges were required to replace local authority representatives with businesspeople. Alexander (2010, 127) also points out that a raft of audits was introduced under the Act: panopticism is embedded within the ‘quality’ paradigm, the observation of teaching by internal inspectors and external agencies such as the Office for Standards in Education (Ofsted), as well as the endless mechanised data collection on student attendance, punctuality, achievement and retention.

As colleges were no longer supported by local authorities, they had to create HR, marketing, estates, and information services departments, and with them came managers who had not been lecturers. In management meetings less time was spent discussing students and education and more time spent discussing, HR, marketing, estates, and, particularly, finance matters. In the writer’s own college, the senior management team went from five managers who were concerned with curriculum to two – the others represented service departments, and they brought their own professional culture with them (Baldwin 2003). Thus, the culture of colleges went from near-collegiate to managerialist with a focus on finance, efficiency, and markets. This is supported by Wilkinson and Pickett (2010), who suggests that the introduction of managerial practices and ideologies into education eroded the influences and power of the educational professional. Gleeson and Knights (2008, 53) note that policy makers believe that the way to manage staff in FE colleges is to better induct them into the management of ‘the contradictory policies, funding arrangements, regulation, and stakeholder preferences that have captured

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the discourse of everyday leadership practice’, rather than focusing on their skills and knowledge. Jameson et al. (2004) writes that managers in FE are driven by loyalty to the college and a duty to achieve external funding requirements, outputs, outcomes, and budgetary control. Consequently, they tend to see lecturers and administrators as resources to be managed and ‘controlled’ for the achievement of efficient quality outcomes for the college. Jameson et al. (2004) goes on to point out that ‘curriculum planning’ and ‘business planning’ are often used as interchangeable terms, and while there may be links between the decisions Executive teams make and their curriculum plan, the process of developing curriculum and associated assessment strategies are, clearly, art forms in their own right.

Conclusion This chapter has explored the mixed and varied approaches on further education which have led to real challenges. The chapter has articulated the tensions between legislation, inspection, funding, and quality improvement regimes, and how these can often be considered to be slightly different to a philosophy of education put forward by many. In this context leadership in the sector has become increasingly fraught. Gregson et  al. observes that ‘leadership in the FE sector has become increasingly complex, with multiple and, at times, competing pressures ... the role of middle leaders has changed and grown in importance, particularly in implementing organisational change policies and programmes’. He argues that the technical rationale is taking over every element of FE leadership. Biggs points out that ‘understanding among middle leaders of each other’s professional role within their institutions is limited and their roles have differential power and perceived worth’, which the technicalrational does not always allow space to demonstrate. Indeed, since 1980, FE has been subject to 28 major pieces of legislation related to vocational, FE and skills training, six different ministerial departments, and 48 secretaries of state with relevant responsibilities. Moreover, no agency has survived longer than a decade (apart from the Association of Colleges (AoC) and the Association of Employers and Learning Providers (AELP)).

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This makes consistency and collaboration difficult. Yet, Dunne argues that we can only secure the internal goods of a practice if the practice is something that is engaged with in detail by its insiders and is based on relationships and the ability to work together as Sennett (2012) would argue. This sense of working together, he insists, must be about developing our own individual skills and attributes without being detrimental to others: ‘every achievement of excellence enriches all those that participate in or care about its practice (Sennett 2005, 153)’. As the higher-level skills agenda develops and perhaps becomes a more interesting space in which FE starts to define itself, there are increasing numbers and networks of relationships in the education landscape. However, rather than opening up spaces for cooperation and collaboration, as Sennett advocates, these increased numbers of networks and relationships serve a more technical-rational and bureaucratic purpose in that they create extra burden and give leaders more external things to respond to rather than focusing on educational improvement and evaluation in and across the sector. Chapter 4 starts to explore in more detail the impact of managerialism and neoliberalism on FE leaders and suggests changes to leadership approaches that could be taken to advance the cause of the sector. During the chapter we start to take the themes here and consider what this has meant for different types of leadership in the sector.

References Alexander, R.J., ed. 2010. Children, their world, their education. Final report of the Cambridge primary review. London: Routledge. Atherston, G. 2017. The success paradox: Why we need a holistic view of social mobility. Bristol: Policy Press. Augar, P. 2019. Independent panel report to the Review of Post-18 Education and Funding. DFE. Baldwin, J. 2003. The management styles of further education managers during rapid and extensive change. A case study. Unpublished PhD Thesis, Nottingham University. Baldwin, J., N. Raven, and R. Webber-Jones. 2019. Whose job is it anyway? Developing the practice of those who support the higher education progres-

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sion of further education students. In Transformative higher education: Access, inclusion and lifelong learning, ed. S.  Broadhead, J.  Butcher, M.  Hill, S.  McKendry, N.  Raven, R.  Renton, B.  Sanderson, T.  Ward, and S.W.  Williams, 111–128. London: Forum for Access and Continuing Education. Bernstein, B. 1971a. In On the classification and framing of educational knowledge, ed. M.F.D. Young. London: Collier-Macmillan. ———. 1971b. Class, codes and control. London: Routledge and Kegan Paul. Biesta, G. 2007. Why ‘what works’ won’t work: Evidence-based practice and democratic deficit in educational research. Educational Theory 57 (1): 1–22. ———. 2010. Good education in an age of measurement. London: Paradigm Publishers. Biesta, G., and N.C.  Burbules. 2003. Pragmatism and educational research. Lanham: Rowman and Littlefield. Bourdieu, P. 1977. Outline of a theory of practice. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Bynner, J., and S. Parsons. 2006. New Light on literacy and Numeracy. NRDC. Callender. C. 2017. How government can widen participation through FE. FE Week (August 11), https://feweek.co.uk/2017/08/11/how-­government-­can-­ widen-­participation-­through-­fe Cockburn, J. 2006. Case study 1: A Case Study of City College Norwich in The role of regional further education colleges delivering higher education in east of England. The Research & Development Bulletin 5. Coe, R.M., M. Waring, and J. Arthur Hedges, eds. 2017. Research methods and methodologies in education. Thousand Oaks: Sage. Coffield, F., ed. 2014. Beyond bulimic learning. London: London University Institute of Education (IOE). Collab Group. 2022. What we do. https://collabgroup.co.uk/about-­us Davy, N. 2016. Let’s take college higher education to the next level, TES (11 July) (online). Available at: https://www.tes.com/news/further-­education/breaking-­ views/lets-­take-­college-­higher-­education-­next-­level. Dewey, J. 1916. Democracy and education: An introduction to the philosophy of education. New York: Macmillan. ———. 1933. How we think: A restatement of the relation of reflective thinking to the educative process. Chicago: Henry Regnery. Doyal, L., and R.  Harris. 1986. Empiricism, explanation and rationality: An introduction to the philosophy of social sciences. London: Routledge.

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Dunne, J. 2005. What’s the good of education? In Reader in Philosophy of Education, ed. W. Carr. London: Routledge. Fielding, M., S.  Bragg, J.  Craig, I.  Cunningham, M.  Eraut, S.  Gillinson, M. Horne, C. Robinson, and J. Thorp. 2005. Factors influencing the transfer of good practice. Department for Education and Skills, https://dera.ioe.ac. uk/21001/1/RR615.pdf. Gicheva, N., and K. Petrie. 2018. Vocation, vocation, vocation, the role of vocational routes into higher education. London: The Social Market Foundation. http://www.smf.co.uk/wp-­. Gleeson, D., and D. Knights. 2008. Reluctant leaders: An analysis of middle managers’ perceptions of leadership in further education in England. Leadership 4: 49–72. Gregson, M., et al. 2020. Teaching in further vocational and technical education. London: Bloomsbury. Grosch, P. 2000. Paideia: Philosophy educating humanity through spirituality. International Journal of Children’s Spirituality 5: 2. Hill, M. 2015. Access and Widening Participation in College HE. Briefing paper 3: effective and collaborative outreach, Action on Access, https://www.aoc.co.uk/ sites/default/files/Briefing paper Effective and Collaborative Outreach pdf Institute of Education. 2017. Further education in England needs more policy attention, says study. http://www.ucl.ac.uk/ioe/news-­events/news-­pub/ aug-­2017/fe-­needs-­more-­policy-­attention, Institute of Education. Jameson, J., Hillier, Y. and Betts, D. 2004. The Ragged-Trousered Philanthropy of LSC Part-time Staff. Presented at the British Educational Research Association Conference, UMITST, Manchester. September 16-18th. Keep, E. 2018. FE colleges in England and the skills policy agenda. In: New Frontiers for College Education: International Perspectives, pp. 61–76. Lucas, B., G. Claxton, and E. Spencer. 2013. Progression in Student Creativity in School: First Steps Towards New Forms of Formative Assessments, OECD Education Working Papers, No. 86. Paris: OECD Publishing. Lumby, J. 2012. What do we know about leadership in higher education. The Leadership Foundation for Higher Education. Lumby, J., and N.  Foskett. 2005. Education policy, leadership and learning. London: Sage. Marginson, Simon. 2017. Higher education, economic inequality and social mobility: Implications for emerging East Asia. International Journal of Educational Development 63: 4–11.

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Martin, W. 2017. HE in FE: 7 things We’ve Learned, TES (18th August) (online). Available at: http://www.tes.com/news/further-­education/breaking-­ news/he-­fe-­7-­things-­weve-­learned%3famp Office for Students. 2019. Regulatory notice 1: Access and participation plan guidance. OfS. ———. 2022. What is Uni Connect, https://www.officeforstudents.org.uk/ advice-­and-­guidance/promoting-­equal-­opportunities/uni-­connect/. Ofsted. 2021. https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/education-inspection-framework Opposs, D., and J.-A. Baird. 2020. Governance structure and standard setting in educational assessment. Assessment in Education, Principles, Policy and Practice 27: 2. Orr, K. 2017. The principal: Power and professionalism in FE. In: M. Daley, K. Orr, and J. Petrie (eds.). London: IOE Press, pp. 149–152, 4 p. Petrie, C. 2020. Spotlight: Quality education for all during COVID-19 crisis (hundrED Research Report 01). United Nations. Reay, D. 2000. A useful extension of Bourdieu’s conceptual framework? Emotional capital as a way of understanding mothers’ involvement in their children’s education? The Sociological Review 48 (4): 568–585. Sarason. 1996. The predictable failure of education reform. San Francisco: Jossey-Bass. Sennett, R. 2003. Respect: The formation of character in an age of inequality. London: Penguin. ———. 2012. Together. London: Penguin. Sibieta, L. 2011. Inequality in Britain: An explanation of recent trends. London: Institute for Fiscal Studies. Smith, S., H.  Joslin, and J.  Jameson. 2017. Progression of college students in London to higher education 2011–2014, project report. London: Linking London. White, J. 2010. Why general education? Peters, Hirst and history. Journal of Philosophy of Education 43: 123. Widdowson, J., and M.  King. 2013. Brief guide for governors, senior staff and clerks in further education colleges: Higher education in further education colleges. Learning and Skills Improvement Service. Wilkinson, R., and K. Pickett. 2010. The spirit level: Why equality is better for everyone. London: Penguin.

4 It’s the Economy Stupid!

Much of this book is concerned with the impact that a range of external factors have had on the way that further education colleges are managed, their culture, the types of education they provide, the kinds of students they recruit, the way they teach their students, and the way that students are treated. This chapter will examine one of these factors, the impact of managerialism and neoliberalism. It will do so by examining how the philosophies of managerialism and neoliberalism were introduced and how they have evolved and impacted not only on colleges but on all educational bodies. It will examine in detail the various ways in which these philosophies, which have coalesced into new public management (NPM), have detrimentally permeated every aspect of college management and life. This chapter concludes by suggesting an alternative philosophy. One that could ensure that college students get better education and training, which is not solely focused on employment and the needs of the UK economy.

© The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2022 J. Baldwin et al., Managerial Cultures in UK Further and Vocational Education, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-04443-4_4

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How Managerialism Came About Managerialism came to the fore in the 1980s during the reign of Margaret Thatcher and Ronald Reagan when they both believed that public sector organisations had become too flaccid, inefficient, cosy, and expensive, and were a drain on the public purse. People who worked in the public sector were often very comfortable and had a job for life (Dorey 2015, 1). They needed some of the pressures that are exerted on private sector organisations to make them more effective and efficient. This view has continued through the Blair years (of 1997 to 2007) to the present day (Hodgson and Spours 2006). In the 1980s Brown and Lauder (1996) suggested that new-right politicians believed that inflation, high unemployment, economic recession, and urban unrest all stemmed from the principles of Keynesian economics and an ideology which promoted economic redistribution, equality of opportunity, and welfare rights for all. They believed that public servants should become more efficient, and budgets should be cut. Private sector disciplines should be introduced in the public services. The inefficiencies of bureaucracy should be flushed out, and a quasi-competitive, marketplace framework should be introduced. Randle and Brady (1997) suggested that good public service management would deliver the 3 Es—economy, efficiency, and effectiveness. ‘Good management did not exist in the public sector prior to 1979 and good management was to be found in the private sector. Privatisation and the marketisation of public sector institutions would therefore improve the 3 E’s’ (Randle and Brady 1997, 230). This change in thinking was evident in the civil service when the UK government made a 20 per cent cut in employees between 1979 and 1988, personal objectives were set for each individual, and competitive tendering and contracting out was introduced in 1986 (Castellani 2018). In the National Health Service, Area Health Authorities were abolished in 1982, performance indicators were introduced in 1983, and performance-­related pay was introduced for general managers in 1987. In 1989 hospitals were given self-governing status, internal markets were created, and fund holding created for general practitioners. Trow (1994,

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2–3) suggests that higher education was affected by managerialism in two stages. The first which he calls ‘soft’ managerialism occurred when the Thatcher government (1979–1990) decided that HE was overfunded and too reliant on government funding and consequently cut funding back. The second, and ‘hard’ stage, was introduced later when the government decided that it was necessary to improve the effectiveness and efficiency of universities by introducing business-like methods to ascertain their strengths and weaknesses and tools which could be used to continually improve the produce and drive down unit costs (Trow 1994, 3). The Education Reform Act 1988 brought the first stage of managerialism to schools when it reduced the role of Local Education Authorities (LEA) by shifting management of schools towards governors, by enabling schools to opt out of LEA control by becoming grant maintained and funded directly by national government, by establishing a National Curriculum, and by facilitating open enrolments giving parents more choice as to which schools their children attended (Dorey 2014). Wright (2001) suggests that managerialism is both an ideology and a set of management practices. Gradually, as the general principles of managerialism became entrenched in public sector organisations, the expression New Public Management began to be used as the way that managerialism applied specifically to public sector bodies (Ferlie et  al. 1996). More recently, the expression neoliberalism has also been introduced as an ideology that also impacts on public sector bodies and is more specifically concerned with creating competition and introducing a marketplace. Throughout this book one of the overarching themes is managerialism/new public management/neoliberalism and the impact these have had on education and other public sector organisations. The three expressions, managerialism, new public management, and neoliberalism, are all linked and all relate to management philosophies that have become more prevalent from the 1980s. However, there appears to be no common understanding of what each of these mean and the boundaries between them. Gordon and Whitchurch (2010, 4–5), for instance, suggest that in the context of education, managerialism has six main characteristics:

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• A greater separation of academic work and management activity • Increased control and regulation of academic work by managers • A perceived shift in authority from teachers to managers and a weakening of the status of teachers • An ethos of enterprise and income generation • Government policy focused on FE colleges and universities meeting socio-economic needs • More market orientation with an increased competition for resources However, Shepherd (2018) suggests that managerialism and neoliberalism are different, and the first three above could be perceived as being managerialism, while the last three are more closely related to neoliberalism. She believes that managerialism plus neoliberalism equals New Public Management (NPM) and produced the following (Table 4.1) to illustrate this. Table 4.1  Practical manifestations of NPM reform and their ideological roots Neoliberalism

Managerialism

• The introduction of market-type mechanisms and competition • The commodification of services • A focus on value for money and doing more with less (i.e. efficiency) • Central regulation and/or control • The adoption of an entrepreneurial culture • A shift of priorities from universalism to individualism • An emphasis on service quality and consumer orientation and choice • Greater flexibility of pay and conditions • The growth of contractual relationships (e.g. purchaser-provider) • A blurring of public-private sector boundaries and increased scope for private sector provision

• The adoption of a more business-like approach and private sector practices • The establishment of a management culture • A rational approach to management (e.g. strategic planning and objective setting) • A strengthening of the line management function (e.g. performance management) • Adoption of human resource management techniques to secure employee commitment • A shift from inputs and processes to outputs and outcomes • More measurement and quantification of outputs (e.g. performance indicators)

Shepherd (2018), 1669

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Incorporation The Education Reform Act 1988 began to loosen Local Education Authority (LEA) control over FE colleges, but the major ways that NPM manifested itself on FE colleges in the UK were the passage of the Further and Higher Education Act 1992. This took further education colleges and polytechnics out of local authority control, with colleges going through an incorporation process which made them quasi-independent bodies. The aim of the Act was to introduce: Far reaching reforms designed to provide a better deal for young people and adults—to give colleges much greater freedom to manage their own affairs and through a funding regime, a powerful financial incentive to recruit additional students and thereby expand participation. (Hansard 1991, 532, Lord Belstead, Paymaster General)

Simmons (2010) recounts that before 1993 the role of FE colleges varied markedly across the country. As there were over 100 different LEAs funding FE colleges, the type of provision offered differed depending on the proximity of schools, polytechnics, universities, and other colleges. Some had a major role but others little (Waitt 1980). Simmons (2008) describes the role of colleges as variable between LEAs including the amount of funding the LEA provided. FE teachers had generous terms and conditions of employment which were designed to draw well-­ qualified professionals away from industry or commerce and into colleges (Taubman 2000, 83). Consequently, Simmons (2010) suggests that this Act had a profound impact on the management, organisation, and funding of FE colleges. Rather than being supported by the local authorities who had provided most administrative and estate services previously, colleges became responsible for their own affairs and thus had to create their own human resource (HR) departments and employ accountants and estate managers, whilst college managers had to move from a role as academic managers to business managers. College governing bodies were required to have at least 50 per cent of their membership drawn from industry or commerce thus encouraging private sector philosophies and views to be used

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at the highest level of college management. Management structures in colleges moved away from an educational focus to a business focus as curriculum managers in college senior management team were replaced by HR and estate managers (McTavish 2003). Moreover, colleges were expected to compete with other colleges, schools, and training providers, and thus marketing departments were established. The Further Education Funding Council was created to provide the funding to colleges and required colleges to produce student charters and monitor customer satisfaction. A funding regime was established whereby the college was funded for each student it recruited, but money was deducted if a student dropped out part way through a course or failed the course. Although, as a consequence of these various developments, colleges were technically free to operate as they wished, they were now audited very frequently. Power (1994, 3) referred to this as an ‘audit explosion’. Moreover, when they were in local authority control each college had its own area for recruitment, and if a student from an adjoining area wished to cross a boundary and go to another college, they had to apply for permission to do so. After incorporation, colleges could recruit students from wherever they wished, and in order to ensure that their courses remained viable and student were not being poached by other colleges, they had to actively market and thus marketing department were established. Neighbouring colleges that had previously collaborated became competitors. Simmons (2010) emphasises that the government regarded competition as a method of ensuring efficiency and effectiveness in public sector organisations. As colleges were now expected to adopt private industry practices, a managerial process of target setting was established to enable senior managers to see whether students in individual departments and on individual courses were dropping out or failing. Business practices were introduced to give each department head a budget based on the income they received from students recruited and retained and the money spent on staffing and running their departments. It was believed that this would make departments more efficient and thus save money. The production of strategic plans was one of the concepts to be transferred from the

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private sector. Lumby (1999) explains that immediately after incorporation, colleges were expected to produce strategic plans for the funding agency. Smith (2015, 1) suggested that incorporation: Brought with it features including institutional self-interest, an authoritarian culture, the erosion of trust, and the stifling of dissent as part of an incorporated view of knowledge production that worked against staff and the public interest.

Senior and middle-level college managers who had previously been ‘the first among equals’ were now being told that they had the right to manage. Clarke and Newman (1997) suggested that NPM was sold to managers as a liberation from the old chains of bureaucracy. Senior managers are to be seen as heroes – visionaries who can turn around ossified organisations. It was argued that the rational/technical character of managerialism offers the resolution to chaos. It brings techniques such as strategic management to create certainty but is still able to act more nimbly than the former bureaucracies which were hindbound by rules and procedures. In reality, colleges were moving from one type of bureaucracy to another. Boocock (2017) argues that successive governments have introduced common managerial policies and processes to control further education colleges across the whole of the UK. He argues that before incorporation, colleges were managed at a local level and thus every college acted differently and responded to local needs. All colleges were now driven by government pressure to act in a similar manner and to have similar internal processes and procedures thus making it more difficult to respond to the needs of their local community and the needs of their particular students. Thus, managers who had formally been solely concerned with timetabling and academic matters became business managers. (Baldwin 2003). College principals as leaders of learning became chief executives instead (Dennis 2016, 117). Thus, colleges were entering into the realm of managerialism and beginning to move into the provinces of neoliberalism as described in Table 4.1 above and thus into the clutches of NPM.

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As described above, NPM has had a profound effect on further education colleges and the way they are managed and operate. Various aspects of the impact of NPM on education and particularly colleges and universities will now be examined.

Benchmarking and Target Setting Proponents of NPM believe that public organisations such as colleges and universities should adopt the processes used by private sector organisations to improve the quality of the service they offer. This includes applying the types of detailed quality processes used by the private sector because not only will this result in better quality but also better effectiveness and efficiency and thus be less of a drain on the economy. Before the incorporation of colleges, the LEA was responsible for quality provision in colleges and did so with a light touch. However, after incorporation, when colleges became free to handle their own affairs, a whole range of bodies, including the government, increased their expectations of how the quality of education is to be assured. Whitehead (2005) explains that before 1993, colleges were managed in a paternalistic way with generous conditions of employment for tutors and senior college managers controlled by elected LEA members. After incorporation there was a honeymoon period when college principals took advantage of their newfound freedom, but some of them did not have the abilities to manage such large organisations in such a competitive marketplace. Thus, the Labour government in the late 1990s decided to use the tool of ‘performativity’ to ensure more probity and transparency across the sector. Dent and Whitehead (2001, 17) defined ‘performativity as an obsession with measurement and assessment’. Whitehead suggests that: ‘Performativity is particularly appreciated by those who succumb to the illusion that education and the learning experience are wholly quantifiable, and that staff are best motivated when given targets to work to. Arguably, these are simplistic and ill-informed beliefs but it suits the government to encourage performativity not least because it allows ministers to exert

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direct control over colleges while appearing to be giving those same institutions the freedom to manage their own affairs.’

Thus, one aspect of NPM was that FE colleges began the business practice of detailed monitoring and target setting. Mather et al. (2009, 142) suggest that this includes labour performance indicators which clash with ideals of professionalism. Mintzberg (1993) argues that organisations such as colleges and universities are professional bureaucracies which are organisations where the ‘workers’ are far more knowledgeable about the job they do than their managers and thus the managers cannot readily tell the ‘workers’ how to do their job. Whereas in the other form of large organisations, a machine bureaucracy, the managers can be more knowledgeable about the content of the roles being carried out by workers as they are usually less complex and thus managers can dictate how the job is done. Consequently, if managers in a professional bureaucracy wish to more closely regulate what the workers do, they must create structures and regulations based on common principles in order to monitor complex roles. Whereas lecturers in FE colleges before incorporation were free to lecture and assess students as they felt best for their subject area, after 1993, processes were increasingly put in place to encourage common ‘best practice’. Felstead et al. (2004, 166) related that with an increase in NPM there was ‘a marked decline in task discretion’ as tutors were being directed more as to how they should carry out their role of teaching and assessing. In universities, Taberner (2018) believes that there is now too much of a focus on the quantitative aspects of academic work rather than the qualitative aspects. Although incorporated colleges were freed from LEA control, they were still expected to report to central government on how well they are performing as part of the funding process. Thus Smith suggests: The systems approach to management can be perceived as exerting a powerful negative influence on teachers’ practice but the all-pervasive language and culture of performativity also serves to widen a discursive hiatus that neoliberalism opens up between performance accountability to the state and the nurturing process of teaching and learning.

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Ofsted As with schools, FE colleges are inspected by the Office for Standards in Education (Ofsted), the body that reports to Parliament on the quality of schools and colleges in England, and a good Ofsted outcome reflects well in the community and to prospective students in a crowded marketplace where young people can choose to stay at school sixth forms or go to a local FE college. The Further Education and Skills Handbook (2019, 49) provides grade descriptors for the quality of education and indicates what an Ofsted inspector would expect a college to achieve for a particular grade. These are detailed descriptors, but one of the many descriptors needed to be met to achieve a good grade is for: Teachers present information and/or demonstrate skills clearly, promoting appropriate consideration of the subject matter being taught. They check learners’ understanding systematically, identify misconceptions and provide clear, direct feedback. In doing this, they respond and adapt their teaching as necessary, but without having to use unnecessary, time-­ consuming, individual approaches to presenting subject matter. (Further Education and Skills Handbook 2019, 49)

Overall, these descriptors indicate how Ofsted expects lecturers to teach and assess students. As college managers and boards of governors are keen to achieve good Ofsted grades, this influences how they also in turn expect their lecturers to teach and assess. One way to monitor whether lecturers are meeting these expectations is to observe their lessons (Burnell 2016). Managers in most colleges observe their lecturers at least once a year, and these observations can take many forms but generally raise an expectation that lecturers will teach in a particular way in order to comply with the descriptors laid down by Ofsted. Often, lecturers will be graded and if judged to be inadequate will have to undergo re-training so that they complied with expectations. The University and College Union (2014) has reported that imposed and punitive graded lesson observation regimes have been the trigger for the largest number of local disputes in FE colleges. However, they report that since 2014, many colleges are moving to a more developmental and non-graded observations as a way of assessing teacher performance.

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Validating Bodies There are different quality requirements for each vocational body such as Pearson Edexcel and City and Guilds, and each college deals with a number of these qualification awarding bodies. In the 1980s, the main quality process was that vocational teachers met to ensure comparable standards. Now each validating body has its own process for externally verifying students’ work but also go through an annual process of ensuring that each college has appropriate quality systems in place. Each awarding body has a different process with different expectations.

Higher Education Provision The new NPM view is that publicly funded organisations should have the same level of quality scrutiny as private sector organisations who have developed a range of quality systems and procedures. This means that organisation such as colleges and also universities should adopt similar quality processes. Most FE colleges also offer higher education courses, some full degrees, but many offer foundation degrees and Higher National Diplomas and Certificates (HNDs and HNCs). About 10 per cent of higher education provision in England is provided by FE colleges (UCAS 2020). Thus, colleges must use the quality systems and procedures discussed above in relation to their further education work but also have to utilise the systems that apply to universities which can be quite different. Initially, a college can usually only offer higher education programmes if they are validated by either a university or a body such as Pearson Edexcel, who validate HND/HNCs. Before a university will allow a college to offer its graduate programmes, it will need to assure itself that the college has the appropriate quality systems in place. Many colleges have programmes validated by several universities and thus must comply with each university’s different systems. The body with responsibility for overseeing the quality of higher education courses is the Office for Students (OfS). Colleges must register with the OfS, and as a condition of doing so, they must comply with 23 different requirements and report on these every year. The OfS delegates

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the responsibility for HE quality assessment to the Quality Assurance Agency who have their own processes which a college must comply with (QAA 2018). As part of OfS registration, colleges must carry out the National Student Survey each year and publish the results on their website and must also report on how successful their students are in getting relevant employment as part of another quality indicator, the Teaching Excellence Framework. Bhattacharya and Norman (2021, 34) suggest that one of the difficulties with collaboration between FE colleges and universities is that neither wishes to be involved with the other’s quality systems, and universities in particular do not wish to be involved with Ofsted.

Other Bodies Colleges also offer apprenticeship training and must comply with another set of quality processes laid down by the Institute for Apprenticeships and Technical Education (Institute for Apprenticeships 2019). In addition, many colleges franchise programmes such as Adult Education, which come with another set of quality expectation laid down by the franchisor. A number of other bodies and the government expect colleges to provide data. Colleges must produce, amongst others, Qualification Achievement Reports, statistics for the National Achievement Rates tables and for Value added Tables, for the Progress 8 Benchmarks, and for the Social Mobility index. The Education and Skills Funding Agency, universities, and a wide range of other bodies provide funding to FE colleges, and thus there is a very detailed process for auditing college accounts which involves both external and internal auditors.

Further Education Commissioner The role of the Further Education Commissioner was established in 2013 to be an independent advisor to ministers (Department for Education 2017, 3). In 2017, the role was expanded to ‘include engaging with colleges earlier to support more rapid improvement and reduce the number

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that require formal intervention’. Technically, colleges are independent, and the college governing bodies are responsible for their performance, but the FE Commissioner can make recommendations for actions that ‘college governing bodies should take to improve. The responsibility for effectively carrying out those actions, and for holding leadership teams to account remains with the college corporation’ (DoE 2017, 3). This role is expected to be further expanded in the Skills and Post-16 Education Bill, 2021. However, if the commissioner believes that a college is not meeting quality standards or is in financial difficulties, they can carry out a diagnostic assessment, and if this assessment reveals a high risk of failure in quality or financial performance, then the commissioner can undertake a formal intervention and, if necessary, make: • • • •

Changes to governance and/or leadership. Conditions or restrictions on funding. The appointment of ESFA observers on the Board. New or revisions to existing recovery plans, curriculum reviews, and quality improvement plans. • A college or FE Commissioner-led Structure and Prospects Appraisal (SPA) to determine the most appropriate way forward that is in the best interest of local learners and employers, including whether the college should be closed and an alternative provision found for learners and employers (Department for Education 2017, p. 9). The Skills and Post-16 Education Bill (2021) is intended to strengthen the commissioner’s powers further. It is difficult to imagine that any other provider of education works with so many different bodies who each have their own very detailed quality processes which are in place because the proponents of New Public Management believe that they will lead to more effective and efficient outcomes and thus save money from the public purse. Although the Further and Higher Education Act 1992 took colleges out of local authority control and theoretically made them independent bodies, as can be seen from above, their ‘independence’ is actually illusionary.

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The Market Place As can be seen in Table 4.1, a major aspect of neoliberalism as a component of New Public Management is the introduction of market-type mechanisms and competition. Brown and Lauder (1996) believed that the view of new-right Thatcherite politicians was that for Britain to survive internationally, it had to improve education, and the way to do this was to introduce the rigours of the marketplace. People would have the choice of which school, college, or university they or their children would attend. A quasi-market of different educational institutions would be sufficient to raise standards because if an institution cannot sell enough spaces to be economically viable, it will go out of business. Schools and colleges would need to be entrepreneurial and, if necessary, create niche markets to meet the needs of their customers. Lauder and Hughes (1999) also suggested that the government believed that the quality of teaching would be raised in an education market because bad teachers would be dismissed. Working people and their employers would select the colleges for part-times courses that offered programmes that would best meet the employer’s and employee’s knowledge and skills needs. However, Lauder and Hughes (1999) argue that choice in education is actually determined by social class, gender, and ethnicity, and that markets polarise school or college intakes. This polarisation will cause schools and colleges in working-class areas to go into decline in performance and have difficulty in re-creating high-quality teachers as better off students leave for schools and colleges in middle-class areas, and working-class parents will be unable to pay for transport to more distant, better performing schools. This causes a decline in funding and teacher and student morale which in turn affects student performance in those schools and colleges is working-class areas. Bottery (1992) points out that there are various problems that relate to applying market and consumer-led principles in education. In reality, businesses are often not consumer led. Sometimes, they have too much money invested in producing the products they believe the public should want to be at the mercy of popular taste. Large organisations spend vast amounts of money on advertising to convince the public that the product they are offering is just what the public wanted all along.

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Mulford (2002) argues that there is a basic difference between market decisions which are based on either a commercial contract or those based on a social contract. He suggests that social contracts are founded upon reciprocal obligation and shared visions of communities. Colleges and universities are such communities who share visions of service, care, and educational excellence. Commercial contracts form commodified relationships and are purely instrumental in nature. They are held together by a transaction price alone and  as it is only transactional rather than reciprocal and thus can be easily broken or ignored and is often superficial, expedient, and short lived. Social contracts, however, are bound by traditional relationships which involve personal obligations to others and take precedence over personal whims. They are much deeper relationships which are based on serving the interests of the group or society. Thus, Mulford suggests that by adopting the values of the marketplace, colleges and universities become much poorer places as the relationship with their students and even their staff and other stakeholders becomes one of mere contractual and commodified nature. Harper (2000) points out the marketisation of FE has brought with it an accountability to its customers which includes a range of initiatives such as charters, learning contracts, vouchers, complaints procedures, and satisfaction surveys. These change the relationship between a lecturer and a student. Education was formerly seen as a gift from the state for which the student should be grateful, but students now have rights and expectations which they expect to be honoured. Randel and Brady’s (1997b) research found that college lecturers considered marketisation as an intrusion which has eroded the relationship between a lecturer and their students. The relationship had moved from one of common enterprise, cooperation, and mutual responsibilities to one of customer/ supplier.

The Student as a Customer (or Consumer) One particular aspect of the marketisation of educational institutions is whether students are ‘customers’. Younger full-time students in colleges do not pay fees although older and part-time students do. As indicated

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above, most FE colleges also offer HE courses, and HE students pay tuition fees. Most universities charge the highest amount allowable of currently £9250 each year, but colleges have to decide whether to levy this or a lower fee. To attract students away from universities, most colleges charge lower fees but in doing so run the risk that their provision is seen as being of poorer quality. There has been a debate, mainly in HE that if students pay fees, they may or may not be customers or consumers. Bunce et al. (2017) carried out research with 608 undergraduates in a range of UK universities and found that those students who regarded themselves as consumers had a lower academic performance. Molesworth, Nixon and Scullion (2009) suggest that when students regard themselves as consumers, they ‘seek to have a degree’ rather than being ‘learners’ and it consequently promotes passive instrumental attitudes to learning where the student expects that they will have learning delivered to them rather than being joint participants in the process. Woodall, Hiller and Resnick (2014). Finney and Finney (2010) found that as students pay tuition fees, they believe this gives them an entitlement and leads to higher levels of complaints. Nguyen and Rosetti (2013) suggest that the student as customer model panders to student expectations and grade leniency results, while Hassel and Lourey (2005) argue that students take less responsibility for their learning and have unrealistic expectations of what a university should provide for them. The model of student as customer naturally leads to an expectation that the needs of the customer and their satisfaction should be met as highly as possible. This view led to the following in a speech in the House of Lords by Baroness Wolf: The student satisfaction measure is fantastically dangerous. The way to make students happy is not asking them to do any work and giving them a high grade. This will reduce standards and undermine quality. I just think this is totally mad, and destructive of everything universities stand for. (C. Turner, The Telegraph, 2017)

Conversely, Guilbault (2016) argues that HE is a competitive industry, and thus a marketing approach has to be taken to attract students, and as

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retention of students on courses is also very important, a customer approach has to be used. Guilbault also argues that as students are the beneficiaries of the university’s efforts and the users of the service, they must be customers. A survey by Koris et al. (2015, 37) showed that ‘students expect an HEI to insist that they work hard before they can graduate’. Richter et al. (2010) suggest that the administrators and senior managers in a university are comfortable with the ‘student as customer’, and the marketing department in the university focuses its efforts on that principle but that the tutors are less comfortable. This can cause confusion among students who are recruited on a ‘student as customer’ basis but find that they are not seen as customers by their tutors. As the marketisation of colleges and universities is central to managerial and neoliberal views on how these organisations should operate, there is going to be conflict between managers who embrace those views as they give them the right to manage and the tutors in colleges and universities who believe they should have the professional discretion to carry out their job as they wish. Parker (2005) argues that the commodification of students has led to a culture of minimum effort and to them feeling dissatisfied and disengaged and that the role of lectures and universities is to bring back challenge and discipline to students. Introducing NPM notions such as being part of a market should lead to more effectiveness and efficiency in colleges and thus save money from the public purse. However, prior to incorporation in the writer’s own college, a small brochure was produced each year which listed the courses available, and that was distributed to local schools and libraries. The college, which is comparatively small, now has a marketing department with five full-time members of staff, one of those a graphic designer and another solely concerned with social media. Although this has the benefit of meaning that potential students are more likely to be able to find a course appropriate for them, a culture of neoliberalism means that each FEC spends large amounts of money competing with other local colleges rather than collaborating with them to meet the needs of all local students. This is  money which could preferably  be spent on delivering a better student experience.

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Human Resource Departments As indicated above, FE colleges became more affected by managerialist processes taken from the private sector, and after colleges were incorporated, the management structures of colleges changed and moved from being curriculum focused to business focused. Departments such as finance, marketing, human resources, information systems, and estates were introduced or became larger or more powerful. In the early 1990s, the writer had been a member of the college’s senior management team which comprised, the principal, two curriculum directors, the accountant, and a director who was responsible for admissions, student support, and information systems. All but the accountant had been lecturers previously. In the mid-1990s, the college was restructured with a principal, the accountant, the head of human resources, head of management information systems, and a deputy principal who was solely responsible for curriculum, admissions, and student support. Only the deputy principal and the principal had been lecturers, and only they were involved with the key role of the college – student learning (Baldwin 2003). The power within the college had shifted from curriculum to business support. Mintzberg (1993) indicated that at the time he wrote his book, colleges and universities were described as professional bureaucracies where the power was held by those who carried out the core work. However, he warned of the support staff whom he referred to as the technocracy that if left unchecked would gradually expand their size and power and introduce more and more bureaucracy to the organisation. The methods used in Human Resource departments in colleges are an example of a shift towards a managerial culture. Prior to incorporation payroll was handled by the local authority, and new staff were interviewed by the head of department and a college governor, and a decision was made by them based on the application form details and the performance of the candidate at interview. Even after incorporation, colleges had personnel departments whose role was to support curriculum managers in recruiting new staff and dealing with the payroll. However, as private industry moved towards the notion of human resources departments, so did colleges and universities.

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With the notion of human resources, rather than a personnel department came the practice of using techniques borrowed from industry as part of the appointment of new staff. Rather than relying on the application details and a general interview, the interview became more formalistic, and candidates were required to give presentations to managers and students, manager candidates were required to carry out mock tests—usually based on finance—and were often required to complete a psychological assessment. The new HR managers evolved and expanded their role to less about supporting the curriculum but more about instructing curriculum managers how to behave and taking over roles such as training and development which had formally been the responsibility of curriculum managers. Warner and Crosthwaite (1993, 79) suggest that the new HR managers recruited to colleges from private industry came with a different managerialist mind set and with ‘a business ethic’. Huxley and Hall (1996, 80) suggest that the use of expressions such as ‘Mission Statement’ was introduced by HR personnel, taken from the private sector and ‘often cited as the starting point for HRM and its integration with corporate strategy’. Mueller and Carter (2006) describe how an HR manager decided which person should be employed based on a range of tests and interview rather than the manager who was going to be responsible for that new member of staff and who preferred another candidate. Colleges have also taken on a number of managerialist concepts, including the employment of staff, both academic and administrative, from agencies on zero-hour contracts who are paid on an hourly basis and only when they are needed. This can apply to short adult education evening classes when tutors are employed if a class recruits sufficient students. However, it also applies to tutors who teach on full-time courses for just a few hours a week. This can be better for a college financially because they only pay staff when they need them and gives the college more flexibility, but the tutors on these contracts often expect just to do the teaching and leave while the full-time tutors pick up the administrative aspects in addition to their teaching. Lopes and Dewan (2015, 29) suggest that in higher education, the use of zero-hour contracts has led to a ‘two-tiered workforce’ with a lack of integration by casual staff into departments and institutions, and a lack of opportunities for professional development and informal learning.

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By using human resource techniques borrowed from private industry colleges should be more efficient and effective, and thus save money. However, at the writer’s medium-sized college the HRM department now has the cost of four full-time members of staff carrying out roles which previously had been a very small part of each college manager’s role.

Unintended or Unforeseen Consequences The imposition of New Public Management on FE colleges has had a number of effects, some of them possibly unintended or unforeseen. Prior to Incorporation in 1993, FE colleges or technical colleges as many were named provided education and training to fill the gap between schools and polytechnics in the local area. Most of their courses were vocational, training technicians in areas such as engineering, construction, catering, and science while also providing secretarial and business training to serve the needs of their local businesses full and part time. They also provided adult recreational courses in areas such as flower arranging and crafts (Simmons 2008). After incorporation, college principals were free to run whatever courses they wished, but as they were now businesses, they went where the funding existed and for the courses that were most profitable. This led to what were possibly unintended consequences. For instance, the small county of Rutland in the English East Midlands had its own sixth-form college where young people and adults from the towns and villages could take A levels, a range of vocational qualifications, and adult evening courses. After incorporation the college struggled to be viable. It was taken over by a large FE college in Northamptonshire but eventually closed in 2016 (Rutland and Stamford Mercury 2016). Thus, young people who live in the county town of Oakham now have to travel at least 15 miles to an FE college for most vocational courses. Both the principles of NPM and government policy for the past 25 years have been concerned with effectiveness, efficiency, and getting value for money in the FE sector. There has been a shift in the role of FE colleges away from meeting all local stakeholders’ needs before 1993, to solely meeting the needs of the overall economy since. Although a major

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aspect of FE has always been to meet the needs of local industry for qualified technician-level employees, this has become almost the sole role. Most colleges offer adult education (PCDL) courses which traditionally have been an opportunity for adults to get back into education while also providing an opportunity for social interaction among students in areas such as crafts, cooking, flower arranging, yoga, and sketching along with opportunities to learn skills such as plumbing, learning foreign languages, or using computers. As the NPM philosophy has been that colleges should contribute towards the economy, the range of adult courses that a college can offer has gradually, over the past ten or so years, been narrowed so that courses can now only be funded if they are instrumental and either provide vocational skills such as plumbing, improve IT skills, particularly for the elderly, or improve wellbeing such as learning about yoga (which could reduce pressure on the NHS) (Education and skills Funding Agency 2019). The Skills and Post Education Bill (2021) has put even more emphasis on the role that employers will play in determining the education and training that a college offers, and if a college is deemed not to be meeting those needs, it can be penalised. Bhattacharya and Norman (2021) have suggested that there would be a great deal of merit in FECs and universities working together, particularly in relation to widening participation and in order to benefit from the strengths that each have, but as they are competing, particularly with level 4 and 5 qualifications they are wary of doing so. This point will be discussed in Chap. 7 and the barriers to collaboration examined. As the impact of managerialism in colleges and universities has increased, so has the fracturing of relationships between academic and support staff. New departments have been established for human resources, marketing, quality control, information systems, and student support with members of staff who do not have an academic background but have their own professional culture and tools. These departments which were established to support the academic staff have gradually grown, become more assertive, and have begun to dictate how academics should behave. Spicer (2017, 1) discovered that two-thirds of universities now have more administrators than faculty members. Spicer suggests that at a time when universities are under financial pressure, they are spending money on ‘empty activities’:

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‘These include costly rebranding exercises, compliance with audits and ranking initiatives, struggling with poorly designed IT systems, engaging with strategic initiatives and failed attempts at “visionary leadership”.

In an article in Times Higher Education, Edwards (2017, n.p.) wrote that he is leaving his university post in the UK to go to Germany for various reasons but states that he believed that the role of administrators was to take care of the administration while academics focused on academic work but: Instead it breeds ever more complex administrative mazes that are not just difficult to navigate but are de facto becoming the main part of the job. Kafkaesque would not be pushing it too far by any means.

Conclusion Simkins and Lumby (2002) argue that although managerialism has had an enormous impact on FE colleges since incorporation, there have been a number of other factors, such as ever-changing government policy and the impact of change in the number and type of students, which have also impacted on colleges and the way they are managed. In addition, they make the point that it is not that the language of the traditional professional paradigm focuses on the student while the managerial discourse does not. It is more that the two paradigms represent different views on how students’ needs will be met and how the quality of provision is assured. Boocock (2019) argues that one impact of NPM has been that leadership and management in FE colleges have become transactional and autocratic and based substantially on meeting government targets rather than meeting the needs of local businesses and communities. NPM top-­ down management has meant that only leaders have been seen as the appropriate college members to make major decisions, following the heroic leader model. However, recent governments have been keen for colleges to move to a more distributed form of leadership involving all staff and stakeholders. This has been encouraged by the Education and

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Training Foundation, which was established in 2013, to ensure an effective and up-to-date workforce. Some writers have identified that the imposition of NPM on FE colleges has created an ethical issue. Dennis et al. (2017, 190) suggest that NPM has created a managerial ethos in which leaders have become ethically impoverished and their role has merely become to implement policies decided elsewhere and ‘questions of educational purpose and value are subsumed beneath the drive for greater efficiency’. Portelli and Eizadirad (2018) argue that as NPM is so damaging to colleges then ethically, subversion is needed to undermine it. This chapter has demonstrated that New Public Management has had a profound impact on further education colleges since the early 1990s. It has impacted on how lecturers teach and assess, how colleges are managed, and courses are marketed, how students are perceived, how the quality of provision is determined, and how administrators have increased in number and influence. College managers’ focus has shifted from being mainly about learning and assessment to being substantially about efficiency and effectiveness and value for money. The Further and Higher Education Act 1992 was designed to take FE colleges out of the grip of local authority bureaucracy and make colleges independent to make their own decisions. We have seen above how local authority control has been replaced with national government control and bureaucracy. This has been underlined by the Department of Education [DfE] White Paper (2021a, 12) Skills for Jobs: Lifelong Learning for Opportunity and Growth (as formalised in the Skills and Post-16 Education Bill), which as part of its provision is proposing that the Secretary of State for Education is given powers ‘so the government can intervene quickly and decisively in cases where there are persistent problems that cannot otherwise be addressed with colleges not delivering effectively’. The Skills and Post-16 Education Bill (2021) is being hailed by the DfE (2021b) as transforming opportunities for all, and it does suggest that the government is focusing more on FE, but it is still managerialistic, neoliberalist, and technical rational as it focuses on employers having a greater say in education and training rather than students (p.  2). It includes new powers for the government to intervene if it believes that a

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college is failing to deliver good outcomes for the community it serves (p. 6)—those outcomes being totally employment related. Osborne (2006) believes that NPM has moved onto New Public Governance, and in the USA Milakovich and Gordon (2013) suggest that NPM has become New Public Service. In the USA, the concept of New Public Service (NSP) has been developed to deal with some of the problems with New Public Management. NPS acknowledges that public organisations such as FE colleges and universities are different from private organisations as colleges and universities not only have stakeholders such as customers (students) but also have a duty to the wider society surrounding them. Moreover, those who work for public organisations are often drawn to them because they wish to serve society and get reward from knowing that they are improving the public good. NPM serves customers, and NPS serves citizens. Milakovich and Gordon (2013, 427) argue that ‘When citizens are transformed into customers the public interest might be diluted, with damaging effect on democratic governance and public administration’. It could be argued that top-down, autocratic, NPM management is probably not the most efficient and effective way of operating a college, or university, and that distributed management could be more effective or that New Public Service could be a better alternative as it blends the service role to the wider public and the needs of industry and be better for the economy. As Lumby (2003) has argued, the principle of top-­down management has proved to be inefficient, and the move to distributed leadership where it is recognised that everybody in an organisation has an important part to play is a much more effective style of shared leadership. This will be explored further in this book, and this is an area ripe for research.

References Baldwin, J. 2003. The management styles of further education managers during rapid and extensive change  – A case study, Unpublished PhD Thesis, Nottingham University. Bhattacharya, A., and A. Norman. 2021. Study buddies? Competition and collaboration between higher education and further education. London: The Social Market Foundation.

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Boocock, A. 2017. Caveats for the new localism in further education – Why the use of principal–agent solutions at the local level will not work. Research in Post-Compulsory Education 22: 2. ———. 2019. Meeting the needs of local communities and businesses: From transactional to eco-leadership in the English further education sector. Educational Management Administration & Leadership 47 (3): 349–368. Bottery, M. 1992. The ethics of educational management. London: Cassell. Brown, P., and H. Lauder. 1996. Education, globalisation and economic development. In Education, culture, economy society, ed. A. Halsey et al. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Bunce, L., A. Baird, and S. Jones. 2017. The student-as-consumer approach in higher education and its effects on academic performance. Studies in Higher Education 42: No.11. Burnell, I. 2016. Teaching and learning in further education: The Ofsted factor. Journal of Further and Higher Education 41: Issue 2. Castellani, L. 2018. The rise of Managerialism in the civil service: The Thatcher years. In The Rise of Managerial Bureaucracy. London: Palgrave Macmillan. Clarke, J., and J. Newman. 1997. The managerial state, Power, politics and ideology in the remaking of social welfare. London: Sage. Dennis, C.A. 2016. Further education colleges and leadership: Checking the ethical pulse. London Review of Education 14 (1): 116–130. Dennis, C., O. Springbett, and L. Walker. 2017. Further education, leadership and ethical action: Thinking with Hannah Arendt. Educational Management Administration and Leadership 47 (2): 189–205. Dent, M., and S.  Whitehead, eds. 2001. Managing professional identities: Knowledge, performativity and the ‘new’ professional. London: Routledge. Department for Education. 2017. Intervention policy in colleges and expansion of the further education commissioner role. DfE. ———. 2021a. Skills for jobs: Lifelong learning for opportunity and growth. DfE. ———. 2021b. New legislation to help transform opportunities for all. DfE. Dorey, P. 2014. The legacy of Thatcherism for education policies: Markets, Managerialism and malice (towards teachers). In The legacy of Thatcherism: Assessing and exploring Thatcherite social and economic policies, ed. S. Farrall and C. Hay. Oxford: Oxford University Press. ———. 2015. The legacy of Thatcherism - public sector reform. Observatoire de la Société Britannique 17: 33–60. Education and Skills Funding Agency. 2019. ESFA funded adult education budget (AEB): funding and performance management rules 2019 to 2020. ESFA.

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Edwards, M. 2017. I Quit! I am leaving UK academica, Times Higher Education. Online: https://www.timeshighereducation.com/blog/uk-academia-has-gonehell-handcart-and-i-quit. Accessed 7 May 2022. Felstead, A., D. Gallie, and F. Green. 2004. Job complexity and task discretion: tracking the direction of skills at work in Britain. In The skills that matter, ed. C.  Warhurst, I.  Grugulis, and E.  Keep, 148–169. Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan. Ferlie, E., L. Ashburner, L. Fitzgerald, and A. Pettigrew. 1996. The new public management in action. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Finney, T., and R. Finney. 2010. Are students their universities’ customers? An exploratory study. Education and Training 52 (4): 276–291. Gordon, G., and C. Whitchurch. 2010. Academic and professional identities in higher education: The challenges of a diversifying workforce. Abingdon: Routledge. Guilbault, M. 2016. Students as customers in higher education: Reframing the debate. Journal of Marketing for Higher Education 26 (2): 132–142. Hansard. 1991. Lord Belstead, Paymaster General, 532. https://hansard.parliament.uk/Lords/1991-03-21/debates/d1ec4c8c-7484-4cd4-8692-0d107cb4 dfa0/FurtherEducationReorganisation Harper, H. 2000. New college hierarchies? Towards an examination of organizational structures in further education in England and Wales. Educational Management, Administration and Leadership Journal 28 (4): 433–445. Hassell, H., and J. Lourey. 2005. The Dea(r)th of student responsibility. College Teaching 53 (1): 2–13. Hodgson, A., and K. Spours. 2006. An analytical framework for policy engagement: the contested case of 14–19 reform in England. Journal of Education Policy 21 (6): 679–696. Huxley, L., and V.  Hall. 1996. Human resource Management in Higher Education: Idiom and incidence. Research in Post-Compulsory Education 1 (1): 77–85. Institute for Apprenticeships. 2019. https://www.instituteforapprenticeships. org/quality/the-­quality-­strategy/. Accessed 18 Jun 2021. Koris, R., A. Ortenblad, K. Kerem, and T. Ojala. 2015. Student-customer orientation at a higher education institution: The perspective of undergraduate business students. Journal of Marketing for Higher Education 25 (1): 29–44. Lauder, H., and D. Hughes. 1999. Trading in futures - why markets in education don’t work. Maidenhead: Open University Press.

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Lopes, A., and I. Dewan. 2015. Precarious pedagogies? The impact of casual and zero-hour contracts in higher education. Journal of Feminist Scholarship. 7: 28–42. Lumby, J. 1999. Strategic planning in further education - the business of values. Educational Management and Administration 27 (1): 71–83. ———. 2003. Distributed Leadership in Colleges: Leading or Misleading, Educational Management. Administration and Leadership 31 (3): 283–293. Mather, K., L. Worrall, and R. Seifert. 2009. The changing locus of workplace control in the English further education sector. Employee Relations 31 (2): 139–157. McTavish, D. 2003. Aspects of public sector management. A case study of further education, ten years from the passage of the further and higher education act. Educational Management and Administration 31 (2): 175–187. Milakovich, M.E., and G.J. Gordon. 2013. Public Administration in America. 11th ed. Boston: Wadsworth. Mintzberg, H. 1993. Structure in fives: Designing effective organizations. Englewood Cliffs: Prentice-Hall, Inc. Molesworth, M., E. Nixon, and R. Scullion. 2009. Having, being and higher education: The marketisation of the university and the transformation of the student into consumer. Teaching in Higher Education 14 (3): 277–287. Mueller, F., and C. Carter. 2006. The HRM project and managerialism. Or why some discourses are more equal than others. Journal of Organizational Change Management 18 (4): 369–382. Mulford, B. 2002. A global challenge. A matter of balance. Educational Management and Administration 30 (2): 123–138. Nguyen, A., and J. Rosetti. 2013. Overcoming potential negative consequences of customer orientation in higher education: Closing the ideological gap. Journal of Marketing for Higher Education 23 (2): 155–174. Osborne, S.P. 2006. The new public governance? Public Management Review 8 (3): 377–387. Parker, J. 2005. Aspirational higher education: Real outcomes in probing the boundaries of higher education. In, ed. F. McMahon and T. Clae. Oxford: Inter-Disciplinary Press. Portelli, J., and A, Eizadirad. 2018. Subversion in education: Common misunderstandings and myths. International Journal of Critical Pedagogy 9: 1. Power, M. 1994. The audit explosion. London: Demos.

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5 Alternative Approaches to Educational Evaluation and Improvement Through Collaboration

The tendency of educational development to proceed by reaction from one thing to another, to adopt for one year, or for a term of seven years, this or that new study or method of teaching, and then as abruptly to swing over to some new educational gospel … would be impossible if teachers were adequately moved by their own independent intelligence. (Dewey 1904, 16)

As articulated in Chap. 1, the incorporation of FE colleges took them out of local authority control and made them independent bodies. Colleges became businesses, principals became CEOs, and colleges entered the marketplace in a ‘climate of entrepreneurialism’ (Smith 2007, 55). Lambert (2013, 39) carried out a survey of college principals since incorporation and found that their ‘role had shifted from academic leadership to managerial’. Although colleges became independent, their independence was constrained by the mechanism of funding which consisted of an amount of money for each student but weighted for particular subject areas. Previously, the sum per student had been different for each of the county councils, but after incorporation standard allocations were introduced with the opportunity taken to reduce that amount in order to encourage efficiency. A different culture was emerging. Government policy encouraged college managers to seek efficiency, and as a result © The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2022 J. Baldwin et al., Managerial Cultures in UK Further and Vocational Education, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-04443-4_5

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lecturers’ contracts of employment were renegotiated, the number of lecturers was reduced, and those that remained worked longer hours (Alexander 2010, 127). The efficiency was partly measured financially and partly in delivery. In April 2019, the Association of Colleges and the Department for Education put together an hour-long online seminar to describe the changes to the 2016 performance tables for qualifications. The webinar revealed that the changes had resulted in a minority of non-academic qualifications contributing to performance tables. Therefore, it was announced that the DfE would be launching a two-part review of post-16 qualifications to ensure that many would make the league tables. This was at the same time that Ofsted were consulting on a new inspection regime which aimed to put ‘less emphasis on outcomes’. Nonetheless the key catalyst for inspection and any other type of intervention continues to be outcomes. The new FE Commissioner’s interventions were no longer based on Ofsted ‘inadequate’ ratings or on programmes not meeting the previously prescribed minimum standards. However, in the new regime ‘the full range of data measures will be used’, demonstrating that each agency controlling the sector is inconsistent. Thus, there is little in these policy imperatives to indicate an appreciation of the pressures that their implementation would place upon the workloads of FE leaders, nor of any support by professional development in order to enable them to manage these pressures. Indeed, ‘inadequate’ and ‘requires improvement’ Ofsted grades lead to Commissioner intervention now, and in the future every college is set to have an annual meeting with the Commissioner and the Education Skills Funding Agency (ESFA). Indeed, so far there has been consideration on how further education’s positioning has been broadly influenced by how it has been considered politically and by how it has responded to these demands. This chapter will consider how collaboration in (what Sennett (2010) describes as) ‘problem-solving, problem-finding, and critique’ could provide a more pragmatic way of supporting educational improvement and evaluation – how Dewey’s (1916) eutopia of educational improvement could be achieved.

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Experiences To reach the assertions made in this chapter, the authors worked with managers in the sector to develop a series of narrative inquiry using the stories and lived experiences of people to illustrate and reflect on event case studies to understand the impact of policy on practice and to ensure that the ideas discussed were authentic solutions. These case studies are followed up in more detail in Chap. 8. They were written by those who work as middle and senior managers in Further Education and recount key critical incidents relating to management that those producing them recall. These case studies have focused on how cooperation with employers, students, and other educational providers can afford more pragmatic ways of working. The 2021 Further Education Trust for Leadership paper Study Buddies? articulated a desire from college principals and vice chancellors of universities to work together. The case studies aimed at exploring the intricacies, difficulties, and opportunities such approaches may give. Clandinnin and Connelly (2000) articulate what narrative inquiry is and the issues that it brings. The first issue they express as ‘temporality’, as any event seems to have an implied future. Things do not ‘happen in the moment but are an expression of things happening over time’. The second, linked to temporality, is people. This is because people are on their own personal learning journey at any point in time. Therefore, it becomes ‘important to narrate the person in the process’. The third challenge is how action is understood. A sign is hard to interpret if the history of the subject has not had experience of what the sign means, so it cannot appreciate where the action came from. The final issue is certainty. Narrative inquiry is about interpretation and how even performance data of individual students can be manipulated and interpreted however we meant it to be. Therefore, all we can do is our best under the circumstances, knowing all the other possibilities. The research articulates the challenges of working together. Sennett (2012, 65) describes ‘the fragile balance’ that collaboration can bring. In the context of education, there are tensions between funding and collaboration. He observes:

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Mutual cooperation and competition can combine. The undertow of competition is aggression and anger, sentiments which are hard-wired into human beings. Rehearsals, conversations, coalitions, communities or workshops can countervail against this destructive pull, because the impulse for goodwill is also imprinted in our genes.

Many of case studies that were explored demonstrated that, fundamentally, the system of FE (or indeed of the system of education in the post-Coalition years, i.e. post 2015) has not changed things massively.

What Did the Case Studies Reveal? The 2021 Further Education White Paper, as the start of a response to the Augar Review, sets out how accountability structures will change in FE over the subsequent ten years. However, Chaps. 2 and 3 have demonstrated how difficult policy traction in the sector is, and the White Paper posits that the Secretary of State should get more intervention powers if providers do not adhere to fulfilling the demands of local skills plans. Through the 19 case studies compiled as part of this research, further education leaders revealed that: • There is a strong desire to collaborate with business. It was clear that this looked different in different regions, but many thought that their role was to support business. • Many do not believe that this desire is understood by policy makers, and this is why there is ‘intervention overload’. • Many felt that the stress of competition does not support collaboration, and this is detrimental; ‘the market does not always produce the best outcomes’ (as one case study said). Indeed, they all commented that the technical-rational approach to policy implementation and evaluation and educational improvement is leading to performative measures which are having a detrimental effect upon leaders in the sector. The result is that leaders are accountable to a broad range of individuals and public bodies, and it is unclear exactly

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who has overall responsibility for improvement in the sector. Elliott (2001) draws our attention to the ways in which technical-rational systems push people into situations where they have to act as if experience is not real and where they are obliged to fabricate evidence of compliance with externally set standards which have little or no connection to the day-to-day realities of their educational practice. The most visible place this is witnessed is in league tables.

 easuring Education and the Impact M of Technical-Rational Approaches Building on Elliot (2018), a number of approaches to quality improvement in the Further Adult and Vocational Education (FAVE) system in England have been introduced in recent times, including a rise in the establishment of institutions charged with responsibility for measures of quality assurance. The detrimental impact that such approaches have on relationships between teachers and education leaders is well documented in the work of the above authors, among others. However, politicians are very aware that moving closer towards topping these league tables plays out well in the polls for governments seeking re-election (Biesta 2010, 15). This is evidenced in the number of guidance documents proclaiming the virtues of league tables and other similar means of measuring the quality of education, while allowing unqualified individuals to teach in mainstream education and, despite purporting to reduce bureaucracy, effectively increasing workloads. Dewey (1933, 26) counters the arguments that the purpose of education is to serve the economy. Instead, he takes a view that education is ‘the supreme art’ and ‘fundamental to social progress and reform’. Thus, he contends that education establishments should become like society. However, this argument has not been heeded over the years, and technical-­ rational approaches surround FE and the work of leaders within it. It is assumed that such approaches provide policy professionals and politicians with ‘the truth’ about what is really going on in the sector. For example, on Wednesday 3 April 2019, the government issued a ‘one-stop’

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document to ‘strengthen college oversight’. In reality the document detailed the whole (new) range of interventions and guidelines from the FE Commissioner regarding the new ways in which intervention can be triggered. Intervention focused on insolvency and how intervention could be initiated if there was a sense that an institution could become insolvent within two years. Funding information continued to be issued annually based on lagged learner numbers and, in the case of adult learning and apprenticeships, handed over on a monthly basis. In the previous five years there had been 60 FE Commissioner interventions and 39 Area Review Visits across the sector in England. At the time, there were four FE colleges in England with ‘outstanding’ grades and between January 2017 and May 2018 no FE college received the top Ofsted rating of ‘outstanding’ (meaning that leadership practices in the sector were either unambitious or a four-point grading system does not work effectively – or both – or that there is something deeper going on in the approach to quality improvement). It is of note that this imbalance in outcome and performance in the sector has never been commented upon by any government agency. It is this complexity that students are taught. In 2011, Mike Neary undertook work on models of ‘students as producers’ in HE, and some of these approaches are becoming more apparent in FE.

Student Involvement in FE Within further education colleges, students have some input into how their college is managed and how quality of provision is maintained. They also have a limited voice in shaping aspects of the curriculum and assessment. However, their level of involvement is not as significant as it is in higher education, and thus an opportunity is missed which could benefit both the college and the students (Frampton and Playfair 2019). However, in the authors’ experience, as most FE colleges provide some higher education programmes, students on those programmes can have a much higher level of impact and involvement. Evidence suggests that there are a range of ways the student voice is starting to filter into approaches colleges are taking which are outlined below.

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Student Governors As has been established, colleges are statutory corporations established under the Further and Higher Education Act 1992 under which every college is required have a governing body. This body has responsibilities for the operation and performance of the college including the employment of staff and the achievement of students (Cass and Stroud 2009). This Act (as amended by the Education Act 2011) required that every FE college must have an Instrument and Articles of Government and included in the instrument and articles that it must have a board of governors. It is then the board’s responsibility to decide how many members it will have, but the Act indicates that there must be both staff and student governors (AOC 2020). Thus, typically, a board will be made up of three students, one full time, one part time, and one representing HE students along with two members of staff – one lecturer and one administrator—and between 10 and 14 other external governors many of whom will represent local employers (DfE 2019). Student governors are appointed in a different way to other governors and will usually serve for shorter periods of time (generally because of course length) but are full members of the governing body. Student governors are elected by their fellow student but are not on the board to represent students. The student governor must act in the ‘best interests of the Corporation’ (Cass and Stroud 2009). Most boards have subcommittees, and the student governors are often asked to serve on the Quality or Standards committee where they can utilise their experience and insights as student customers at the college and its most important stakeholders. They are a valuable resource for the other external governors who may not always be able to appreciate matters from a student point of view. Student governors can also give valuable feedback to their fellow students on how and why decisions are made by the board which affect them.

Students and Quality Assurance Students at colleges are possibly the best placed to judge the quality of the education they receive. They are asked to give a judgement in a variety of ways as most colleges indicate that they are keen to receive feedback from

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students to improve the service that they offer. Typically, the methods used include online surveys, student representative meetings, student focus groups, course representative feedback to senior staff, and surveys usually conducted termly (DfE 2015, p8). Survey feedback in FE can take different forms but often colleges will ask, as a minimum, the questions that Ofsted ask as part of any inspection. In higher education, a national student survey takes place each year where all final year students in English universities and many FE colleges answer 27 questions about their experience of studying higher education (OfS 2021a). The survey is designed to provide information for prospective students and to provide data to enable higher education institutions to enhance their students’ experience and to support public accountability. In further education, a simpler FE Choices Learner Satisfaction Survey is conducted, comprising just ten questions. Mainly satisfaction based on this allows colleges to compare their results with other FE colleges (DfE 2020). Colleges also use their own questionnaires to get feedback from their students on their experience at college. This can sometimes by controversial as in 2010 when the University and College Union complained that student surveys were a managerial tool which had led to a culture of complaint in FE colleges and universities (UCU 2010). Student views are also usually gathered when college lecturers are observed. In addition, most FE colleges have student councils with representatives from each course group in the college (NUS Connect 2021). This acts as a consultative body and is generally chaired by a college senior manager. It is the experience of the author that these are useful as the council members are able to raise concerns and make suggestions for changes to college systems, but often the points raised are important to the college students but comparatively trivial such as the price of chips in the refectory. Separate councils are often held for HE students, and these are often very useful for both the students who learn more about how the college operates and for the college in raising real concerns which can be remedied. The National Union of Students has a major presence in universities and large colleges and is able to lobby on behalf of its student members at both institutional level and nationally. They provide training for student governors. However, it does not have the same standing or influence in most colleges as it does in universities.

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Ofsted – As part of an Ofsted inspection and as part of the evidence gathering, inspectors will have discussions with students at college and at their workplace and look at learners’ work. In addition, Ofsted provides access to an online student questionnaire called Learner View, which supplements the face-to-face or online discussion with students. After the college has been informed that they are to be inspected, they should inform all their students about the questionnaire and invite them to contribute (Ofsted 2021). QAA  - The quality of Higher education provision at FE colleges is regulated by the Quality Assurance Agency which is very committed to student involvement both in the review process and as part of a college’s or university’s quality systems. When the QAA is carrying out a review, one of the major sources of evidence is feedback from students, and the review panel has a student as a member (QAA 2018a, b). The QAA has a series of Quality Codes against which it reviews universities and colleges, and the Quality Code for Student Engagement indicates how it expects higher education provides to involve students. The code indicates that: Partnership working is a key concept for student engagement in higher education - students and staff fulfil mutually important roles in shaping the student experience that enables staff and students to recognise and value the impact of student engagement in enhancement and quality assurance. (QAA 2018a, b, 5)

Scott (2018) suggests that the methods used in universities for involving students in quality processes may not necessarily be successful when used with HE in FE students who may view their tutors and their managers in a different light. FE tutors and managers need to emphasise to these students that they are co-producers in education rather than mere customers.

Access and Participation Plans If FE colleges provide higher education courses, as most of them do, and if they charge course fees of more than £6250, they are required by the Office for Students to produce an access and participation plan (APP).

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This plan is required to be produced annually and must outline how a proportion of the higher fees charged is to be spent on widening participation into higher education and supporting students from underrepresented categories of students. As part of the process of producing the plans, students at the college or university must be consulted on how this money will be spent (OfS 2021b).

Involvement in Curriculum Design Students in FE colleges tend to have little involvement in the design of their curriculum because much of it is predetermined by examining bodies and professional associations although students may have some choice in the units; they will study on courses such as BTEC. However, in higher education there has been a tradition of involving students in curriculum and assessment design since the 1960s, although Dewey had been advocating more democratic progressive education in the early 1900s (Dewey 1960). Thus, when HE courses are being designed in FE colleges, often in liaison with a validating university, there is usually an expectation by the university that students who are on similar programmes or on similar FE programmes will be consulted on the content of the curriculum. Bovill (2013) contends that HE students can be involved in changes to the content of course design, designing learning outcomes or assessment criteria. Bovill, Cook-Sather, and Felten (2011) suggest that the advantage of involving learners is that students and academic staff gain a deeper understanding of learning; they both experience enhanced engagement, motivation, and enthusiasm, and they also relate differently, more as colleagues.

Joint Tutor/Student Research and Scholarship Healey, Flint, and Harrington (2014) suggest that in higher education, not only can students be involved with the quality of teaching and learning and with curriculum design but also with the scholarship of teaching and learning and subject-based research and enquiry. They suggest that

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students should be involved in jointly exploring with tutors the most effective ways that they can learn and experiment with different methods and techniques. Involving students in subject-based research and enquiry takes the concept of student involvement one stage further where the tutor and the student jointly carry out research or enquiry as equals. This is akin to students behaving as research assistants and learning by doing and provides students with excellent skills.

Technical-Rational Education Reform In many of the areas discussed above, student involvement is small and is an area that should be developed to enrich and enhance student skills and knowledge. However, as with so many methods to measuring we have already seen, approaches become part of the lexicon of quality improvement rather than a way of being. Fielding also observes how the technical-rational approach to education reform, coupled with a ‘fatuous’ and ‘hectoring’ form of language, the language of ‘performance’, has come to pervade the discourse of educational policy in England through thinly framed notions of ‘impact’ and ‘outcomes’. Although identifying the impact of any social policy upon practice is never a straightforward matter, the case studies that the authors engaged in demonstrate that it is possible to identify some of the negative impacts of the more technical-rational dimensions of inspection regimes upon current FE leadership practices. Elliott (2001) and Coffield (2008) chronicle the detrimental impact that outcomes-based policies and ‘top-down approaches’ to policy implementation have had upon educational practice. While these regimes (Ofsted, QAA, OfS and ESFA, amongst others) have become the benchmarks by which the efficacy of leadership and management are judged, Coffield and Elliott separately highlight that there is a gulf between having a set of standards and making them good in practice. Dunne (2005, 23) underscores how technical-rational approaches to educational evaluation and improvement are fundamentally flawed, which draws attention to the ways in which practice is developed from the ground up by its insiders where he describes the development of practice in terms of:

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A coherently and invariably complex set of activities and tasks that has evolved cooperatively and cumulatively over time. It is alive in the community that are its insiders (i.e. genuine practitioners) and it stays alive only so long as they sustain a commitment to creatively develop and extend it – sometimes by shifts which may at the time seem dramatic or even subversive. Central to any such practice are standards of excellence, themselves subject to development and redefinition, which demand responsiveness from those who are, or trying to become practitioners.

Technical-rational approaches to educational evaluation in England require a range of data that is laid before inspectors. The assumption here is that scrutiny of this data will make solutions to problems obvious. However, this, in itself, assumes that the data gathered is the most relevant and that the questions being asked by inspectors encompass the full complexity of educational practices. Sarason (1990) argues that what we choose to notice and what we choose to ignore in the highly charged political contexts and power relations of educational reform are of enormous importance in ensuring that context and complexity are acknowledged when judgements are being made in educational contexts. Sarason highlights how education reform can become effectively ‘locked into a cycle of failure where, the more things change the more they remain the same, or even get worse’. In such circumstances and situations the illusion of change, in the form of activity (or perhaps more accurately, hyperactivity), masquerades as change itself. It is evident that leaders in FE genuinely feel that this is the case. The work of Sarason (1990), Coffield (2011), and Knowles(1978) is drawn upon here as an alert to the dangers of ‘missing the point’ (pages) and ‘ignoring the obvious’ in education reform by drawing attention to the consequences and costs of overlooking the potential of other ways of seeing impact which may not only be more capable of taking these complexities into account, but also be able to bring about real change and improvement in educational practice. Thus, the challenge of the technical-rational is that it assumes the impact of policy and approaches as an event or outcome. It fails to recognise that impact can be part of a process and that there can be outcomes which are not intended. Furthermore, practices are complex processes, and the context that they operate in can be highly complex. In the

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context of further education, it is difficult to see how research (which has generally been conducted by individuals not working within the sector) has informed policy. It is also evident that wider groups (LEPs, the CBI, and others) have influenced policy, but there is little to suggest the actual impact of policy on the education leaders and teachers who have to implement these policies in practice. Indeed, in the five chapters that make up the 2021 Skills White Paper, employer engagement is a key theme running through the document. However, it starts from an assumption that more work needs to be done with employers, rather than acknowledging the wide range of work that has already taken place across apprenticeship reforms, study programme delivery, and curriculum design.

Other Ways of ‘Seeing’ There are a range of approaches with FE Leaders which could be considered. The approaches by the SUNCETT (University of Sunderland Centre of Excellence for Teacher Training) team as part of the Education and Training Foundation’s Practitioner Research Programme is beginning to demonstrate that there is a counter-narrative to the positive scientific approach to conducting education research and securing educational improvement. Their work has focused on practice-focused research conducted by sector practitioners to secure improvements in educational practice. They argue that approach may be able to operate as a corrective to some of the shortcomings of top-down, inside-out, neoliberal, and positivist meta-narratives in the field of education (Gregson et al. 2015). Gregson takes the view that the practitioner voice has equal weight to ‘big’ research (such as that of randomised controlled trials which the Department for Education use with increasing frequency) to make claims about the practice of education. She argues that practitioner research is uniquely capable of taking context and knowledge seriously and that practice is the arena where ideas from research and theory are tested and challenged.

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In other words, if democracy is a key part of education (if Dewey is right) then democracy should be a key part of the way the curriculum is structured and, therefore, led: We live in difficult times: democracy has been swallowed by the gluttony of neoliberal consumerism regurgitated as an emetic scramble for easy and endless acquisition at the cost of a narrowing vision, a corrosion of generosity and human sympathy, and an impoverishment of much that distinguishes democracy as an enabling way of life.

Thus, the argument for student-, employer-, and practitioner-based input into how quality improvement and enhancement could be framed seems sensible.

Working Democratically to Improve Outcomes It should be acknowledged that technical-rational approaches cannot be pitted against pragmatic epistemological approaches as one side against the other. If improvement to the condition of further education is to be made, then leaders need to seek opportunity within technical-rational approaches to improve the quality of education. Silver (2003) acknowledges difficulties in the concept and contemporary technical-rational usage of measures of ‘impact’ in education in England alongside reservations about the often-short time scales made available for the collection of ‘hard’ evidence of impact. Realistic and authentic impact evaluation, Silver claims, must look for evidence of outcomes which attempt to ‘consider how a programme or project or other activity is proceeding, and the manner or extent to which it is attempting to carry out intentions’ (Silver 2003, 2). From this perspective, impact evaluation is interested as much in processes as outcomes. While Silver recognises the essentially flawed and absurd nature of impact studies which attempt to measure educational or other social processes in the same ‘hard’ ways that ‘length of track laid’ or ‘yield per acre’ might be measured, he objects most strongly to outright dismissals of ‘all interest in impact’ and what he describes as

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unwarranted condemnations of any search for impact and its influences in all situations (original emphasis). This said, Silver (2003) accepts that in some situations sensitive evaluation is not possible, given a quantitative, testing framework in which results are required to be scrutinised. However, he argues that even within situations where only ‘hard’ measures of impact collected within short time scales are deemed to count, there is a case for attempting to say something about impact even ‘if only to suggest ways in which more serious further analysis might be conducted, further questions asked about the ongoing or apparent outcomes of the experience being considered, and to offer a continuum of guidance’ (Silver 2003, 3). Dewey’s epistemology is helpful in extending the above discussion of the role and importance of ‘transaction’ and of paying attention to the process of impact in educational evaluation. Biesta (2007) and Burbules show how Dewey offers a different way to think about knowledge and the real, one based on experience, which is very different from the technical-­rational world view. Through an accessible and vivid account of Dewey’s pragmatic philosophy, Biesta and Burbles (2003) illustrate how Dewey’ work provides a way of approaching educational research, which is not only humane but also manages to avoid the polarising pitfalls of positivism, post-positivism, and postmodernism. To change the nature of approaches then the language and discourse of impact need to change: ‘Impact names the new hegemony: its presumptions and pretensions need to be examined more closely than seems to have been the case thus far’ (Fielding 2003, 294). The practical analysis of technical-rational approaches to the evaluation of education reform suggests that it does not serve FE leaders well. Any system for evaluating policy that forces people into positions where they have to act as if they know what they do not and cannot yet know is bound to be ineffective and inefficient. This is because transactions are conducted as if enquiry were no longer required, as if the problem and its solution were already known and as if what would count as relevant evidence could be predetermined. The use of ‘hard indicator’ measures are, according to Unwin (2009, page), ‘necessarily crude, with large samples soothing out errors and disguising instances of significant success or

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failure. Even when ‘measurable’ in such a fashion, however, the impact of any educational change or intervention may require a period of years to become observable’.

Alternatives to Technical-Rational Approaches Here we find support for the work of Dunne (2005, 51). He reminds us that there are issues with the tractability of how philosophy and education interconnect: ‘real considerations’ come into play - strategic planning, efficient management, adequate resourcing. Dunne questions how far this language and the technical-rational final ends of such approaches will take us in relation to the development and exercising of good judgement in educational contexts. He points out how often the aims and values discussed at the start of government papers do not match the reality of the paper’s contents. Here he is drawing our attention to the difference between a political or educational idea and its realisation in practice. Dunne foregrounds the importance of context in arriving at judgements in complex and unfolding situations in education and that these always have a moral dimension in that decisions are made in the interests not only of individual learners but for the common good. Biesta (2010, page) makes a similar point where he emphasises the ‘subjectification’ (contributing to society as a ‘good human being’) aspect of education which seeks to encourage the challenging of taken-for-granted assumptions. Sennett (2010) is highly critical of approaches to the evaluation and improvement of practice which rely upon the central prescription of standards and the micromanagement necessary to ensure compliance. Instead Sennett argues that good judgement is best encouraged and developed in collaboration and cooperation and through ‘problem-finding, problem-­solving and critique’. Indeed, Sarason (1996) reminds us that when individuals are pushed into power relationships where they are required to act as if experience is not real and that they have to engage in a masquerade, where the truth becomes fabricated, this makes it difficult for anyone to challenge taken-­ for-­granted assumptions and ways of working. As Chap. 8 asserts, relationships of power are locked in FE. Nothing changes because the structure and legislative history of the sector has

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frozen ways of working. While the White Paper (which one) provides some new ideas, the suggestions on apprenticeships reveal nothing new, and the government has not used it to propose a full review to Augar. The conditions for different types of transaction and change are simply not there. Hunt argues that the starting point in the change process is personal and practical knowledge rather than theoretical knowledge. It is clear from these data sets that these managers are using practical knowledge or practical wisdom (phronesis) to address an enduring problem or as Dewey (1933) might describe it as a disturbance in their own practice. Indeed, Carr (2005, 12) note that, ‘if education managers make judgments in complex and uncertain circumstances where it is not always clear what to do for the best’, then the best learning that can be done as a leader is to engage in making errors and be involved in thinking about ways of improving things. Gregson and Hillier (2015, 128) also remind us that ‘learning is a social activity’. Learners should be encouraged and helped to work with others, to share ideas and build knowledge together. Coffield (2010, 9) contends that in the best colleges ‘learning is not treated as another task for senior management to deal with but becomes the central organising principle of the college. Learning takes place at individual, group and organisational levels; all tutors are learners and all learners tutors’. Unwin (2004, 135) argues that this creates the very essence of an ‘expansive’ organisation. It is evident, therefore, that the consequences of actions are as important as the process of carrying out actions, especially if the organisation is going to learn from its mistakes. Leaders need to make space for discussions and mistakes to take place. However, during a period of heightened competition and challenge in the further education sector, any notion of vulnerability or not having the answers to all the questions may make managers feel threatened.

Comprehending Complexity As Fesmire cites (2015, 119) when comparing the ethical approaches of Descartes and Dewey, ‘the central dogma that unites ethical theories, whatever the differences that divide them, is that most identify the fundamentally right way to organise moral reflection’. In his 1930 essay,

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Dewey introduces the idea of dualism. In opposition to the monistic search for a single principle for moral life, he asserts that ‘there were at least three independent variables in moral action  - moral experience, individual ends, and social approbation (duty, virtue and the good)’. There is a notion that dualism requires people to see a range of perspectives. These perspectives need to be perceived against a backdrop, within further education and skills, of inspectorates and regulators producing lists of expected standards against which holistic judgements about providers can be made. Scott (1998, 6) describes ‘the indispensable role of practical knowledge, informal processes, and improvisation in the face of unpredictability’. Dewey’s pragmatic epistemology suggests that we need to consider the world from a range of perspectives. It is evident that the more senior that managers become, the less expert they are in certain things. This can create the kind of tunnel vision that Chang-tzu (quoted Sennett 2010) described. It means that it is harder for middle managers, focusing on a particular area of a college, to describe their situation against the broader brush stroke of the whole institution. Thus, it becomes clear that most senior leaders do not apply Dewey’s broad approaches to their work. Dewey’s pluralism suggests that there is no single principle, law, or concept that provides the lowest line for the good or virtuous. Instead, complexity should be acknowledged. Dewey (1916) provides a lens against which challenges to technical-rational approaches can take shape. Dewey approaches ethics as a practical art of helping people. Dewey argues that imagination emerged from early childhood and through play and allowed children to understand the world metaphorically. To take all of this into account those involved in inspection in FE need to make good judgements. Exercising good judgement is nothing new in relation to thinking about education. Aristotle’s view of virtue is that it must be a ‘final end’ (ref ). Aristotle was not referring to a hard and selfish outcome that each of us needs to exercise in doing this. Indeed, he was referring to applying phronesis to take action: making decisions based on applied wisdom for the good of everyone in society. Many leaders in FE who were canvassed as part of our research, even within the same organisation, struggled to define what the ‘final end’ for the organisation and

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individuals in it is. Therefore, any notion of people able to make good judgements is curtailed as people do not know, in these cases, how to act wisely or with phronesis. Part of the complication for educational leaders is defining that final end or principal objective. The Browne Review in HE (2010), and the five changes to funding bodies in ten years, in FE, has meant that the definition of the final end has been complex to understand. Managers’ time has been spent chasing bureaucracy as opposed to developing a philosophical underpinning for the education that people want to deliver. Reductions in the unit income in funding have created a reality that has meant for many the final end is mere survival so the brave decisions have been based on what could be interpreted as greed at the expense of good decisions. To apply phronesis, however, relies on individuals being able to make decisions which are for the internal, external, and individual good in spite of the backdrop of ever-shifting government policy. Indeed, the challenges to the form of structure of FE detailed in Chaps. 2 and 3 can be seen to create more complexity in approaches to educational improvement. One of the most interesting aspects of the research conducted is the ‘character gap’ (Millar et al. 2006, page) that leaders experience. This character gap exerted by more senior leaders gave rise to a sense of injustice. Kantian political theorists (such as John Rawls) would argue that impartiality guards against biases. Yet, people do not experience such impartiality within further education institutions. Dewey felt that justice could only be worked out through the practices of actual communities. It was evidence that spaces had been created between leaders, teachers, and assessors to build the notion of community justice, but that those spaces for deep conversations are not taking place within leaders. All felt that they had been asked to continue reflecting and enacting new initiatives, but this did not improve the sense of justice they had. Dewey understands that even when working democratically bad decisions can be reached. However, the ramifications for individuals are less severe and the learning becomes more collaborative. The question for any leader (in any organisation, but especially in FE) is how to turn inherent human potential into real goods for human endeavour and to decide what structures are needed to support that.

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Creating Progressive Leadership Cultures A range of articles are beginning to emerge (six in total since its foundation in 2015) on the need to develop FE leaders from the Further Education Trust for Leadership (2019). In a paper in 2019, Dame Ruth Silver argues: Sector leaders (need to work) within local systems, and acknowledge their important role in their local community, within networks to which they should be seen as key contributors. The government needs to think further about how this kind of collaboration can be supported. Second, it appreciates the challenges leaders in further education face, and the factors that can lead to leaders being isolated and de-motivated and makes concrete recommendations to address them.

In similar reflections Coffield (2011, 11) says: A culture change is needed to help FE become a learning sector: a sector which seeks to understand the underlying causes of failure, and to allow leaders to seek and receive support. Part of this is a challenge to FE to be a ‘self-improving sector’. But, this should be part of a broader political mission to value further education and its leaders. The recent Augar Review has argued forcefully in favour of refunding and reforming FE to address a situation where ‘no prior government of any persuasion has considered further education to be a priority. The consequence has been decades of neglect and a loss of status and prestige amongst learners, employers and the public at large.

While echoes of Dewey, Wenger, and others can be heard in these words, the reality of what it means for practice and how this can emerge from the technical-rational structures which have locked colleges into patterns of behaviour. The reality is that while there have been surveys into training in colleges, the ETF, AoC, and other bodies have not focused on the impact of leadership training. Maclure (2010, 33) says ‘middle leaders are becoming increasingly crucial to the functioning of colleges as organisations. They are also future leaders and are currently not receiving sufficient investment or attention’.

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He charts the changes to how government has considered FE in recent years starting by charting the impact of marketisation, the increased emphasis on financial structures such as the accountability measures from the FE Commissioner, and then the ‘softer’ approaches suggested by Augar. While there are some suggested solutions, they all focus on working within the technical-rational approaches previously mentioned rather than providing structures for leaders to hold up a mirror to them. Coffield (2014) encourages positive collaboration describing colleges as a place themselves for individuals (staff and students) to learn. Billett (2001) describes this or any other type of workplace learning as important for two reasons. Firstly, it ensures that learning is a social practice rather than something privileged. There are social practices and rituals around meeting structures and groups within any learning institution. This calls into question the notion of intentional learning in such places. Secondly, he argues, the workplace seems the most visible place to learn so developing a pedagogy around it is most sensible. However, as the third motif reveals, managing continual policy change does not enhance the practice of educational leadership. Fielding (2003, 292) argues that the ‘existential texture of a concept affects how we see the world, how we understand it, how we engage with it, and how we conduct our daily work within it’, which is essential to improve the practice of education – to move poesis to phronesis. Fielding emphasises how the language we use to describe educational policy and its aspirations matters a great deal because it influences how and how well we can identify and distinguish between levels of change in education and most importantly because the same language signifies the relays of power and control at work in the framing of notions of ‘social justice’ and a ‘better’ society. Fielding challenges current approaches to assessing the ‘impact’ of education in England and draws attention to their deeper ontological and epistemological roots in the seventeenth- and eighteenth-­ century mechanical world views. Fielding (2003) also notes how the technical-rational approach to education reform, coupled with a ‘fatuous’ and ‘hectoring’ form of language, the language of ‘performance’, has come to pervade the discourse of educational policy in England through notions of ‘impact’ and its outcomes.

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Although it has been argued that identifying the impact of any social policy upon practice is never a straightforward matter, the case studies demonstrated that it is easy to identify some of the negative impacts of the policies of inspection regimes on current further education practices (the findings are explored further in Chap. 8). The research has also brought to light questions about who is best placed to make judgements about the practice of further education and its improvement. It has also suggested that students should become co-designers of their education, along with employers, but in ways which are radical and go beyond questionnaires and skills plans. There are political dimensions to the problem which also seem to have a negative impact, which prime minister, for example, would remove an Ofsted grading system to determine the ‘success’ or otherwise of an institution. In the traditional sense of technical-­ rational approaches, the range of data that is laid before people makes solutions to problems seem obvious. However, this assumes that the data gathered is most relevant and that the questions being considered cover the full complexity of educational practices. Sarason (1996) argues that what we choose to notice and what we choose to ignore in the highly charged political contexts and power relations of educational reform are of enormous importance. Here Sarason is drawing our attention to the importance of ensuring that context and complexity are acknowledged when judgements are being made. The work of Sarason (1996) is presented here not by way of idle pessimism but rather as an alert to the dangers of ‘missing the point’ and ‘ignoring the obvious’ in education reform and the suffering of consequences and costs of overlooking the potential of other ways of seeing impact which may be capable of taking these relationships into account.

Conclusion Our research has not suggested a revised or preferred review or inspection method. It is this current technical-rational policy paradigm which creates part of the challenge for leaders and managers in FE. The evidence points to many aspects of inspection being flawed, and many occasions where ‘support’ does not feel supportive, collaborative,

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or genuine. The research highlights some of this behaviour coming from inspection, funding, and monitoring regimes. Ultimately, to strengthen the sector the way in which it is weighed and measured needs to be altered, and this needs to be reflected in how the value of the sector is assessed by any given government. The research shows that current approaches are having significant unintended consequences for individuals working within it and that this is costly. The research has also shown that new, more pragmatic, and democratic approaches to educational evaluation and improvement and educational leadership might achieve good things for students without being detrimental to those who are genuinely trying to lead the sector in the best way they know how. This, in turn, might result in some financial savings. Moreover, the research has shown that there may be some approaches which could respond more effectively than the top-down approaches that the technical-rational world view brings. Perhaps a re-work of the 1992 FE and HE Education Act, along with a renewed focus on curriculum, is at least one of the ways we can move forward to improve the stressful situations in which middle managers in FE currently find themselves. These ideas and further potential solutions start to be explored in Chap. 8.

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Elliot, L., and S. Machin. 2018. Social mobility and its enemies. London: Penguin. Fesmire, S. 2015. Dewey. London: Routledge Press. Fielding, M. 2003. The impact of impact. Cambridge Journal of Education 33 (2): 289–295. London: Routledge. Frampton, S., and E.  Playfair. 2019. Why student engagement in colleges is vital. Times Education Supplement. Gregson, M., and Y. Hillier. 2015. Reflective Teaching in Further, Adult and Vocational Education (4th edition). London: Bloomsbury. Healey, M., A. Flint, and K. Harrington. 2014. Engagement through partnership: Students as partners in learning and teaching in higher education. The Higher Education Academy. Knowles, M. 1978. The adult learner: A neglected species. Houston: Gulf Publishing. Lambert, M.J. 2013. Outcome in psychotherapy: The past and important advances. Psychotherapy 50 (1): 42–51. Maclure, M. 2010. Arguing for yourself: identity as an organising principle in teachers’ jobs and lives. British Educational Research Journal 19 (4), 311–22. Millar, R., Leach, J., Osborne, J. and Ratcliffe, M. 2006. Improving Subject Teaching: Lessons from Research in Science Education. London: Routledge. National Union of Students Connect. 2021. About student rep systems. https:// www.nusconnect.org.uk/the-­s tudent-­e ngagement-­p artnership-­t sep/ supporting-­course-­reps/about-­student-­rep-­systems. Office for Students. 2021a. National student survey. https://www.officeforstudents.org.uk/advice-­a nd-­g uidance/student-­i nformation-­a nd-­d ata/ national-­student-­survey-­nss/. ———. 2021b. Access and participation plans. https://www.officeforstudents. o r g . u k / a d v i c e -­a n d -­g u i d a n c e / p ro m o t i n g -­e q u a l -­o p p o r t u n i t i e s / access-­and-­participation-­plans. Ofsted. 2021. Further education and skills handbook. Ofsted. Quality Assurance Agency. 2018a. Students. Quality assurance agency. https:// www.qaa.ac.uk/about-­us/who-­we-­work-­with/students. ———. 2018b. UK quality code for higher education advice and guidance student engagement. QAA. Sarason, S.B. 1990. The predictable failure of education reform. San Francisco: Jossey Bass. Sarason, S. B. 1996. The predictable failure of education Reform. Scott, J. 1998. Seeing like a state: How certain schemes to improve the human condition have failed. New Haven: Yale University Press.

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6 Who has the power? What those at the chalk face can teach us

Introduction The Demand for Higher-Level Skills Recent years have seen calls for more people to gain the skills that higher-­ level qualifications bestow. A 2015 Universities UK (UUK) study, based upon projections covering the period up to 2022, warned of a likely ‘undersupply of graduates relative to the number of jobs demanding them’, along with an ‘unmet demand for workers with higher qualifications’ (UUK 2015, 1). Similar concerns were reported by Hale (2018, n.p.), who discussed a ‘rising demand for qualifications at level 4 and above’ fuelled by the growth of ‘automation, artificial intelligence and digital technology’. Underpinning this claim, the same commentator reported on the concerns expressed by employers about a looming ‘staff skills shortages at level 4 and 5’. Level 4 qualifications include higher apprenticeships and higher national certificate, whilst foundation degree and higher national diploma are amongst the most widely taken level 5 programmes (GOV.UK 2021a, b; Quality Assurance Agency for Higher Education 2014). Following on from the UUK study, the Augar report, which was published in 2019, argued for ‘a stronger technical and vocational education © The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2022 J. Baldwin et al., Managerial Cultures in UK Further and Vocational Education, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-04443-4_6

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system (in England) at sub-degree level to meet the structural skills shortages that’, it contested, are ‘contributing to the UK’s weak productivity performance’ (GOV.UK 2019, 9). Most recently, the government’s Skills White Paper identified ‘significant skills gaps at higher technical level’ (GOV.UK 2021a, b, 6). This chapter argues that further education colleges (FECs) could a play a pivotal role in meeting this challenge. Afterall, a large proportion of English FECs are dual sector institutions, providing HE programmes as well as those from foundation to advanced level, and including a wide range of ‘technical and professional’ courses (Association of Colleges 2021, n.p; Learning and Skills Improvement Service 2013; Education and Training Foundation 2020; Parry et al. 2012; Higher Education Funding Council for England 2006). Moreover, many of those pursuing advanced level programmes that could lead to HE are to be found in England’s FE colleges. Indeed, Playfair (2021) observes that ‘there are more 16-18 year olds in colleges than in school sixth forms’. In terms of providing training in higher technical skills, the same commentator observes that ‘colleges have the vast majority of level 3 vocational students’, as well as those on levels 1 and 2 ‘some of whom’, it is added, ‘will progress to level 3’.

Advancing the Fair Access Agenda In enabling more people from a wider range of backgrounds to acquire higher-level skills, FECs also have the capability to advance the fair access agenda. Whilst many of those already pursuing HE in FE derive from backgrounds that have traditionally been underrepresented in HE (Education and Training Foundation 2017), the potential of FE colleges to make an even greater contribution to widening access can be found in the larger numbers from disadvantaged backgrounds studying level 3 programmes at these institutions. In this respect, the book’s authors have observed that FE colleges are ‘significant recruiters of WP (widening participation) students’ (Baldwin et al. 2020, 111). Similarly, Raven (2021b, 79) points to evidence which indicates ‘that those who study in FECs are more likely to derive from areas of educational disadvantage than their school sixth form counterparts’. Likewise, Norris and Francis (2014:

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n.p.) argue that ‘the majority’ of FE college students ‘belong to the bottom three socio-economic groups’, whilst Playfair (2021) observes that ‘at level 3, 56 per cent of all disadvantaged students are in colleges’.

The Potential of FE Colleges The potential of FE colleges to increase the take up of higher-level skills in general, and amongst those from underrepresented and marginalised groups in particular, has been recognised in recent policy initiatives. The Skills White paper (GOV.UK 2021a, b, 50) states that ‘a clear priority for further education providers’ will now be ‘to give people the higher technical skills they need to get good jobs’. Meanwhile, from a widening access perspective, the need to recognise and support HE progression from FE colleges is highlighted in the new phase of Uni Connect programme (starting in 2021). This is a government-funded outreach initiative comprising consortia ‘of universities, colleges and other local partners’ across England (Office for Students [OfS] 2021). Indeed, Baldwin et al. (2020, 115) describe the Uni Connect programme as providing an opportunity for FE colleges to transform fair access. Colleges are also seen as key players in the government’s new levelling-up agenda. Whilst not specifically a WP-focused initiative, this is concerned with ensuring young people in all areas of the UK have access to high-quality education and training (Anon 2020; Hughes 2020; UK Parliament 2020, Raven forthcoming). This objective, it can be argued, aligns with the long-standing community role played by FE colleges. Hill (2015, 1) notes that many of the communities that colleges ‘serve’—and from which they draw their students—are in deprived areas of the country.

Recent Record However, to date FECs have been relatively quiet contributors, both in terms of HE progression and in terms of fair access. Raven (forthcoming) discusses how HE participation rates from further education colleges are lower than from school sixth forms (see also Bowl 2012; Smith et  al.

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2015; Tazzyman et al. 2018). Indeed, Beech and O’Neill’s (quoted Davy 2016) study of higher education demand in London discovered that whilst 56 per cent of young people in school sixth forms progress to HE, the comparable figure for FECs is 17 per cent. The reasons for this state of affairs have been explored by the book’s authors in a series of recent studies. The following section seeks to bring the findings from these investigations together, including those from a previously unpublished study, whilst also considering the work of a number of other researchers.

Current Progression Trends The Attractions of Employment Findings from a report on the National Collaborative Outreach Programme (the forerunner to the Uni Connect programme, OfS 2019a, b) discuss an ‘increased intention’ amongst first-year level 3 learners in FECs to enter full-time employment after completing their current courses, rather than pursue higher-level study and training (OfS 2019a, b, 80). Whilst there may be a tendency to view this trend as one of concern, for at least some students it may be a rather positive one. The outreach practitioners and FE professionals interviewed by Raven (2018a, 145) talked about the employability options and transferrable skills gained on level 3 vocational programmes. In particular, reference was made to the ‘significant amounts of work-based experience’ gained on BTECs, which are a widely taken sector-based vocational qualification (Pearson 2021), and how this advanced level qualification ‘sets [learners] up for employment’. Moreover, it was observed that the content of BTEC programmes means that students are likely to come into contact with employers and are presented with an opportunity ‘to build a network’ of those who could, subsequently, ‘employ them’ (Raven 2018a, 145). Linked to this, the same interviewees talked about the availability of jobs that require level 3 qualifications.

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Awareness, Understanding, and Confidence Whilst post-level 3 destinations should be a matter of choice, a number of studies question the extent to which FE students are aware of HE as an option (Raven 2021b). The work of Gartland and Smith (2015, 3) suggests that compared with FE college students, those studying at sixth forms are ‘better informed and more confident about progression to higher education’. Voake et al. (2013, 9) argue that ‘college students feel that they have less opportunity to learn about expectations at HE’, whilst they are less aware of HE funding opportunities, the assessment methods deployed, and the levels of independent study required (Voake et  al. 2013, 9). Similar findings were reported in an Aimhigher Greater Manchester study (2009, 4–5), which argued that vocational learners, and in particular those from non-traditional backgrounds, could ‘lack [an] understanding of [what] HE study’ involves. These findings align with those of Raven (2018a, 143), which reported that many BTEC students are unaware that vocational study and coursework could be a feature of HE-level programmes. The Aimhigher Greater Manchester study (2009, 4) also found that vocational learners were less likely than their academic counterparts to understanding the university ‘admissions process’. Similarly, a number of the practitioners interviewed by Raven (2018a, 143) suggested that BTEC learners may not receive ‘the same amount of advice and support as they would [on] an A-level route’, adding that these ‘students have perhaps not heard of as many people going down this route’. Indeed, the same interviewee made reference to students who are unaware that many universities recognise level 3 BTECs as a suitable entry qualification. Beyond this, various studies describe ‘a lack of confidence’ amongst some vocational learners ‘in their ability to succeed in HE’ (Raven 2018a, 142). Those practitioners interviewed by Raven talked about ‘some students feel[ing] that they’re not good enough to be at university because they don’t have A-level[s]’. These issues were also recognised in a study by Aimhigher Greater Manchester (2009, 4), which discussed the ‘low aspirations’ and a ‘lack of confidence’ amongst vocational learners at FE colleges. ‘Such issues’, it was added, may mean that such learners are ‘put off’ from ‘applying to HE’.

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Recognising Success However, these concerns need to be placed in the context that, as Raven (2021b, 81) notes, ‘many learners do progress onto HE programmes having previously studied at FE colleges’. In their study of FECs and sixth-­ form colleges covering the period 2008–2012, Smith et  al. (2015, 7) suggest an average ‘progression rate for those proceeding to study HE immediately following their college course’ of 34 per cent, ‘increasing to 48 per cent when tracked over a number of years’. This compares with an overall predicted young participation rate of between 43 and 49 per cent for the period 2007/2008 to 2011/2012 (Department for Education 2019, n.p.). Moreover, many of these are likely to be from disadvantaged backgrounds. In this respect, Playfair (2021) notes that over 13,000 ‘disadvantaged students’ from FE colleges progressed to university in 2015–2016, representing 49.7 per cent of all of those from such back grounds embarking on HE-level study and training. This evidence implies that cases of good practice in supporting HE progression, including for those from non-traditional backgrounds, do exist within FECs (Raven forthcoming). A common thread that runs through a number of studies that have investigated these practices relates to the dual sector function that characterises many FE colleges. Notably, utilising the higher education expertise and HE facilities found on college campuses. The following provides a consideration of these practices. In so doing, it draws on various studies that the authors of this book have conducted.

Effective Practices Centrally Organised Initiatives A number of these practices constitute what might be described as cross-­ institutional or centrally organised initiatives. For Raven (2021b, 89) these include ‘HE information days’ that provide prospective students with information about the college’s higher education programmes,

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whilst also offering them an opportunity speak to ‘students who are [now] studying HE [at the college]’. The same study draws attention to ‘open evenings’, in which those interested in level 3 study are informed about opportunities to ‘carrying on’, and which enable parents to ‘see that their children can stay for the full progression’ into HE, including continuing their studies at the college. The students participating in the focus group conducted by same author also highlighted ‘open evenings, which provide attendees, including current level 3s, with a chance to be ‘shown around’ the college’s HE facilities and to ‘talk to us in more depth about what we could do’ (Raven 2021b, 89). Elsewhere, Raven (2021c, 8) discusses the role of progress coaches. Assigned to students at the start of their studies, they were considered to be ‘very supportive’, including in ‘help[ing] with options’, and offering guidance on routes into university. Although for some accessing their tutors could prove difficult at times, given the ‘heavy workloads’ tutors were managing and how ‘many students’ they were supporting.

Subject-Level Support Whilst the evidence indicates the important role often played by centrally organised and administered interventions, many of these studies pay rather more attention to departmental-level support and, in particular, that offered by subject tutors. • Progression routes Prominent amongst the practices discussed by Raven (2021b, 90) is the value of alerting those about to embark upon their level 3 studies of the possible subject-based progression routes into HE. For the practitioners interviewed, this included offering guidance on ‘how to get onto our HE programmes’. Moreover, it was an approach that was underpinned by engaging parents and guardians, and informing them of the ‘jobs some of our students have got from doing’ the college’s HE programmes, having previously taken level 2 and then level 3 courses at the college (Raven 2021b, 90). A comparable point was made in another study by the same

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author (Raven, 2018b), which explored the practices adopted on a work-­ based programme that returned very high rates of HE progression. The practitioners interviewed for this study talked about presenting the level 3 course to new students as a ‘four year’ programme that could enable them to acquire a higher-level qualification. In underpinning this message, ‘reference was made to the deploying HND students [on] recruitment days’. Corroborating this claim, the students interviewed for the same study described being made aware of this potential HE ‘progression route’ during the level 3 application process (Raven 2018b, 46). Similarly, a study by the Higher Education Funding Council for England (HEFCE 2009, 97) referenced the practice adopted by one FE college that involved ‘tutors actively promot[ing] the range of foundation degrees available to students at the college during class’, although without detailing how this might be facilitated. Similarly, an unpublished study by Raven (2019) that looked at widening access into professional construction described the positive response amongst the students interviewed to the work of ‘their tutors in informing them about HE opportunities and the different progression routes that would be available once they had completed their level-3 programmes.’ Little and Connor (2005, 3) also emphasise the value of showing learners the training ‘pathways’ available to them, whilst the need to ensure ‘that progression routes are in place that can take students from FE-level courses onto those offered at HE’ is referenced by Baldwin et al. (2019: 122). Along similar lines, Baldwin et al. (2020, 120) describe the role of programme leaders who inform those embarking on level 3 courses ‘that to be successful’ in their sector ‘they [will] need to gain a degree.’ There is, it was added, ‘an expectation amongst students and staff that all the students would apply to university and, consequently, almost all did’. • Subject links and content The students interviewed by Raven (2021b, 91) discussed the presentations given to their class by HE lecturers from their college. These included outlining the ‘units available’ and ‘the different modules you would be doing’. The same interviews also highlighted the role played by tutors who were also involved in delivering HE and who could show you ‘how the level

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3 curriculum aligned with the HE one’ (Raven 2021b, 91). In another study by the same author (Raven 2018a, 150) that sought to explain the high progression rates returned by some of the BTEC programmes offered in one college, reference was made to the role of tutors who teach at both level 3 and HE, and that are able to ‘provider learners with a chance to see the kinds of work involved’ at higher level. As a result the students surveyed ‘talked about gaining confidence in university’ as an option. • Skills A number of studies also discuss tutors who inform their students about the skills required for success at higher level. In this respect, Raven (forthcoming) talked about the feedback provided on coursework and of class time allocated to discussing the meanings of terms and concepts that were likely to be encountered at HE. Similarly, the tutors interviewed by Raven for another recent study (Raven 2021b, 87) described ‘the practice of familiarising their students with academic writing and referencing’. Whilst a further study (Raven 2018a, 150) offered the example of a tutor who helped develop their students’ note-taking skills by speeding up the rate at which they went through their presentation slides. • Workloads In a recent study which drew on the experiences of final year level 3 vocational students, a number of whom expressed an intention to go onto higher-level training, Raven (forthcoming) discussed the role that subject tutors played in helping to familiarise their students ‘with the workloads likely to be experienced at university’, which included managing ‘different assignments’ and being responsible for submitting their work on time. For participants, this experience had enabled them to feel confident that they could cope with the demands of higher-level study. • HE progress examples Elsewhere, various studies discuss tutors informing their students about those who had completed the same level 3 course and were now

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pursuing higher-level programmes (Raven 2021a). Similarly, a number of the HE students surveyed by Raven (2018a, 150) who had completed advanced vocational courses talked about the ‘encouragement’ offered by their former tutor, which included ‘inform[ing] us about other students’ who had gone to university. • Interaction with HE students and graduates In some instances, tutors were described as playing an important intermediary role in enabling their level 3 student opportunities to meet with those on comparable college-based HE programmes (Raven 2018a, 149). Such interaction it was noted enable ‘level 2s and 3s to see the progression route right in front of them’. A comparable practice associated with a work-based professional construction programme was described by Raven (2019, 23). This involved assigning level 3 students a higher education ‘mentor’, whom they met ‘on a regular basis and from whom [they] received support and guidance, and who [they] ‘shadow[ed]’ in the workplace. The level 3 students interviewed for the same study also talked in positive terms about the presentations they have received from those working in the sector. These provided valuable insights into the progression routes they had taken (Raven 2019, 23). Table 6.1 provides a summary of the centrally initiated practices that have been discussed in this chapter, as well as those adopted at subject level, including by tutors.

Discussion The Role of Subject Tutors This chapter has drawn attention to the part played by subject tutors in supporting and facilitating HE progression. A study by Aimhigher Greater Manchester (2009, ii) affords a possible explanation for their pivotal role. This found that learners tend to see their tutors ‘as a more important source of support than advice and guidance specialists, because’, it was added, ‘they have subject specific expertise’. Drawing on a review of various studies, Bowl (2012) makes a comparable observation. However, it is

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Table 6.1  Summary of key practices Centrally organised initiatives • HE information days that provide prospective level 3 students and their parents/guardians with information about the college’s higher-level courses and the chance to engage with students now study on these programmes • Open evenings in which those interested in level 3 study, as well as current level 3 students, visit the college’s HE facilities and find out about opportunities to continue their studies • Progress coaches who provide advice and guidance on post-18 options Course-level initiatives, including those provided by subject tutors • Informing those embarking on level 3 courses, as well as current level 3 learners, of the potential subject-based progression routes into HE, and the career opportunities available to those with higher-level skills • Guidance on the content of HE courses at the college in the same discipline and demonstrating how the level 3 curriculum links to these • Familiarising level 3 students with the skills required for HE study, including essay writing, referencing, presenting, and work-load management • Providing examples of former students who were now pursuing higher-level programmes • Inviting alumni now on higher-level programmes at the college to talk to level 3 students about their university experiences • Guest speakers, including those now working in professions linked to their disciplines, to talk to level 3 students about their work and learner journeys Source: based on Table 3, Summary of Key Practices in Raven (2021b, 93)

also likely to reflect the close working relationships that are forged between tutors and tutees in institutions that are often far larger than schools and sixth forms, and where central services may seem more distant and detached. In focusing on one subject area, as opposed to three for those pursuing A-levels, students on vocational programmes are also likely to engage with a smaller number of tutors. The greater coursework focus of many vocational programmes may also encourage closer working relations. However, these are suppositions. Given the primacy of the tutors’ role, this area warrants further investigation. Moreover, there are reasons to consider the progression supporting role played by many subject tutors could become even more central. A number of commentators have advocated a more focused discipline-based approached to widening access in FE. Playfair (2021) calls for ‘the next phase of WP to move beyond awareness raising and to support and enrich curriculum delivery’, which, it is argued, ‘can motivate and enthuse students based on their aspirations’.

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Variations in Practice Returning to the present, whilst the studies reviewed in this chapter highlight the part played by many tutors, they also suggest that the nature and extent of this support is likely to vary within and between institutions (Raven 2021b; Bowl 2012; Aimhigher Greater Manchester 2009). The practices profiled by Raven (2021b, 95) were judged to be ‘far from universally deployed across’ the institutions featured in his study. Similarly, in an early study the same author (Raven 2018a, 140) drew attention to wide variations in the progression rates of BTEC learners in different institutions. Whilst in part this may relate to subject mix, differences in local employment, and HE progression opportunities, it may also be explained by variations in tutor support and practice. In this respect, Baldwin et al. (2020, 120) discuss the approaches taken by the leads of two different programmes at the same college. Whilst one expected their students to go on to HE-level study and training, the other ‘did not encourage students to apply for university’ since it was considered that they could advance through employment. Whilst the view held by the second of these leads may have substance, the argument remains that the acquisition of higher-level skills through pursuing HE study and training - be it full or part time, classroom or work based - may be a more appropriate outcome for least some of their students.

The Case for Wider Adoption Based on this premise, it can be argued that the progression practices explored in this chapter, and especially those deployed by subject tutors, should be more widely adopted across the sector. In doing so, FECs could fulfil the upskilling role ascribed to them in recent policy discussions and become the engines of ‘transformational change’ in widening HE access that is being sought by the Office for Students: England’s HE regular (OfS 2019b, n.p.). However, to achieve this requires overcoming what might be described as a knowledge transfer challenge (Senaratne and Amaratunga 2008). In this respect, Nelson and Campbell (2017a, b, 127) have argued that simply ‘improving the supply of research’, in terms

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of the dissemination of papers and reports, is unlikely to generate the required take-up. Rather, it is argued ‘that key preconditions must be in place so that educators are ready to critique, implement and adapt evidence as they encounter it’. For Nelson and O’Beirne (2014, vi), these conditions include ‘effective interaction and collaboration between teaching professionals and researchers’, whilst for Hunter (2013) the need is for ‘a two-way conduit between practice and research’. Similarly, Bero et al. (1998) talk about need for an open discussion of practice and the provision of opportunities for ‘local experimentation’.

The Need for New Approaches However, Hunter (2013) argues that such preconditions require those ‘who hold power in the organisation’ to be open to change, and support and facilitate staff interactions and experimentation. An ‘organisational and professional culture’ that is ‘target driven’ (Hunter 2013), and associated with fixed structures and established procedures, is unlikely to afford the ‘fertile ground’ that Nelson and Campbell (2017a, b, 127) suggest is required for innovative local practices to ‘take root and grow’ (Standaert 1993). To meet their potential in becoming the engines of change in advancing the skills and WP agendas, FE colleges would need to adopt flatter, more democratic structures that facilitate horizontal communication and empower those at the chalk face to develop and share good practice. In other words - and perhaps rather appropriately - they would need to adopt structures and ways of doing and thinking that are associated with the ‘learning organisation’ (Garvin 1993).

Conclusion This chapter has argued that FE colleges have the potential to have a transformative effect on the absolute numbers acquiring higher skills, and the proportion accessing HE-level training and education from non-­ traditional backgrounds. In doing so, England’s battalion of FECs could be at the forefront of efforts to upskill the workforce and widening

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participation. Yet, many current accounts point to their modest record, with those pursuing level 3 courses with them comparatively less likely to participate in HE study and training than their counterparts in school sixth forms. However, this chapter has challenged the view that colleges are not successful at encouraging and enabling the progression of thousands of students. Many do indeed progress, and the evidence presented here has drawn attention to a range of effective practices that have made a positive difference to the next, post-college steps taken by their students. Whilst some can be described as institution-wide and centrally initiated measures, many more are to be found at the local level, with subject tutors the key providers. Moreover, many of the activities and actions taken at curriculum level are based on informal collaborations between college FE and HE, and the blurring of FE and HE boundaries. Whilst evidence - including that gathered by the book’s authors over recent years - speaks of the effectiveness of these practices, and the differences they can make, it is also evident that in many instances they remain local and are far from universally pursued. There are likely to be a range of reasons why progression rates vary between FE colleges, as well as within them, but the differences in subject-level practices, and the extent to which they are pursued, are likely to be a significant contributing factor. Consequently, this chapter has argued for their wider recognition and adoption, as well as the opportunity for those at the chalk face to experiment and develop further initiatives. However, to achieve this requires more than simply sharing and disseminating research findings. It demands the nurturing of conditions conducive to the sharing of practice as well as the encouragement of local experimentation. In turn, this requires the rethinking of many current management philosophies as well as organisational structures. There is a need to support and facilitate horizontal communications across different subject areas and between a college’s FE and HE provision, and to support the dissemination of ideas and practices, and empowerment of those at the chalk face with the freedom to try different approaches. In sum, it requires colleges to become true learning organisations. Arguably, the same broad prescription needs to apply to external relations between FE colleges and universities. Many of the students

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surveyed in the studies discussed in this chapter expressed ambitions to pursue HE at university. Greater cross-institutional collaboration would provide the information, advice, and guidance, as well as the outreach opportunities, that would help to ensure these ambitions are realised. This subject is taken up in the next chapter.

References Aimhigher Greater Manchester. 2009. Exploring support for progression to higher education for young full-time vocational learners in further education colleges. Manchester: Aimhigher Greater Manchester. https://silo.tips/download/ exploring-­s upport-­f or-­p rogression-­t o-­h igher-­e ducation-­f or-­young-­f ull-­ time-­vocati. Anon. 2020. Further education will be central to our mission of levelling up the nation says Education Secretary. FE Week, 9 July. https://www.fenews.co.uk/ fevoices/51065-­f urther-­e ducation-­w ill-­b e-­c entral-­t o-­o ur-­m ission-­o f-­ levelling-­up-­the-­nation-­says-­education-­secretary. Association of Colleges. 2021. General further education colleges. https://www. aoc.co.uk/general-­further-­education-­colleges. Baldwin, J., N. Raven, and R. Webber-Jones. 2019. Whose job is it anyway? Developing the practice of those who support the higher education progression of further education students. In Transformative higher education: Access, Inclusion and Lifelong Learning, ed. S.  Broadhead, J.  Butcher, M.  Hill, S.  McKendry, N.  Raven, R.  Renton, B.  Sanderson, T.  Ward, and S.W.  Williams, 111–128. London: Forum for Access and Continuing Education. Baldwin, J., N. Raven, and R. Weber-Jones. 2020. Access ‘Cinderellas’: Further education colleges as engines of transformational change. In Delivering the public good of higher education: Widening participation, place and lifelong learning, ed. S.  Broadhead, J.  Butcher, E.  Davison, W.  Fowle, M.  Hill, L. Martin, S. Mckendry, F. Norton, N. Raven, B. Sanderson, and S. Wynn Williams, 107–126. London: Forum for Access and Continuing Education. Bero, L.A., R. Grilli, J.M. Grimshaw, E. Harvey, A.D. Oxman, and M. Thomson. 1998. Closing the gap between research and practice: An overview of systematic reviews of interventions to promote the implementation of research findings. British Medical Journal 317 (7156): 465–468. http://www.ncbi.nlm. nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC1113716/.

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Bowl, M. 2012. The contribution of further education and sixth-form colleges to widening participation. A literature synthesis of the widening access, student retention and success National Programmes Archive. York: Higher Education Academy, http://www.heacademy.ac.uk//resources/detail/WP_syntheses/Bowl. Davy, N. 2016. ‘Let’s take college higher education to the next level’, Times Education Supplement, 11 July 2016, https://www.tes.com/magazine/ archive/lets-take-college-higher-education-next-level. Department for Education. 2019. Participation rates in higher education: Academic years 2006/2007–2017/2018. https://assets.publishing.service.gov. uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/843542/ Publication_HEIPR1718.pdf. Education and Training Foundation. 2017. College Based Higher Education/ https://www.et-­f oundation.co.uk/wp-­c ontent/uploads/2017/08/RCU-­ National-­16N003-­FINAL.pdf. ———. 2020. So what is the FE sector. A guide to the further education system in England, https://www.et-­foundation.co.uk/wp-­content/uploads/2020/03/ 200313-­ETF-­FE-­Sector-­Guide-­FINAL-­RGB.pdf. Gartland, C., and C. Smith. 2015. Towards a connected approach for inclusive and positive transitions into higher education. https://pdfs.semanticscholar. org/3c94/13b0502db673c1ec76ec8011de0ddbed08b6.pdf. Garvin, D. 1993. Building a learning organization. Harvard Business Review, (July–August). https://hbr.org/1993/07/building-­a-­learning-­organisation. GOV.UK. 2019. Independent panel report to the Review of Post-18 Education and Funding. https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/805127/Review_of_post_18_education_ and_funding.pdf. ———. 2021a. Skills for jobs: Lifelong learning for opportunity and growth. ———. 2021b. What qualifications mean. https://www.gov.uk/what-­different-­ qualification-­levels-­mean/list-­of-­qualification-­levels. Hale, C. 2018. Universities’ role in providing higher level skills. FE Week (28 November). https://www.fenews.co.uk/featured-­article/22621-­universities-­ role-­in-­providing-­higher-­level-­skills. Higher Education Funding Council for England. 2006. Higher education in further education colleges Consultation on HEFCE policy. https://dera.ioe.ac. uk/6316/1/06_48.pdf. ———. Supporting Higher Education in Further Education Colleges. Policy, Practice and Prospects. [Online] Available at http://dera.ioe.ac.uk/8645/7/09_ 05_Redacted.pdf.

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Hill, M. 2015. Access and Widening Participation in College HE. Briefing paper 3: effective and collaborative outreach, Action on Access, https://www.aoc. co.uk/sites/default/files/Briefingper cent20paperper cent203per cent20Effectiveper cent20andper cent20Collaborativeper cent20Outreach_0.pdf. Hughes, D. 2020. Jobs, green recovery and levelling up: FE is the answer. Times Education Supplement, https://www.tes.com/news/jobs-­green-­recovery-­and-­ levelling-­fe-­answer. Hunter, B. 2013. Implementing research evidence into practice: some reflections on the challenges. Evidence Based Midwifery. 22 August. https://www. rcm.org.uk/learning-­a nd-­c areer/learning-­a nd-­r esearch/ebm-­a rticles/ implementing-­research-­evidence-­into-­practice. Learning and Skills Improvement Service. 2013. Higher Education in Further Education Colleges. https://www.aoc.co.uk/sites/default/files/Guideper cent20toper cent20HEper cent20inper cent20FEper cent20forper cent20collegeper cent20Governorsper cent202013.pdf. Little, B., and H. Connor. 2005. Vocational ladders or crazy paving? Making your way to higher levels. London: Learning and Skills Development Agency. https://www.researchgate.net/publication/42792376_Vocational_ladders_ or_crazy_paving_Making_your_way_to_higher_levels/download. Nelson, J., and C. Campbell. 2017a. Evidence-informed practice in education: Meanings and applications. Educational Research 59 (2): 127–135. ———. 2017b. Evidence-informed practice in education: Meanings and applications. Educational Research 59 (2): 127–135. Nelson, J., and C. O’Beirne. 2014. Using evidence in the classroom: What works and why? National Foundation for Educational Research. [Online] Available at https://www.nfer.ac.uk/publications/IMPA01/IMPA01.pdf. Norris, E. and Francis, B. 2014. ‘The Impact of Financial and Cultural Capital on FE Students’ Education and Employment Progression’, in A. Mann, J. Stanley and L. Archer (eds), Understanding Employer Engagement in Education: Theories and Evidence. London: Routledge. Office for Students. 2019a. The national collaborative outreach programme end of phase 1 report for the national formative and impact evaluation. https://www. officeforstudents.org.uk/media/2d55ab17-­7108-­4e1d-­b883-­6bf8d1504e72/ ncop-­end-­of-­phase-­one-­evaluation-­report.pdf. ———. 2019b. Our new approach to access and participation. https://www. officeforstudents.org.uk/newapproachtoap/ ———. 2021. Uni Connect. https://www.officeforstudents.org.uk/advice-­and-­ guidance/promoting-­equal-­opportunities/uni-­connect/.

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Parry, G., C.  Callender, P.  Scott, and P.  Temple. 2012. Understanding higher education in further education colleges, Technical Report. London: Department of Business, Innovation and Skills. https://eprints.bbk.ac.uk/id/eprint/ 11380/1/BIS69.pdf. Pearson. 2021. BTEC qualifications. https://qualifications.pearson.com/en/ about-­us/qualification-­brands/btec.html. Playfair, E. 2021. FE and HE working together to widen participation’, workshop presentation. NEON online symposium, 2021. Quality Assurance Agency for Higher Education. 2014. The frameworks for higher education qualifications of uk degree-awarding bodies. https://www.qaa. ac.uk/docs/qaa/quality-­code/qualifications-­frameworks.pdf. Raven, N. 2018a. The higher education progression of BTEC learners: Trends, challenges and tactics. In Concepts of value and worth: National and international perspectives on widening access and participation, ed. S.  Broadhead, J.  Butcher, M.  Hill, A.  Hudson, S.  McKendry, N.  Raven, D.  Sims, and T. Ward, 137–157. London: Forum for Access and Continuing Education. ———. 2018b. The progression of advanced apprentices: Learning from the student experience. In Concepts of value and worth: National and international perspectives on widening access and participation, ed. S. Broadhead, J. Butcher, M. Hill, A. Hudson, S. McKendry, N. Raven, D. Sims, and T. Ward, 33–58. London: Forum for Access and Continuing Education. ———. 2019. Identifying, engaging and facilitating the HE progression and sector entry of those from under-represented backgrounds. A report for the Bridge Steering Group, unpublished. ———. 2021a. Widening HE access from FE colleges: The key role played by subject tutors. Perspectives: Policy and Practice in Higher Education. https:// doi.org/10.1080/13603108.2021.1961173. ———. 2021b. Making a difference: Insights into effective HE progression practices in further education colleges. Widening Participation and Lifelong Learning 23 (1): 79–101. ———. 2021c. Realising ambitions: supporting the HE progression of level 3 college students, unpublished report, Leicestershire Shire Grants. ———. (forthcoming). Responding with resilience: the impact of the pandemic on the educational experiences and ambitions of FE students. Widening Participation and Lifelong Learning. Senaratne, S., and R.  D. G.  Amaratunga. 2008. A Knowledge Transfer Perspective on Research and Teaching in Higher Education. In International Conference on Building Education and research, University of Salford.

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[Online] Available at https://usir.salford.ac.uk/id/eprint/9815/1/knowledge_transfer.pdf. Smith, S., H.  Joslin, and J.  Jameson. 2015. Progression of College Students in England to Higher Education, BIS research paper number 239. https://assets. publishing.service.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_ data/file/460394/BIS-­15-­531-­progression-­of-­college-­students-­in-­england-­ to-­higher-­education.pdf. Standaert, R. 1993. Technical rationality in education management: A survey covering England, France and Germany. European Journal of Education 28 (2): 159–175. Tazzyman, S., L.  Bowes, R.  Moreton, M.  Madriaga, and C.  McCaig. 2018. National Collaborative Outreach Programme. Year one report of the national formative and impact evaluation, including capacity building with NCOP consortia. Bristol: Higher Education Funding Council for England. https:// webarchive.nationalarchives.gov.uk/*/http:/www.hefce.ac.uk/. UK Parliament. 2020. The role of colleges in a skills-led recovery from covid-19 outbreak, Research Briefing, House of Commons Library, https://commonslibrary.parliament.uk/research-­briefings/cdp-­2020-­0108/. Universities UK. 2015. Supply and demand for higher-level skills. https://www. universitiesuk.ac.uk/policy-­and-­analysis/reports/Pages/supply-­and-­demand-­ for-­higher-­level-­skills.aspx. Voake, C., L.  Taylor, and R.  Wilson. 2013. Transition Difficulties from FE to HE – What is the situation and what can we do about it? The Higher Education Academy. https://www.advance-­he.ac.uk/knowledge-­hub/transition-­difficulties-­ fe-­he-­what-­situation-­and-­what-­can-­we-­do-­about-­it.

7 Collaboration: Developing Common Languages?

As seen from previous chapters, the curriculum provided in further education colleges traditionally fell between the schools and the university sectors. In particular, since the passage of the Further and Higher Education Act, 1992 the boundaries have become blurred with colleges offering school subjects such as GCSEs and A levels as well as offering higher education qualifications (Orr 2020). At the same time, schools have been offering vocational qualifications such as BTECs (Rodeiro and Vitello 2020). FE colleges are in a unique position because not only do they offer higher education programmes but also they educate students who progress onto higher education. Generally, about one-third of all students under the age of 19 who enter higher education through the Universities and Colleges Admissions Service (UCAS) have studied at an FE college (Association of Colleges 2019). In this chapter we examine the overlap in the provision of higher education courses between FE colleges and universities, and the competition and tensions that result. We then suggest remedies to these tensions, including collaboration and a way forward that could benefit both colleges and universities as well as the country more generally. In doing this, we will be drawing upon research carried out by the authors and our own experience working in FE and HE.

© The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2022 J. Baldwin et al., Managerial Cultures in UK Further and Vocational Education, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-04443-4_7

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FE colleges teach about 8 per cent of all undergraduate higher education students in England, as detailed in Tables 7.1 and 7.2. The former presents the number of full-time undergraduate higher education students in England broken down by universities (HE providers), colleges (FE providers), and alternative providers. The latter represents the number of part-time undergraduate higher education students in England using the same categories. Alternative providers are a small number of private universities and private degree awarding bodies without a university status, as well as those who hold specific course designation (HESA 2018). This means that eligible students on designated courses at these institutions can access student financial support. Most of these are small, but some such as the University of Law recruit about 7000 undergraduate students a year (Eurydice 2019). As can be seen from Tables 7.1 and 7.2, further education colleges recruit a comparatively small number of postgraduate students. Similarly, colleges recruit a small number of undergraduates compared with universities and even alternative providers. Moreover, although the number of full-time undergraduate students has increased annually for universities Table 7.1  Numbers of full-time students on higher education courses Title

2015/2016 2016/2017 2017/2018 2018/2019 18/2019 % of total

HE providers FE providers Alternative providers (designated courses) HE providers FE providers Alternative providers (designated courses) HE providers FE providers Alternative providers (designated courses) Total Source: HESA (2018/19)

251,565 1020 0

250,530 905 0

266,510 985 3215

279,985 17.01 1115 0.07 8120 0.49

1,099,155 1,143,560 1,180,640 1,206,075 73.28 19,565 19,585 20,040 19,920 1.21 23,465 27,490 29,130 30,670 1.86 40,870 43,895 23,870

36,290 46,050 18,185

35,730 46,590 16,900

34,890 46,510 18,480

1,503,400 1,542,595 1,599,745 1,645,770

2.12 2.83 1.12

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Table 7.2  Number of part-time students on higher education courses Title

2015/2016 2016/2017 2017/2018 2018/2019 2018/2019 % of total

HE providers FE providers Alternative providers (designated courses) HE providers FE providers Alternative providers (designated courses) HE providers FE providers Alternative providers (designated courses) Total

191,010 1945 20

188,115 1680 0

190,960 1780 3585

188,075 1620 6935

40.85 0.35 1.51

152,230 2495 455

143,285 2105 4200

135,100 2270 3555

130,395 2410 4395

28.32 0.52 0.95

109,165 58,985 2055

98,165 54,740 2880

83,040 54,335 2285

72,520 51,735 2370

15.75 11.24 0.51

518,355

495,165

476,910

460,450

Source: HESA (2018/19)

and alternative providers, the numbers opting for HE in FE have remained roughly the same. However, when considering full-time other undergraduate programmes, colleges recruit more students than universities. For part time other undergraduate programmes, colleges recruit almost as many students as universities, and although the number of part-time students has fallen since 2015, the decline has been less pronounced in FE colleges. The ‘other undergraduate programmes’ are mainly two-year vocational programmes such as Higher National Diplomas and Certificates and Foundation Degrees (HNCs, HNDs, and FDs). Colleges tend to recruit most of their students from their local area. Thus, in 2015/2016, about 80 per cent of HE in FE students came from their Local Enterprise Partnership (LEP) area, compared with 37 per cent for universities (Education and Training Foundation 2017). In addition, more HE in FE students come from areas where the HE participation rate is comparatively low (based on OfS POLAR data). In 2015/2016, about 42 per cent of students from POLAR Quintiles 1 and 2 studied at FE colleges

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compared with 27 per cent at universities. Thus, FECs deliver higher education but often with different courses, to mainly local students, a significant proportion of whom are from disadvantaged backgrounds (Education and Training Foundation 2017).

Why Do Colleges Offer HE Programmes? We will demonstrate in the next section that colleges face a range of hurdles and difficulties when they offer HE programmes. However, providing these courses also comes with a number of benefits. The LSIS Guide on Higher Education in Further Education. Widdowson and King (2013) suggest that ‘colleges offer higher education courses for a variety of reasons, including to: • Provide internal progression opportunities for college students to support widening participation initiatives. • Enhance external progression opportunities from level 3 vocational programmes. • As part of a local, sub-regional, and regional HE offer to address skills gaps and shortages. • Enhance the college profile and staff experience. • Support a diversified income stream. These include international students paying a significantly higher fee but also those in employment supported partly or wholly by employer.’ In the author’s experience as an HE manager in a medium-sized FE college, the first of these is the most important. As mentioned in Chap. 6, the writer was aware that many students on level 3 programmes in the college were fully qualified to progress onto HE but decided against this option. This particularly applied to students on vocational courses, mainly those on Edexcel Business and Technical Education  Council (BTEC) validated programmes. On analysing the details of these particular students, it became apparent that they were more likely to come from backgrounds underrepresented in HE, based on POLAR data provided

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by the OfS (2021a). Consequently, it was decided by the college’s senior managers to provide either an HND or Fd for every vocational area in the college. This was partly successful, as the demand for some courses such as in computing was consistent every year, but for many courses in areas such as Art and Design, the demand varied, and thus some years a course would not recruit a sufficient number of students to make it viable but the next year it would. Some programmes introduced, such as Travel and Tourism, never recruited sufficient student numbers and consequently were abandoned. Renewed attempts have been made with success, and thus a public service course which would not recruit in 2010 did recruit in 2019. The intention of offering HE courses at the college was not to compete with universities but to provide an alternative for those people who lived locally but did not wish or were unable to go away to university. This is not always the case. Some colleges such as New College Durham and Blackpool and Fylde have very large cohorts of students  – more than some of the smaller universities. The amount of government funding for each student in FE is based on a complicated formula, but the basic rate was £3455 for 2020–2021 (Education and Skills Funding Agency 2019), whereas the tuition fee for HE students can be up to £9250  in 2020/2021 (UCAS 2019). Thus, there is substantial motivation for colleges to offer HE courses. However, FE colleges generally charge lower fees. Table  7.3, based on data for 2012/2017, was produced when the maximum tuition fee was £9000. Moreover, in addition to typically charging lower fees than universities, colleges generally have smaller class sizes. As universities can recruit greater numbers, they can have very large classes for lectures, although this varies by subject area (as illustrated by Table 7.4). Table 7.3  Mean headline fee income of population by provider and qualification type (rounded to nearest £10) Title

Bachelor’s degree

Foundation degree

HNC

HND

Universities FE college

£8960 £7490

7510 7240

7860 5910

7160 6180

Source: Department for Education (2019)

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Table 7.4  Average class size at universities by subject for 2012/2013 Lecture size Class size Practical size

Economics

History

Physics

112 20 66

41 16 36

76 21 25

Source: Huxley et al. (2018) Table 7.5  The number of students at a range of universities, FE colleges, and alternative providers in 2019/2020 Institutions Anglia Ruskin University Higher Education Corporation (10000291) Arden University Limited (10005451) Arts University Bournemouth, the (10000385) Askham Bryan College (10000415) Aston University (10007759) Aylesbury College (10000473) Barnet & Southgate College (10000533) Barnsley College (10000536) Basingstoke College of Technology (10000560) Bath College (10001465) Bath Spa University (10000571) Bedford College (10000610) BIMM Limited (10037544) Birkbeck College (10007760) Birmingham City University (10007140) Birmingham Metropolitan College (10006442) Bishop Auckland College (10000720) Bishop Burton College (10000721) Bishop Grosseteste University (10007811) Blackburn College (10000747) Blackpool and the Fylde College (10000754)

Student numbers 21,200 7715 3010 450 12,565 75 300 450 95 195 6610 685 5020 8495 19,120 255 110 610 1460 1610 2455

Source: Office for Students (2020a)

As can be seen, universities have the opportunity to lecture to very large numbers of students. FE colleges rarely have these opportunities as they tend to have fewer students overall. Table 7.5 illustrates a number of different types of organisations that offer undergraduate programmes and the number of undergraduate students at each institution. These vary from Anglia Ruskin University with

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21,200 students to Bishop Grosseteste University with only 1460 students. Titles can be confusing as Birkbeck College is part of the University of London, but student numbers at FE colleges vary from Blackpool and the Fylde College with 2455 students to Aylesbury College with 75 students. Blackpool and the Fylde College is the largest FE provider of undergraduate degrees in England and is one of the few colleges that can award their own foundation degrees. BIMM Ltd is a private alternative provider that offers music education to 5020 students but spread over a number of sites in England. Although colleges tend to have smaller class sizes, they do not have some of the overheads that universities have as they carry out comparatively little research and often do not have their own halls of residence as students are more likely to live locally and at home.

 hat Difficulties Do Colleges Face in Offering W HE Programmes? As mentioned, Blackpool and the Fylde College are one of the seven FE colleges that have the power to grant their own foundation degrees. The Further and Higher Education Act 1992 as amended in 2008 gave authority for FE colleges to be granted the power to offer Foundation Degrees in their own right (QAA 2018a). This, however, is a very bureaucratic process, hence the small number of colleges and college groups who have these powers. A less bureaucratic process is provided by Pearson Edexcel for the validation of BTEC Higher National Diplomas or Certificates, and thus many colleges offer these qualifications. Consequently, most colleges that wish to offer undergraduate degrees or foundation degrees can only do so if they are validated by a university. Depending on the location of the college, some work with one, often a local university, while many colleges work with a number of universities for different qualifications (Further Education Trust for Leadership 2017). Bhattacharya and Norman (2021) examined the advantages of a college working with a local university or one at some distance away. They believed that the main advantage of a college collaborating with a

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local university is that they could jointly work with local industry to provide the level and type of qualification needed, and also by being close to each other, students at the college could use some of the specialist equipment and the library at the university. However, this means they are in competition, and Bhattacharya and Norman (2021) found examples of universities luring away students who had enrolled on a level 4/5 sub-degree course at the college to a degree course at the university. It means that the college and the university are actually in competition with each other, and thus some colleges prefer to work with universities at a distance to avoid this problem. In return for validating a programme at a college, the university charges a fee – usually between 10 and 15 per cent of the tuition fees of the students on the course. The university undertakes a process to validate the college and ensure that it has the appropriate infrastructure and quality processes to support the level of programme. Each course is then validated to ensure that the college has the appropriately qualified staff and resources to successfully offer that programme. Some universities then work closely with the college to monitor the programmes validated but others do not. Some concerns have been expressed about these partnership arrangements, and so the Department for Education tasked the Office for Students with investigating them and to provide a fact sheet on basic good practice (Department for Education 2017). Moreover, the Quality Assurance Agency for Higher Education has the responsibility for ensuring quality in higher education and have a Quality Code dealing with validation (QAA 2018b). According to Widdowson and King (Further Education Trust for Leadership 2017), universities undertake this validation process with colleges for a variety of reasons: • It is a way of generating extra income. • It is a way of forming links with a local college who may then recommend their own students go to that university. Sometimes formal agreements are made whereby the college’s students will be guaranteed an interview and/or lower offers. • Moreover, universities must have processes in place to recruit students from widening participation backgrounds, and colleges tend to recruit more of these students.

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• They validate two-year programmes only and give a guarantee that successful students will be considered for a top-up onto the equivalent degree programme at the university. This is advantageous for both college and university, and it is a good marketing ploy for the college, and it provides students onto the final year of a degree when some of their own students have dropped out. • It is evidence that the university is working with the local community. Sometimes universities will validate only programmes where they have expertise in that area, and sometimes courses validated will be those that the university already offers or can be new programmes that either the college writes or the two institutions combine to write the course. The author has been involved with the validation of degrees for over 20 years, and during that time his college has worked with eight different universities but with usually only two or three at one time. The university has always triggered the separation often with very short notice leaving the college to find another university who will validate a programme that already has students enrolled on it. The universities have often decided to end a validation agreement because of a change of priorities triggered by the recruitment of a new vice chancellor. All the universities have been within 50 miles of the college, and all have been reluctant to validate full degrees. The college has always needed the university more than the university has needed the college because we found that there are a limited number of universities who are prepared to validate courses at a college. The college is currently going through the process of validation with the Open University because it will validate full degree programmes. Nationally, the relationship between colleges and universities has often been strained particularly where they are close to each other and thus in competition. As a result, the Council of Validating Universities has been established to promote good practice (Council for Validating Universities 2021), and as mentioned, the Office for Students and the QAA also encourage good and fair practice. As well as the demands on a college by their validating universities, who all have different quality and procedure expectations, colleges must also comply with the requirements of the Office for Students (OfS 2021a). A college that offers HE courses must register with the OfS,

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comply with its reporting requirements, deliver the National Student Survey, and will normally take part in the Teaching Excellence and Student Outcomes Framework (TEF). Further, it will often have to produce an Access and Participation Plan (APP) and comply with the Quality Assurance Framework. Much of this has been covered in Chaps. 3 and 4. However, in Chap. 3 the additional difficulties that colleges face in producing Access and Participation Plans (APPs) compared with universities were not discussed in full. As we mentioned there, any HE provider who charges more than the basic tuition fee to students, which currently is £6250, has to produce an APP. This plan indicates how the excess income generated by charging a higher fee on widening participation and support for underrepresented groups will be spent. This applies to most colleges who have HE courses, although a few charge less than the minimum amount and thus do not produce plans. As we have indicated the process for producing the plans is lengthy and for the plan to be accepted by the OfS is has to comply with their template and guidance. The plan has to be based on the statistics that the OfS provides, although these are at least a year old at the time the plans are being produced. The OfS also provides a dashboard which illustrates how well the institution is performing against the main categories specified by the OfS. Colleges must complete exactly the same access and participation plans as universities despite the fact that there are very many differences and there are difficulties for colleges which are as follows: • The comparison data provided by the OfS which must be used for completing the plan is very sparse for colleges because of the small number of students involved and thus makes comparisons very difficult. Moreover, universities are able to make copious use of the graphs from the dashboard to illustrate their plans and to show comparisons. In many cases the same graph for the college is blank – again because of small numbers. • As the universities’ main focus is on HE courses and because of the enormous amount of money generated by their plans, they can afford to employ specialists to produce their APPs – in colleges this is just a small part of one person’s job. Universities also have specialist staff who are experts in statistical analysis. Thus, colleges need to spend a

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­ isproportionate amount on Research and Evaluation but also an d overall disproportionate amount of its Higher Fee Income. This was recognised to a certain extent by the OfS in its report on the first year of the new APP process (OfS 2020e). • Colleges offer a much smaller number of courses to a smaller number of students, mainly on vocational programmes with lower fees and mainly Two-Year Foundation Degrees and Higher National Qualifications and thus generate a much lower amount of excess income. • Most colleges automatically recruit a higher proportion of students from wider participation backgrounds because of the provision they offer and because they generally only recruit locally. Thus, their plans are often less about access but more about support for students once they are on programme. Thus, the burden on FE colleges is proportionally greater than it is for universities and does not fit with the widening participation agenda of most colleges because the APP template and requirements are designed for the processes, needs, and agenda of universities. This despite the fact that numerically, slightly more colleges produce plans than universities. An analysis of APPs was made by the author, and one of the findings was that universities tend to use various administrative interventions to improve their widening participation profile with little mention made of improvements in teaching and learning to support students from underrepresented groups, whereas for many colleges this was a major part of their strategy. Moreover, the OfS makes no mention of this in their advice to improve widening participation outcomes. However, the problems that colleges face has been recognised in a report commissioned by the OfS which concerns the use of data by universities and colleges and the role of the Centre for Transforming Access and Student Outcomes in Higher Education (TASO) (Krcal et al. 2020). TASO is an independent body set up by King’s College London, Nottingham Trent University, and the Behavioural Insights Team (OfS 2021b). TASO is an evidence centre and a member of the UK What Works Network with the task of enabling universities and colleges to more effectively use data to monitor whether they are meeting their widening participation objectives. The OfS commissioned the report to

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establish how effective TASO is. The authors of the report (Krcal et al. 2020, 44) found that ‘FEC provider interviewees have reported that the available evidence does seem more tailored to the issues facing universities and they report struggling to apply evidence to their situation’. One of the recommendations made by the report (Krcal et al. 2020, 72) of TASO is: Work more on reaching out to FECs and on providing guidance tailored to their specific context. Unlike other providers, such as universities, FECs cannot usually draw on wider institutional resources (e.g. for data analytics skills) in cases where separate evaluation units do not exist.

The Student Experience When colleges offer HE programmes the expectations of the students and the staff who do the teaching can be different. It is the author’s experience that when young people go away to university, there is a substantial change in the way they live. They are on their own, probably for the first time, and in a completely different environment often far from their home. They are expected to study in a different way and be more independent in the way they approach their studies. They may have to do their own cooking and laundry for the first time  - it can be exciting. However, when they enrol on an HE course at a college, particularly if they had been taking a level 3 course at the college previously, not much will have changed. It can be difficult to get students to appreciate that they now have to study in a different way and be more responsible for their own learning – particularly when they are still in the same building and taught by the same tutors as before. In a survey of FE students progressing onto HE in an FE college, Roffey-Barentsen (2015) found that many students found the progression difficult, and they suggested that they should have been better prepared for the demands of HE. Thus, colleges have to try to make special provision for HE students to attempt to give them the ‘university experience’ by sitting the HE students in separate rooms or blocks if possible, by providing HE only study or common rooms, or even giving them lanyards of a different colour.

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Allen (2016) found that many colleges referred to their HE areas as university blocks (as does the writer’s own), and she found that students often refer to their university study experience even though they are studying in an FE college. Otherwise the students continue to be given the same level of support as previously. They also do not experience the same social life as they would have done at university because most live at home and travel to college every day, and there is unlikely to be a student union bar or clubs. Nixon (2019) and Allen (2016) found that students studying the same Batchelor’s course at a college as at a validating university often had less choice in the modules they took as the numbers taking the course at the college were smaller. HE students in FE college cannot have the same access to resources and facilities as students at universities although colleges attempt to provide the main resources needed particularly library resources. Sometimes as part of the validation agreement, students at the college have the opportunity to use the university library and facilities, but if, as in the writer’s case, the university is 50 miles away, this is infrequently used – although there is access to university online facilities. Nevertheless, there are benefits for students who study HE in FE. Allen (2016) found that colleges will often compress students’ attendance at college on HE courses into two or three days as they are conscious that students who take HE in FE are more likely to be working at the same time, and if students on a particular course have school age children, they will timetable the classes to fit in with school times. Parry et al. (2012, 134) found that one of the major advantages of studying HE in FE is the smaller class sizes and the much closer, supportive relationship with the teachers of the course and their fellow students. Allen (2016, 200) quotes a student who had left a university course to return to the FE college because he felt unsupported at university as the lecturers could not give him the time that college staff did, and Allen also discovered that HE in FE students regard themselves as collaborators, whereas students at university often regarded themselves as being in competition with other students on their course. Rocks and Lavender (2018) in their research observed that the sort of non-traditional students who are attracted to HE in FE are more likely to improve their self-confidence and self-esteem and be transformed and

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have a change in life perspective by the style of nurturing teaching and learning and the culture provided in FE colleges rather than at university. Allen (2016) also found that welfare support at colleges was much more readily available but that career’s advice for HE students was more limited. In reality as one of the authors found when conducting research for a study (Raven 2019), commissioned by the Derbyshire and Nottinghamshire Collaborative Outreach Programme, some students study at their local FE college because they have no option. This study explored the progression challenges faced by level 3 learners from WP backgrounds studying in two East Midlands-based FE colleges, and how these challenges could be addressed. Raven (2019) found during that college tutors and lecturers who were delivering courses at both FE and HE levels talked of ‘a group [of students] who would never have gone to university’ were it not for the opportunities provided by their colleges. Similarly, the writer has been told by students in his own college that they would not have been able to go away to university, particularly older students with families who can study at their local college while looking after their families. Many colleges have articulation agreements with universities, often local so after the student has completed an HND or Foundation degree at a college, they can then automatically progress on to a degree course at the university. This is easier if the university has validated the foundation degree because it can be designed to dovetail with the degree course. Bhattacharya and Norman (2021) believe this is a major way in which colleges and universities could collaborate more. Kalitowski (2019) quotes the Hertfordshire Higher Education Consortium, which is made up of the University of Hertfordshire and four FE colleges and provides students with access to a University of Hertfordshire–validated HE course allowing local students the opportunity to progress to the university on completion of their course. Since the Consortium was established in 2000, about 15,000 students have come to the university through this route. As has been explored in Chap. 6, FE colleges are more successful in recruiting students from disadvantaged backgrounds onto their HE programmes, but this often means that these students come with a greater

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need for support, but as this also applies to many FE students, the structures for support are already in place (Bathmaker 2016). Studying HE in FE is not the same as studying the same course at the university. It is the writer’s experience that when negotiating validation agreements with universities, it was always accepted that the student experience could not be the same, but it could be equivalent when taking the advantages and disadvantages into account. For instance, although colleges cannot provide the same library facilities or the same social experiences as universities, the students in FE have the advantage of smaller class sizes and much closer contact with their tutors. Some of the colleges with the largest numbers of HE students have separated their HE from FE students by constructing HE blocks with a common room and catering facilities and having dedicated HE tutors.

The Staff Experience Universities expect their tutors to undertake research as well as teaching, but this is not normally the case at FE colleges, and when validation events take place university staff are often alarmed at the amount of teaching an FE lecturer does each week. In most colleges, the tutors who teach on HE courses also teach on FE courses and thus have to get used to two types of teaching and involvement with students (Feather 2016). This is not always easy. Feather (2016) found that FE lecturers who were teaching HE had various reservations including a tension between loyalty to their college with its managerial culture and their subject profession, whilst in HE a more collegiate approach is expected. FE lecturers’ contracts generally indicated that they should teach for between 23 and 25 hours a week, but they were aware in discussions with their validating universities that university lecturers had a much lower teaching load – teaching on exactly the same HE programmes. King and Widdowson (2012) carried out research with FE lecturers who teach on HE courses and found that they taught in a different manner with HE students. They made the teaching more personalised but expected the students to undertake more independent learning. Lecturers on HE courses are often encouraged to carry out research, and some

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universities offer cut-price masters or doctorate programmes to tutors on their validated programmes (Parry et al. 2012). Creasy (2013) argues that undertaking research is an integral part of being an HE tutor, and unless the college tutors are carrying out research, their students are not getting a full HE experience and the HE is devalued. The author has been involved with a number of universities and with their staff when validating HE courses at the college, and his experience is that university tutors often voice concerns about their workload, but when they work with their FE counterparts they realise that their working life is different but more intensive, as there is an expectation that they will be available to give support to students almost immediately. Allen (2016) found that an FE staffroom is much noisier with student demands than a university common room. In an FE college many students regularly visit their tutors in the staff room, particularly during break times to ask questions or get advice although Allen did not find this in universities. College administrative and admissions staff also have to learn and administer a separate set of HE regulations and procedures as well as dealing with the processes relating to FE students. Although in the few colleges with very large cohorts of HE students, separate administrative staff deal with the HE students.

The Employer Experience As FE colleges mainly deliver vocational education, they often work closely with local employers to ensure that they deliver the type and content of training that the employers need. Colleges are expected to have employer representatives on their governing body. In relation to delivering HE in FE and particularly on a part-time basis where employees are released from their workplace, Husband and Jeffrey (2016, 5) suggest that many employers may prefer ‘HE level training in vocational and technical abilities than a more theoretical or creative research-based immersion in a subject matter’. We have discussed collaboration with employers in more detail in Chap. 4.

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The Differences This is the current situation with most FE colleges offering a small number of HE courses and just a few offering a larger range. The experience of both staff and students at colleges is different at FE colleges and universities. As we have examined, universities and colleges have distinct roles and cultures, and thus it is not surprising that the differences summarised in Table 7.6 exist. Table 7.6  Comparison between aspects of universities and FE colleges Priority

Role

Culture

Visibility Size Flexibility Finance Student recruitment Planning Range of subjects Student background

Universities

FE colleges

Research with teaching and assessment secondary Narrow – Higher education – Levels 4–8

Teaching and assessment with little research

Collegiate shifting towards managerialist Academic In the public and government eye Usually large or very large Limited High fees and some endowments Nationally and internationally Medium and long term Wide

Narrower in age and socio-economic background Period of study Mainly full time – three years Student Mainly on campus residence

Broad – Levels Foundation and 1 to 6 and apprenticeships, adult education Managerialist Pragmatic Less known to the public and government From small to very large Generally nimble Lower fees Mainly local Short and medium term Narrow – mainly vocational Very broad in age and socio-­ economic background Full and part time – mainly two years Mainly live at home

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Collaboration As can be seen from above, colleges and universities collaborate in relation to the validation of HE programmes at colleges. Bhattacharya and Norman (2021) examine collaboration between colleges and universities and suggest that there are various barriers to collaboration and explain how these barriers can be overcome. They argue that one of the major barriers is competition as has been described in Chap. 3, and thus colleges and universities within the same locality are often wary of working with each other. However, examples can be identified where universities and colleges have collaborated well, with both local industry and students benefiting as a consequence. Derby University (2021), for example, states on its website that: Working in partnership with other institutions is fundamental to the way in which we promote participation in higher and further education, contribute to regional economic growth and strengthen our reputation and we welcome the opportunity to partner with institutions who share this goal.

It then lists 12 colleges it currently works with. Bhattacharya and Norman (2021) have produced a report examining collaboration between colleges and universities, and one of the positive examples they have given is the Teesworks regeneration development. By pooling their resources and expertise, the Teesside University College Partnership, which is made up of Darlington College, Redcar and Cleveland College, Stockton Riverside College, Hartlepool College and Teesside University, has collaborated and positioned themselves as brokers for Teesworks’ training needs, offering both higher and further education skills. The All-Party Parliamentary University Group (2019) produced a paper extolling the virtues of colleges and universities working together to offer provision and particularly for employers. They gave an example of Middlesex University working with three London FE colleges to work collaboratively on degree apprenticeships. However, the group accepts

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that relationships between universities and colleges have not worked because of lack of funding and competition. They also suggested that: The diversity amongst partners can also create problems for collaboration, with higher education and further education institutions creating their own terminology for provision. It can be difficult to try to cut across this and ensure all involved are clear on the objectives and practices of the partnership.,

Hale (2018) cites the Middlesex Universities’ Centre for Apprenticeships, which works collaboratively with local further education providers in a partnership which supports the alignment and growth of apprenticeships at all levels and ensure clear routes for progression. He also refers to the University of Birmingham collaboration with University College Birmingham (UCB) and South & City College Birmingham, who have created a single system to encourage progression to higher-level skills in engineering. The University Alliance is a body made up of 12 lower tariff universities, and they consider that collaboration between college and universities is essential and: That is why University Alliance is calling on the next government to build a more integrated tertiary education system that further incentivises HE and FE to work in partnership to deliver flexibility, choice and clear career pathways for learners of all ages and backgrounds. (Kalitowski 2019)

Similarly, when responding to the DfE 2021 White Paper the Chair said: We welcome the opportunity through these reforms to build a more integrated tertiary education system that further incentivises HE and FE to work in partnership to deliver flexibility, choice and clear career pathways for all learners. (University Alliance 2021)

The White Paper was formalised into the Skills and Post Education Bill, and in a press release (DfE 2021b), the DfE suggested that the

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actions proposed in the Bill will bring greater parity between FE and universities and removed the allusion that a degree is the only pathway to a good career. Mention has been made of access and participation plans in Chaps. 1 and 2, and in many of the plans, reference is made by universities to their collaboration with local FE colleges to encourage and enable access by young people from underrepresented groups. In its APP, the University of Birmingham explains how it has formed links with two FE colleges in Birmingham to create pathways from the colleges in order to support the acquisition of higher-levels skills into Engineering in the city (Office for Students 2021c). Similarly, in its APP the University of Lincoln states that it has formed an alliance with all the FE colleges in Lincolnshire to create a Lincolnshire Institute of Technology, where all partners will deliver education and training (Office for Students 2021d). The authors organised a webinar under the auspices of the Forum for Access and Continuing Education, and a representative from the Office for Students gave an example of successful collaboration between the Southampton and Solent University and the local FE colleges to identify areas ripe for upskilling and then provide appropriate HE programmes. However, another contributor from The  Newcastle  College Group described how the group had gained degree awarding powers for its college members because in the past colleges had often been treated as junior partners in collaborative relationships and sometimes treated poorly by universities. Although universities appear to be keen to work with colleges to access their level 3 students, collaboration is not always as successful with HE courses, probably understandably because they are often in competition for the same young people.

Uni Connect and Widening Participation In order to encourage people from disadvantaged groups to progress into higher education, the National Collaborative Outreach Programme (NCOP) was established in 2019 to work in areas in the country where progression to HE is the lowest. This programme, now entitled Uni

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Connect, receives £60 million of funding each year from the OfS. The OfS states: There are 29 local partnerships of universities, colleges, local authorities, local enterprise partnerships, employers and others who work together to develop and deliver Uni Connect locally. OfS (2020b, 1)

A number of projects are carried out with colleges and schools to encourage young people from the disadvantaged areas to progress onto higher education. Some of these projects are designed specifically for FE students progressing to higher education. On its website the OfS provide an example of the Essex partnership designing a programme specifically for over 16-year-old students in FE colleges to ensure they were aware of their HE options (Ofs 2020c). This could also be seen as a good opportunity for young people to be advised of the advantages of some young people studying HE at FE colleges. However, it is the author’s experience that as the Uni Connect partnerships tend to be dominated by the local universities, most of the focus is on encouraging the young people to go to university. This experience is underpinned by the other case study examples on the OfS website which are all concerned with progression to HE but all but one of the examples relate to studying at university (OfS 2020d). At the time of writing a consultation on Uni Connect is being completed with one of the recommendations being that there should be greater focus on FE colleges, although this only appears to be concerned with the progression of FE students and older students onto university (OfS 2020e). Raven (2021) expresses concern that the demise of Uni Connect would not be compensated for by the work that universities report that they carry out in their Access and Participation Plans. As can be seen from the above, some collaboration between universities and colleges is claimed by universities, although it is difficult to find many examples. This could be an area for development where the two could work more closely together, but the neoliberal culture of marketisation in both types of organisations militates against this. In most areas and particularly in cities, it is sometimes the case that FE colleges and universities are trying to recruit some of the same students who might have a choice of taking an HND course at their local college or a degree

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course at the local university. The author is aware on an example where the city university had validated an HND course at the local college, and as a result, the university had the details of the students who were enrolling. As the recruitment on the degree course at the university was poor, they offered preferential places to the college HND students, some of whom transferred to the university. The particular strength that FE colleges have of recruiting widening participation students onto their HE courses was discussed in Chap. 5.

The Future HE Role of Colleges To summarise, most FE colleges provide higher education programmes, and their students can apply for student loans to pay the tuition fees that colleges charge. To offer a degree or foundation degree the course has to be validated by a university with the exception of a few colleges who have gained the power to award their own foundation degrees. These programmes are known as prescribed higher education. However, there is another category of non-prescribed higher education, which are also at level 4 and 5, and many colleges offer these courses. They include professional qualifications such as those offered by the Association of Accounting Technicians, the Chartered Institute of Marketing, and the Chartered Institute of Legal Executives. It also covers higher-level NVQs in subjects such as management. These HE programmes are often offered on a part-­ time basis (Widdowson and King 2013). In this final section, we will demonstrate how increased enrolments on this level of qualification can benefit students and the country.

L evel 4 and 5 Qualifications: The Way Forward? There have been several government reports and initiatives that have encouraged the expansion of HE in FE some of which have been mentioned in the first two chapters. Suggestions have been made about the

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focus in England on three-year bachelor’s degrees when in many cases a two-year HND and HNC or Foundation degrees might serve the needs of employers and the country more effectively. Concern about technical education was raised in 2016 by the Sainsbury Report, (2016)  which made a number of recommendations including suggestions about level 4 and 5 technical qualifications. The panel indicated that technical education in the UK is too complex and does not provide the technical skills necessary for the future. They proposed a new system of technical training for levels 2, 3, 4, and 5 based on the technical knowledge and skills employers will need in the future. They suggested that this new centralised system of technical training be managed by the Institute for Apprenticeships. This was followed by a Dept for Education (2016) White Paper - Post 16 Skills Plan, which accepted all of the Sainsbury recommendations. The White Paper suggested that there would be 15 routes, and the Institute for Apprenticeships would maintain a register of technical qualifications at levels 4 and 5, which are eligible for public subsidy through government-backed student loans. To begin with, this register will be drawn from those existing technical qualifications which are considered to do the best job of meeting national standards. The standards used will be set by the panels of professionals based on the relevant technical knowledge, skills and behaviours at the higher levels, and will align with the standards for apprenticeship programmes in the same route. (p 26)

In the Augar report (2019, 134), the panel recommended that there should be a greater focus on colleges delivering level 4 and 5 qualifications and access courses. A House of Commons Briefing paper on level 4 and 5 Education in 2019 indicated that the take-up of level 4 and 5 qualifications in the UK is low with about 10 per cent of adults holding this level of qualification compared with about 20 per cent in Germany and 34 per cent in Canada (House of Commons 2019). Moreover, the number of learners enrolled on level 4 and 5 qualifications fell between 2009/2010 and 2016/2017 from 510,000 to 190,000. The briefing paper also indicated that about half of level 4 qualifications are delivered in FE colleges with about one-third at universities. This also compares with

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Scotland, where the number of students taking HND/Cs remained almost the same between 2008/2009 and 2017/2018 and about 26 per cent of all graduate students taking HND/Cs. Colleges recruited 88 per cent of all HND/C students in 2017/2018 (Scottish Funding Council 2019). Zaida, Beadle, and Hannah (2019) produced a report for the DfE on the market for level 4 and 5 qualifications and found that a slightly higher proportion of ethnic minority students take them and a higher proportion of older students and those with disabilities. They recommended that FE colleges should be encouraged to deliver more of these qualifications, and they should be made more widely known as they serve a valuable need (House of Commons 2019, 108). A DfE Employer Skills Survey (2017, 13) found that ‘skilled trades roles continue to have the highest density of skill-shortage vacancies’, with around two in every five vacancies proving hard to fill for skills related reasons. In addition, a National Audit Office report (2018) also suggested that there is a shortage of technician-level STEM skills, which can be attributed to an undersupply of people with level 3–5 vocational qualifications over the last 20 years. The Augar (2019) panel found that the decline in level 4 and 5 qualifications was probably unintended but has come about because of financial pressures on FE colleges and financial disincentives for students, particularly part time, and employers to take part in these qualifications which are mainly made up for Foundation Degrees and Higher National Diplomas/Certificates. The report agreed that there is a very large skills shortage at technician level, and these qualifications can be a major method of reducing that shortage. The report made a number of recommendations as to how that shortage can be overcome by the expansion of the provision for level 4 and 5 qualifications with FE colleges making a major contribution. It was not until January 2021 that the government responded to these reports by producing a White Paper (DfE 2021a). The White Paper reiterated the concerns that the government had for the state of higher-level technical education and referred to a report which suggested that adults with a higher technical qualification can actually be earning more at the age of 30 than those with a degree (Espinoza et al. 2020). The paper proposed that a wide-ranging scheme will be put in place based upon the findings of the Sainsbury and Augar reviews to implement a completely

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new scheme for enabling people to undertake vocational technical education and training throughout their life. This will be delivered by further education providers with a particular remit for further education colleges, which includes reforming level 4 and 5 technical education. It is proposed that there will be: • A reforming of higher technical education to make it a more popular and prestigious choice. • Greater employer involvement using Chambers of Commerce and other local employer groups. • A reforming of higher technical education (levels 4 and 5) with a new approval system based on employer-led standards. • The creation of clear progression routes for students towards the higher-level technical qualifications that employers need. • The implementation of a flexible lifelong loan entitlement to the equivalent of four years of post-18 education from 2025. • Provision to make it as easy to get a student finance loan for an approved Higher Technical Qualification as it is for a full-length degree. • Investment in the college estate to transform facilities and enable high-­ quality provision. But also: • A strengthening of the governance of colleges, by taking a clearer position on what good governance and leadership looks like. • An ‘Introduction of new powers for the Secretary of State for Education, so the government can intervene quickly and decisively in cases where there are persistent problems that cannot otherwise be addressed, either with colleges not delivering effectively or where local providers are unable to deliver the skills priorities for that area’ (Reference needed p12). The Skills and Post-16 Education Bill (2021) includes the provisions proposed in the White Paper, and in a press release by the Department for Employment (2021b), it was suggested that these actions will assist in levelling up employment and prospects across the country.

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As Dennis (2021) has suggested, it was a conservative government that took colleges out of local education control in 1992 to free them from bureaucracy and control to another conservative government re-­ introducing bureaucracy and control but at a national level. A representative for the Workers Education Association (WEA) (TES 2021) commented that although the changes proposed in the Bill will bring significant changes to the skills landscape, they are totally focused on post level 3 qualifications and only support a narrow band of technical disciplines. Although it is suggested that these changes will support lifelong learning, they do not relate to many of the lower-level qualifications which provide skills which employers favour. As a manager of an FE college the writer is aware that many of the students in his college who take Hospitality and Catering and Hair and Beauty courses leave after they have completed level 2 qualifications because they now have the essential skills needed for those occupations. During their time on the college course they have been employed at local pubs, restaurants, or hair and beauty salons on a part-time basis, but once they have completed the level 2 award, their employers offer them full-time jobs at what appear to be very good wages. In most pubs and hair and beauty salons the knowledge and skills they have gained are adequate for their roles as cooks or hairdressers and meet the needs of their employers. As Brexit bites, employers can no longer rely on people from Eastern Europe to undertake these roles. In press releases, the government has indicated that the Skills and Post-16 Education Bill (2021) is designed to encourage the take-up of higher education, particularly at levels 4 and 5 in FE colleges and does so in various ways (Department for Education 2021b). One of these is the introduction of a new flexible loan system for adults which can be used for higher education at any point in their lives. However, the Bill focuses primarily on qualifications in engineering, digital, clean energy, and manufacturing, and another aspect of the Bill relates to the rationalising of qualifications generally in England so that only those qualifications which satisfy the government’s agenda will continue. Thus, it is likely that FE colleges will benefit, as long as they are offering the ‘right’ qualifications. It appears that universities, and their representative bodies, are nervous that government funding will be diverted from them to FE colleges,

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and thus they are becoming interested in collaborating with their local FE colleges in order that they can get a share of this new, level 4 and 5, lifelong learning business (Million Plus 2021).

Conclusion If these proposals are implemented this could create a chance for FE colleges to be instrumental in creating new opportunities for young and older learners to undertake qualifications full and part time which will give them the knowledge and skills needed in an increasingly complex technical world post-Brexit and post-COVID.  This could potentially increase the percentage of level 4 and 5 students in English FE colleges to the levels seen in Scotland and Germany. However, with the proposed lifelong loan entitlement, many people having completed a level 4/5 qualification will then wish to top up to a degree. Many colleges already offer degrees validated by universities or have top-up arrangements with universities so collaboration will still be important. Milton (2021), a former skills and apprenticeships minister, argues that, in the light of the Skills and Post-16 Education Bill (2021), it is vitally important that colleges and universities collaborate and use their individual skills. However, for collaboration to take place a common language as to the role of higher education in society, understandable by those in both universities and FECs, needs to be established, but while neoliberal market views and values exist this will be difficult. For too long FECs have been the ‘Cinderella Service’. Is this the time when they will go to the ball?

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———. 2020c. https://www.officeforstudents.org.uk/advice-­and-­guidance/ promoting-­equal-­opportunities/effective-­practice/make-­happen-­further-­ education-­providers-­become-­future-­ready. OfS. ———. 2020d. https://www.officeforstudents.org.uk/advice-­and-­guidance/ promoting-­equal-­opportunities/uni-­connect/case-­studies-­in-­words/. ———. 2020e. Consultation on a new approach to the Uni Connect programme from 2021–22 to 2024–25, https://www.officeforstudents.org.uk/publications/consultation-­on-­new-­approach-­to-­uni-­connect/. ———. 2021a. Young participation by area.,https://www.officeforstudents.org. uk/data-­and-­analysis/young-­participation-­by-­area. ———. 2021b. Evaluating the delivery and impact of the OfS investment in the Centre for Transforming Access and Student Outcomes. https://www. officeforstudents.org.uk/publications/taso-­baseline-­report. ———. 2021c. https://apis.officeforstudents.org.uk/accessplansdownloads/ 2024/TheUniversityofBirmingham_APP_2020-­21_V1_10006840.pdf ———. 2021d. https://apis.officeforstudents.org.uk/accessplansdownloads/ 2024/UniversityOfLincoln_APP_2020-­21_V1_10007151.pdf Orr, K. 2020. A future for the further education sector in England. Journal of Education and Work 33 (7–8): 507–514. Parry, G., Claire Callender, P. Scott, and P. Temple. 2012. Understanding higher education in further education colleges, Technical Report. London: Department of Business, Innovation and Skills. Quality Assurance Agency. 2018a. The right to award UK degrees guidance. QAA. ———. 2018b. UK Quality code for Higher Education: Chapter B10: Managing Higher Education Provision with Others. QAA. Raven, N. 2019. They would never have gone to university': the unique role that further education colleges play in widening access. FACE e-bulletin, 139 (August, 2019). ———. 2021. The outlook for outreach. A survey of access and participation plans for 2020–21 to 2024–25. National Education Opportunities Network, Report, https://www.educationopportunities.co.uk/wp-­content/uploads/ Outlook-­for-­Outreach-­single-­pages.pdf. Roffey-Barentsen, J. 2015. Smoothing the ride: An exploration of students’ experiences and perceptions of the transition from a level 3 qualification to a higher education programme (level 4) in a further education institution. Research in Teacher Education 5 (2): 12–16.

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Rocks, E., and P. Lavender. 2018. Exploring transformative journeys through a higher education programme in a further education college. Education and Training 60 (6): 584–595. Rodeiro, C.V., and S. Vitello. 2020. Vocational qualifications at key stage 4 and key stage 5: Who takes them and how they fit into students’ programmes of study, Cambridge assessment research report. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge Assessment. Sainsbury Report. 2016. Report of the independent panel on technical education. DBI&S. Scottish Funding Council. 2019. Higher education students and qualifiers at Scottish Institutions 2017–18. SFC. TES. 2021. Skills and Post-16 Education Bill: The sector reacts, TES. https:// www.tes.com/magazine/archived/skills-and-post-16-education-bill-sectorreacts. Accessed May 8, 2022. University Alliance. 2021. University Alliance responds to the government’s skills for jobs white paper and interim conclusion of the review of Post-18 education and funding. UA. Universities and Colleges Admissions Service. 2019. https://www.ucas.com/ finance/undergraduate-­t uition-­f ees-­a nd-­s tudent-­l oans#how-­m uch-­a re-­ tuition-­fees, UCAS. Widdowson, J., and M.  King. 2013. Brief guide for governors, senior staff and clerks in further education colleges: Higher education in further education colleges. Learning and Skills Improvement service. ———. 2017. Higher Education in Further Education: Leading the Challenge. FETL. Zaidi, A., S. Beadle, and A. Hannah. 2019. Review of the Level 4–5 qualification and provider market. DofE.

8 The Impact on FE Managers: Research Findings

As detailed in Chap. 1, we have spent a great deal of our respective careers as managers in further and higher education. This body of experience demonstrates the enormous potential that further education has to change lives and how it operates within the sphere of the whole education and skills ‘system’ in the UK. However, as has been demonstrated in a range of chapters in this book (e.g. 2 and 4) the same experiences also signal how the people that work in the sector can be adversely affected, depressed, repressed, and oppressed by neoliberal managerial approaches. In 2016–2019 the writers of this book collated 19 case studies from leaders and managers in the FE sector to try to explore the impact of policy on their experience. This narrative inquiry approach is drawn on Clandinnin and Connelly’s work, who, in turn, argue that their work is influenced by John Dewey, who writes about ‘experience’ (2000, 2). All argue that experiences are cumulative and that it is by writing and talking about these experiences that we are better able to make sense of what is really going on, and to consider other ways in which solutions to problems may be explored. In the past 30 years ‘narrative inquiry has become part of this discourse’ (author Dewey 1996a, 4). Indeed, in 1986 Fischer wrote that there was ‘an experimental moment in the life of human science inquiry’, and others echoed this view (Denzin and Lincoln 1994). Drawing on the fields of anthropology and psychology, Geertz (1995) © The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2022 J. Baldwin et al., Managerial Cultures in UK Further and Vocational Education, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-04443-4_8

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establishes narrative inquiry as a robust way of comparing experiences of people in different countries as part of an anthropological study. In 1994, Bateson wrote a reflective view of his life as an anthropologist. He uses a narrative approach to argue that ‘change comes from learning …. learning is change’ (7). He describes the approach that he took to ‘uncertainties in life, novelties that may even seem meaningless, inexplicable, ‘chaotic’ (ibid). It is in this format that the experiences of leaders in further education in the study will be considered. Our research is, therefore, closely aligned to a constructivist ontology and an interpretivist epistemology in that the reality it tries to understand is a reality interpreted in social action. This research accepts that the phenomena exist not ‘out there’ but in the minds of people and in their interpretations. As Robson (2000, 147) notes, ‘people, unlike objects of the natural world, are conscious, purposive actors who have ideas about their world. Their behaviour, what they actually do, has to be interpreted in light of underlying ideas, meanings and motivations’. In relation to this, Clandinnin and Connelly (2000, p. xxiii), who were the first to use the phrase ‘narrative enquiry’, discuss four issues with the complexity of the type of research we undertake. The first issue they express as ‘temporality’, as events described often happen in a moment, but the details and ramifications of them go on into the future beyond the incident. Things do not ‘happen in the moment but are an expression of things happening over time’. The second, linked to temporality, is people. People are on their own personal learning journey at any point in time, and therefore, it becomes ‘important to narrate the person in the process’ (Clandinnin and Connelly 2000, p. xxiii). The third challenge is how action is understood. A sign is hard to interpret if the history of the subject has not had experience of what the sign means, so the individual interpreting what is going on may not fully appreciate where the action came from. The final issue is certainty. Narrative inquiry is about interpretation, and even the performance data of individual students can be manipulated and interpreted to how we meant it to be. Therefore, all we can do is our best under the circumstances, knowing all the other possibilities. The study is grounded in Dewey’s philosophy of education being about life and that experience

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provides that ongoing education, so the study assumes that the conclusions and next stages after the research is complete will build on the body of knowledge developed here. Therefore, it is a study in time. If education is life then people put their own education on a continuum, but people’s experience also influences how they behave and what they are. Thematically, the case studies reveal that leaders were trying to engage students, employers, and their staff to improve the quality of the educational experience. However, they felt locked in ways of working because they had to respond to a policy paradigm (examples of which can be seen in Chap. 3) without being given more time or a sense that they can spend time embedding new practice. Indeed, they all felt that their voices as professionals were not always considered. The standard evaluative measures in education - identify the objectives and measure outcomes – remain prevalent, and this mantra is unlikely to disappear. Eisner (1969) does not accept this simplistic outcomes-based model as it tends to ignore the impact of unpredicted and/or complex problems. As Spillane (2007, 7) argues: We need a reporting procedure for facilitating vicarious experience. And it is available. Among the better evangelists, anthropologists, and dramatists are those who have developed the art of storytelling. We need to portray complexity. We need to convey a holistic impression, the mood, even the mystery of experience.

This is why a case study approach becomes interesting. Working with FE Leaders to explore how experience can also inform research and improve their practice seems a sensible way of moving from purely responding to technical-rational approaches to applying democracy and pragmatism to leadership. It would be naive to think technical-rational approaches will disappear overnight, but if we can find new ways of responding to and infiltrating technical-rational approaches then there may be some hope for change. To pit the two approaches against each other risks not securing the change that FE leaders seemingly need. As Stenhouse (1984, 78) contends: There is some danger in evaluators creating their own establishment and glamorise it as an elite. Let’s keep hold of the idea that it is mostly a matter

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or common sense and learning from experience. That is not entirely true, but it keeps us from going technical and theological; and a little modest oversimplification is better than a lapse into jargon or pretentiousness.

What Does the Research Suggest? Following Eraut (2005) and Carr (1995), the case study research tried to put the theory of leadership into practice through inquiry. Thus, leaders were asked to consider how experience influenced their epistemological approaches. The activities also considered how by changing their approach it might serve to change the approach to curriculum design and delivery and to the experience that both staff and students have. Therefore, the research suggests: • Leaders and managers need a structure to support their development in transforming approaches to pedagogy and interpreting policy. Structures such as those in HE or even schools, for example, may help with this. Acknowledging models such as those suggested by Biesta (2010) on good education, or Joint Practice Development (JPD) approaches such as those suggested by Fielding (2005) and put into practice by SUNCETT, can provide ways to develop leaders and to give a language to transcend the technical-rational. • Development of leaders and managers in the sector needs to move beyond simple budget management into one where there is a discussion about the internal goods of the practice of education and how leaders can support its development. Understanding educational philosophy (such as describe Dunne), and research in collaboration and craft (such as Sennett) leaders can be more forthright in the support offered to those that they manage. • While the world of policy and inspection will not alter any time soon, the implementation of policy can be more focused on curriculum development if leaders open up spaces to talk about educationally important issues such as assessment and assessment practice rather than making a first responsibility to ever-changing funding models.

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• To undertake this activity, leaders and managers should be given the skills needed to be courageous in challenging taken-for-granted assumptions and to be able to take a practice-focused approach to research, and in addressing educational problems and problems of policy implementation and evaluation. This could involve adopting JPD (definition would be good) practices and principles illustrated in some case studies, as well as drawing on the potential of Dewey’s pragmatic epistemology in addressing enduring problems in vocational education. To make good leadership practice better, the approaches of Dewey (1916b), Ayers et al. (1998), and Gregson et al. (2015) need to be adopted. Human experiences of what is actually happening in practice need to be taken seriously and taken into account to ensure that the practice of leadership extends beyond simply demonstrating operational skills, and responding to lists, towards a more cooperative, pragmatic epistemic position based on democratic principles, cooperation, and collaboration. Human beings are shaped by their biographies and stories and the stories of others. It is clear from people like Geertz and Bateson (cited by Lave and Wenger 1991) that change is constant, and people try to construct realities. In beginning with our experience, we are trying to use this study to make sense of the reality we have experienced. As Lave and Wenger (1991, 32) observe ‘organisational researchers are forever on shaky ground, insofar as they mediate between organisational authors and academic theorists ... practitioners and consultants are busy writing texts and authoring works. The researcher’s role is to interpret these texts’. They argue there is no clear difference between fact and fiction. As mentioned, our inductive approach means that this grand narrative will be incrementally arrived at. However, this does need to be considered in the context of professional boundaries. Schon’s writings (1983, 1987, 1991) begin to consider this in the context of narrative inquiry as he explores the boundary between technical approaches and reflection in action: Once we put aside the model of technical rationality, which leads us to think of technical practice as an application of knowledge to instrumental

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decisions, there is nothing strange about the idea that a kind of knowing is inherent in intelligent action. (Schon 1983, 50)

The case studies suggested that little has changed for leaders in FE in recent times. Indeed, the original issues presented at the start of the research demonstrate that: • The culture and language of the sector has emerged through a range of restrictive policy developments which are exacerbated by quality control and inspection methods imposed by other agencies. • Managers can struggle to navigate their way into and through the sector because of the politics and policies and sector and institutional characteristics. • Professional development of managers entering the sector is not always useful in supporting and encouraging good decision making. Constant change in reporting, funding, and quality monitoring policies does not help with this. • There is expense and challenge in implementing consistent and constant change, and managers can find this hard to respond to. Moreover, it does not always help to facilitate good decision making. Indeed, managers and leaders that engage in taking different approaches to decision making do so at considerable additional time and personal cost to themselves. • The impact of constant change on students, parents, employers, and other stakeholders is not fully understood, and policies have little chance to gain any tractability. • There is little evidence to show how individuals are supported (or not) to make good judgements in the sector. We have been involved in several leadership development programmes as managers in FE. Recent papers from the Further Education Leadership Trust suggest a five-point plan for leadership development. There is a risk with any plan of creating a smorgasbord of ideas, which are hard to pin down and which miss some key elements. Therefore, there is a risk in creating a long list of suggested actions. I have found it hard not to think through what might help to make the sector better for middle leaders and

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move to a position where phronesis (acting with wisdom to determine a final end) is exercised as the norm in FE.

Leadership Approaches We explored whether there could be more pragmatic and democratic ways for leaders to think about and reflect on their practice that could be put in place. This could be focused on leadership unique to FE, the standards and the internal goods of the practice of leadership unique to the sector. It could be adapted from other sectors where more pragmatic and democratic ideas such as ‘pedagogic leadership’ are better embedded (such as Early Years Education). This way, professional learning can focus on the job of educational leadership, as well as picking up the more generic leadership skills which need to be developed. Evidently, while operational leadership is hard, especially when the demand is to grow student numbers to increase income, data sets in the study suggest that greater emphasis needs to be placed on continuing professional development (CPD). A recent 2019 ETF report indicates, ‘60 per cent of FE teachers’ had no time to spend on CPD’. The OECD (2014, 11) affirmed that vocational teaching is becoming ‘harder than teaching academic counterparts’, and so teachers require additional support to make that happen. This needs to be understood by inspection bodies so that there are robust and well-rounded thresholds for CPD for all staff. This should include leadership CPD. While there is rhetoric around career routes through the sector for emerging managers, there needs to be greater emphasis on how these routes operate and support progression for managers. This could also improve the quality of decision making as leaders would be able to see themselves working in the sector for a longer term. While engagement in practitioner research is beginning to have a positive impact in the sector, especially from a practitioner and Joint Practice Development perspective, greater urgency is needed to ensure that practitioner research has more visible impact. Perhaps another challenge for any executive manager working in the sector is to accept that context is critical. A strategy can work in one context but may not in another. Therefore, it is unrealistic to treat all managers working in the same

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context in the same way. Just as good teaching relies on varied assessment and differentiation, so good leadership relies on the same approaches. Often when I am asked to help or assist with something it is because someone has recognised it as a ‘good practice’. However, those practices can often emerge only from context, responding to need and meeting teachers, other staff members, employers, and learners in the way that most fits their needs. This research has demonstrated that establishing context takes time and that approaches such as Joint Practice Development (JPD – the process of working collaboratively to reflect on challenges and develop and test collaborative solutions) can help but that understanding and articulating that context takes even more time. For example, there have been moments when I have embarked in ‘employer engagement’ work to help with curriculum development. However, this has only worked when there has been a willingness and availability for employers where we have been located, a lack of competition, and a strong commitment from other partners. The Local Enterprise Partnership (LEP) has also been focused on such activity, and while the establishment of devolution deals have not always gone to plan, the keenness to engage in such activity has helped and the colleges have been able to influence the LEP in its engagement and decision making. These extra layers and agencies add to cost, complexity, and the politics of the operational running of a large institution. Moreover, as I have been engaged in activity such as T-Level development, colleagues from more rural locations have struggled to engage with employers, as there are fewer of them and they are more dispersed. Furthermore, the research shows curriculum design and development need to be understood fully, especially in such complex policy surroundings. Often people with ‘business development’ (or similar) roles are involved in helping to shape and influence the curriculum. What is troubling here is that the level of understanding of curriculum theory and curriculum design can, in some cases, be rather rudimentary. If FE colleges are to rise to the demands of government in relation to ‘higher-level professional and technical’ policy imperatives, then they need staff who have a sound grasp of curriculum theory and practice, as well as a clear awareness and understanding of current thinking in the field of practice development and workplace learning. However, often faced with

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ferocious recruitment targets leaders can become lost in a web of policy. Consequently, the importance and focus on such activity can sometimes be side-lined. Indeed, if we accept that it takes 10,000 hours to gain mastery of a craft, as Sennett (2008) suggests, then why should we assume that mastery of the craft and practices of education leadership in FE, including, collaboration, cooperation, problem finding, problem solving, and critiquing, should be any less challenging or requiring any less time.

Potential Next Steps So, where does all this leave educational leadership in the sector? First, managers will need to collaborate and cooperate to make decisions in the interests of the common good. This will involve acting with respect, generosity, and virtue within their organisations and beyond them. Second, it will be important for education leaders to understand what a good education is, how we can know it when we see it, and that there is some clarity about the purpose of FE. Third, we will need to create conditions in which education leaders and managers can develop the qualities and virtues necessary for collaboration and cooperation, including humility, an acceptance of human fallibility, and the importance of being able to admit and learn from individual and collective mistakes. Fourth, we need to think about approaches to teaching and learning differently. While de Saussure and Orwell would argue that words come in and out of fashion and denote different phenomena, education leaders need to become researchers and improvers of their own practice. Indeed, in this sense we could argue that FE managers have adapted part of a craft model in what Aristotle would have described as techne or technique. However, the development of good practice involves much more than instrumental technique. It demands that the internal goods of the practice of education leadership are articulated and embodied in practice. This includes the exercise of practical wisdom or phronesis in context as well as a commitment to praxis which Dunne (1993, 10) describes: Praxis is conduct in a public space with others in which a person, without ulterior purpose and with a view to no object detachable from himself, acts

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in such a way to realise excellences he has come to appreciate in his community as constitutive of a worthwhile life.

The ways of acting or ways of being detailed above through the work of Aristotle are a long way from the values and practices of the market which currently dominate education leadership in the sector. The values and practices of the market are clearly not fit for purpose (as we have argued in this book) in an FE sector which seeks to enable people to find and realise their vocational calling in life. This will be challenging to achieve in a culture where managers struggle to navigate a complex world of budget constraints, policy changes, and personality clashes while trying to stay close to their core values within a 37-hour working week. Addressing the question of how we prepare them to move towards more democratic ways of working will not be easy and will take time. This research has shown that democratic and collaborative approaches can offer a framework/guide/blueprint for managers which allow them to transcend institutional, political, and social structures to think about curriculum development differently. Gregson et al. (2015) when discussing making JPD work have the first stage in the cycle as creating the conditions for people to discuss the issues at hand, in other words, what is really happening in practice. The emphasis is on leaders having the courage to not be so subservient to neoliberal policies governing how the sector behaves but to begin to challenge this ideology in order to nurture the development of more democratic models of education leadership across the sector. It is evident that technical-rational approaches have led to FE leaders to try to make decisions and exercise judgement, perhaps without really reflecting on the impact of these approaches on educational practice in the sector. This has resulted in training and development for leaders being focused almost solely on operational activities, and many of the issues, challenges, and problems which have arisen in the past not being resolved in the present. It is evident from data in this book that this is coming at a great personal cost to individuals and to the sector at large. As a manager within the sector for a considerable period of time, there are

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behaviours which I have witnessed which have been systemically shaped by technical-rational policies. To offer some examples: • Inspection bodies seem to have all-encompassing power, and leaders responding to their demands can be put under so much pressure that they are abrupt with or unkind to their subordinates. This was especially true in organisations in the shadow of Ofsted inspections and was much less evident in other peer-reviewed methods (such as those used in HE). Furthermore, the appointment of Chris Woodhead as the previous Chief Inspector at Ofsted could be considered a political appointment bringing the ministry and the inspectorate closer together rather than positioning them as separate approaches. • An unclear and ill-defined FE system and a College Higher Education (CHE) system which has not yet fully articulated its overall sense of direction, and who it serves and what independence it exercises is a contributing factor to the problem of education leadership in the sector. • Lack of controlled risk taking to encourage curious teachers, who in turn can develop curiosity in learners is prevalent in the research. It is also notable that publications such as FE Week (over a period of 4 weeks analysed) produced four times as many negative articles about the sector compared to positive articles. (This analysis was done over January and February 2018.) • The Technical and Further Education Act (2017) has allegedly increased the independence of colleges but has reduced the support for FE from the state and, along with the Higher Education and Research Act (2017), has quadrupled accountability measures across the FE sector and further ensured governing boards need to have a strong legal and accountancy base at the detriment to those who understand and are committed to the improvement of educational practice. All of these technical-rational approaches accentuate the problematic nature of the FE system in England. We believe that managers, teachers, and support staff are directly placed at odds with each other by the system. Yet, the literature on ethical leadership and the philosophy of education indicates that there are other more democratic approaches that might lead to better outcomes for students and the sector.

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Courage, challenge, and incremental reflection are currently difficult for education leaders to do because technical-rational approaches adopted by inspection and funding bodies who are implementing often incoherent education policies are pushing such spaces to the margins of practice. While JPD offers an opportunity to approach things differently, the technical-­rational world view surrounds FE and HE leaders, and it is assumed that the approaches taken provide ‘the truth’ about what is really going on in the sector while in reality this is far from the case. For example, on Wednesday, 3 April 2019, the government issued a ‘one-stop’ document to ‘strengthen college oversight’. In reality, the document detailed a whole (new) range of interventions and set out new ways in which intervention can be triggered from the FE Commissioner. Funding information continued to be issued annually based on lagged learner numbers and, in the case of adult learning and apprenticeships, handed over on a monthly basis. In the previous five years there had been 60 FE Commissioner Interventions and 39 Area Review Visits (which were focused on reducing the number of colleges and forcing mergers). This went along with the fact that there were four FE colleges with ‘outstanding’ grades at the time, and between January 2017 and May 2018 no FE College received an Ofsted ‘outstanding’ rating.

 ow the Further Education World Is Seen H and Measured This imbalance in outcome and performance in the sector has never been commented on by any agency or senior sector leader. In April 2019, the Association of Colleges and Department for Education put together an hour-long online seminar to describe the changes to the 2016 performance tables for qualifications. The webinar revealed that the changes had resulted in a minority of non-academic qualifications contributing to performance tables. Therefore, the DfE was launching a two-part review into qualifications post 16 to ensure that many would make the league tables. This was at the same time that Ofsted were consulting on a new inspection regime which aimed to put ‘less emphasis on outcomes’.

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However, the key trigger for inspection and any other type of intervention remains outcomes. Fielding (2003, 292) argues that the ‘existential texture of a concept affects how we see the world, how we understand it, how we engage with it, and how we conduct our daily work within it’ is essential to improve the practice of education - to move poesis to phronesis. Fielding emphasises how the language we use to describe educational policy and its aspirations matters a great deal because it influences how and how well we can identify and distinguish between levels of change in education and most importantly because the same language signifies the relays of power and control at work in the framing of notions of ‘social justice’ and a ‘better’ society. He/she challenges current approaches to assessing the ‘impact’ of education in England and draws attention to their deeper ontological and epistemological roots in the seventeenth- and eighteenth-century mechanical world views. Fielding (2003, 3) also notes how the technicalrational approach to education reform, coupled with a ‘fatuous’ and ‘hectoring’ form of language, the language of ‘performance, has come to pervade the discourse of educational policy in England through notions of ‘impact’ and its outcomes. Although it has been argued that identifying the impact of any social policy upon practice is never a straightforward matter, this research has demonstrated that it is easy to identify some of the negative impacts of the policies of inspection regimes on current further education. The research has also brought to light questions about who is best placed to make judgements about the practice of further education and its improvement. There are political dimensions to the problem which also seem to have a negative impact. Which prime minister, for example, would remove an Ofsted grading system to determine the ‘success’ or otherwise of an institution. In the traditional sense of technical-rational approaches, the range of data that is laid before people makes solutions to problems seem obvious. However, this assumes that the data gathered is most relevant and that the questions being considered covered the full complexity of educational practices. Sarason (1996) argues that what we choose to notice and what we choose to ignore in the highly charged political contexts and power relations of educational reform are of enormous importance. Here Sarason is drawing our attention to the importance of

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ensuring that context and complexity are acknowledged when judgements are being made. Sarason (1998, 8) highlights how education reform can become effectively locked into a cycle of failure where ‘the more things change the more they remain the same, or (even get) worse’. In such circumstances and situations the illusion of change, in the form of activity (or perhaps more accurately hyperactivity), masquerades as change itself. It is evident that leaders in FE genuinely feel that this is the case. The work of Sarason (1996) is presented here not by way of idle pessimism but rather as an alert to the dangers of ‘missing the point’ and ‘ignoring the obvious’ in education reform and the suffering of consequences and costs of overlooking the potential of other ways of seeing impact which may be capable of taking these relationships into account. The challenge of the technical-rational is that it assumes the impact of policy and approaches as an event or outcome. It fails to take into account that impact can be part of a process and that there can be outcomes which are not intended. Furthermore, practices are complex processes, and the context that they operate in can be highly complex. In the context of further education, it is difficult to see how research (which has generally been conducted by individuals not working within the sector) has informed policy. It is also evident that wider groups (LEPs, the CBI, and others) have influenced policy, but there is little to suggest the actual impact of policy on the human beings (education leaders and teachers) who have to implement these policies in practice. Furthermore, in some policy contexts the use of research seems scant. In 2002 Landry worked with policy makers to establish how research influenced some of their practices. However, only 8 per cent said that research fully influenced their work, and a further 38 per cent said that it might occasionally influence their work. The effect of this kind of policy can be seen in things like the former DfES (now DfE) paper in 2007 ‘Making Good Progress’; it mistook Assessment for Learning as a ‘type’ (not process) of assessment and assumed that could be ‘levelled’. Of course, not all policy decisions will necessarily be ‘researched’ and nor does all research relevant and useful to the sector. Often policy can be born out of ideology. For example, the 2011 White Paper previously mentioned was born out of a Conservative ideology of neoliberal

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approaches to education structures. Furthermore, the Secretary of State at the time (Michael Gove) introduced phonics as the main approach to reading in primary schools, against a public body of research that suggested there may be better approaches to take when teaching children. Indeed, it could be argued that the 1998 studies by Fisher (2013) that peddled phonics has a greater influence upon policy than was merited by its research base. Here can be another quandary for those researching in a practice; how do individuals know which practice to promote? For those that were interviewed as part of this study it was the first time any of them had been asked about their lived experience as a leader in further education. The case studies were the first time that I had reflected on some of the themes that have emerged as a leader within the sector for a number of years. Therefore, the process of dissemination of those experiences has had no real route of dissemination to policy makers (who may or may not respond to it in any case).

Some Cause for Hope? There are some standard routes of dissemination which are opening up to practitioners in further education. This includes conferences, papers, seminars, and others. This is partly because further education is becoming increasingly prevalent in the further education through practice-­ focused research conducted by sector practitioners themselves. Moreover, the Education Training Foundation has been forward thinking in funding programmes such as those developed by SUNCETT, which use pragmatic approaches as a counterbalance notion of existence of and possibilities for absolute ‘excellence’ and ‘best practice’ in education arguing for the use of the term ‘good’ practice which embraces moral aspects of educational practice and the internal ‘goods’ of educational practice in its own right. However, politics and the implementing reflective processes are not going to change immediately in education. Policy makers cannot know all the issues of the problems that they are trying to solve or ensure that they have humane solutions to those problems when only considering hard impacts. Moreover, it is clear that there are financial, human, and

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humane costs to the current status quo. Indeed, as Coffield (2010, page required) hints in his paper ‘Yes- but what does Semmellweiss have to do with my role as a tutor’ he suggests that it took 200 years for reflective, academic approaches to become commonplace within medicine. Moreover, the paper cites significant consequences for people who challenged given assumptions and approaches. Therefore, it must be acknowledged that technical-rational approaches cannot be pitted against pragmatic, epistemological approaches as one side against the other. If improvement to the condition of further education is to be made, then leaders need to seek opportunity within technical-rational approaches to improve the quality of education. Silver (2003, page needed) acknowledges difficulties in the concept and contemporary technical-rational usage of measures of ‘impact’ in education in England alongside reservations about the often-short time scales made available for the collection of ‘hard’ evidence of impact. Realistic and authentic impact evaluation (Silver 2003, 2) suggests that we must look for evidence of outcomes which attempt to ‘consider how a programme or project or other activity is proceeding, and the manner or extent to which it is attempting to carry out intentions’. From this perspective, impact evaluation is interested as much in processes as outcomes. While Silver recognises the essentially flawed and absurd nature of impact studies which attempt to measure educational or other social processes in the same ‘hard’ ways that ‘length of track laid’ or ‘yield per acre’ might be measured, he objects most strongly to outright dismissals of ‘all interest in impact’ and what he describes as unwarranted condemnations of any search for impact and its influences in all situations (original emphasis). Silver accepts that in some situations sensitive evaluation is not possible given a quantitative, testing framework in which results are required to be scrutinised. He argues (Silver 2003, 3) however that even within situations where only ‘hard’ measures of impact collected within short time scales are deemed to count, there is a case for attempting to say something about impact even ‘if only to suggest ways in which more serious further analysis might be conducted, further questions asked about the ongoing or apparent outcomes of the experience being considered, and to offer a continuum of guidance’.

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Dewey’s epistemology is helpful in extending the above discussion of the role and importance of ‘transaction’ and of paying attention to the processes of impact in educational evaluation. Biesta and Burbules (2003) and Biesta (2007) show how Dewey offers a different way to think about knowledge and the real, one based on experience, which is very different from the technical-rational world view. Through an accessible and vivid account of Dewey’s pragmatic philosophy, Biesta and Burbules (2003) illustrate how Dewey’s (1916b) work provides a way of approaching educational research which is not only humane but also manages to avoid the polarising pitfalls of positivism, post-positivism, and postmodernism. The epistemological and practical analysis of technical-rational approaches to the evaluation of education reform suggests that it does not serve FE leaders well. Any system for evaluating policy that forces people into positions where they have to act as if they know what they do not and cannot yet know is bound to be ineffective and inefficient. This is because transactions are conducted as if enquiry were no longer required, as if the problem and its solution were already known, and as if what would count as relevant evidence could be predetermined.

Potential Indicators Therefore, the question is what the solution to this might be, and what might the solutions be to some of the dilemmas and questions posed at the start of this chapter. How might ‘soft’ indicators be developed that work within a reasonable cost and timeframe? How might leaders within FE develop the skills to put importance on soft indicators and trying to achieve them while at the same time maintaining the requirements of external evaluation methods? Given that soft indicators, by their very nature, are subjective, anecdotal, and impressionistic, how can leaders find ways of communicating their importance in ways which satisfy external bodies, while creating cultures which are broad, curious, and not afraid to take risk? How can leaders research new approaches which can influence policy and policy implementation? Indeed, how can we ensure that policy is informed by a broad range of research?

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Working with FE Leaders to explore how experience can inform research and improve their practice seems a sensible way of moving from purely responding to technical-rational approaches to applying democracy and pragmatism to leadership. It would be naive to think technical-­ rational approaches will disappear overnight, but if we can find new ways of responding to and infiltrating technical-rational approaches then there may be some hope for change. To pit the two approaches against each other risks not getting the change that FE leaders seemingly need. As Stenhouse (1984, 78) contends: There is some danger in evaluators creating their own establishment and glamorise it as an elite. Let’s keep hold of the idea that it is mostly a matter or common sense and learning from experience. That is not entirely true, but it keeps us from going technical and theological; and a little modest oversimplification is better than a lapse into jargon or pretentiousness.

There are a range of approaches with FE Leaders which could be considered. The previously described approaches by the SUNCETT team as part of the Education and Training Foundation’s Practitioner Research Programme are beginning to demonstrate that there is a counter-­narrative to the positive scientific stance in conducting education research and securing educational improvement. Their work has focused on practice-­ focused research conducted by sector practitioners to secure improvements in their work. They argue that approach may be able to operate as a corrective to some of the shortcomings of top-down, neoliberal, and positivist meta-narratives in the field of education (Gregson and Hillier 2015). As detailed in previous case studies, Gregson takes the view that the practitioner voice has equal weight to ‘big’ research (such as that of randomised controlled trials, which the Department for Education uses with increasing frequency) to make claims about the practice of education. She argues that practitioner research is uniquely capable of taking context and knowledge seriously and that practice is the arena where ideas from research and theory are tested and challenged. Reflecting on this and taking into account the case studies I have had to consider middle and senior managers as practitioners and explore ways in which

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conditions can be created to better support their work and their professional learning. This led me to trial some new approaches. As part of this research, and in the light of suggested other ways of working from SUNCETT, Stake, and others, as researchers and practitioners in the sector we wanted to consider whether or not there were other ways of developing leaders in FE. In response, we developed a series of CPD sessions for middle managers. The workshops took the format of several sessions: Session one focused on introducing the ideas of pedagogic leadership, and by using the lenses of educational leadership, educational management, and educational administration, a discussion of the current state of affairs and the potential future state took place! It asked managers to think about what they felt the priorities in their role were. It asked them to explore what they wanted to achieve within the roles and whether or not they were focusing on those things. Session two focused on decision making. It explored how managers made decisions, how assumptions were challenged, and what frameworks individuals used to make decisions. It also considered how (un)conscious biases influence judgement making. Exercises were devised to start to build on the description of their philosophy of education the session to explore the barriers to making this happen. The session included a discussion of where virtue ethics might sit in leadership, as it explored the motivations for people making certain types of decisions and establishing what influenced their decision making. Session three focused on how managers could work better together and with colleagues around the organisation to have a larger impact. It focused on exploring the role that each manager had and how their roles fitted together. The session started to consider how the impact of activities and decisions might be evaluated to lead to better judgements. This session set out to explore several questions: • How do we sustain practice and building expertise? • How do we define our roles, and are we happy with how we perceive activity? • How do we approach partnerships (internal and external), and how do we know that they work?

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• What is effective change management? How long does it take? The concept of the change curve was introduced, which individuals considered their own perspective and team members’ perspectives against it. Session four then started to look at how practice can be changed. It explored how an enquiry-based approach could improve curriculum design to support achieving the desired outcomes detailed. In doing so it explored how increasing reflection on the practice of leadership to pursue quality improvement could be an embedded way of working. Additionally, it considered how improving transparency can improve student experiences and life chances. It asked managers to think about: • What attitudes and routines they need to successfully undertake leadership roles? • What is the craftsmanship of educational leadership? How do we know, and what will success look like? • What does preparing people for the world of work entail (a feature of ‘good’ and ‘outstanding’ colleges – by Ofsted rating)? • What can we learn from others, and why is that important? • How do we exercise rigour, responsiveness, and compassion? Measuring the impact of this was challenging. We always had a feeling that the sector needed to develop its intellectual and social capacity if it was going to stand up to perverse policy decisions and to assert itself. While everybody responded positively to the training, it took five months to lead to any real action and that was only after considerable developmental effort. Indeed, the research changes in practice have only been demonstrated with sustained effort.

Other Challenges and Findings The research also considered other elements of leadership in further education. Some analysis has been undertaken on staff turnover and development in the sector. In most institutions’ leadership teams had shrunk by

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23 per cent in the last five years and this had a detrimental impact on organisational capacity. The feedback from the interactions was interesting. As leaders compared the work they were doing administratively with the work they were carrying out in their leadership roles, they were not surprised about the disparity of emphasis in activity between the current state and the future state. What was interesting was the conversation about what could be done about it and how people would be able to assess whether or not it had worked. Individuals were all able to express how software platforms (ones they mentioned included ProResource, MarkBook, ProAchieve, and ProObservb) drove their working practice, and they spent a considerable amount of time focusing on how to complete them as opposed to the impact they had on students. The other thing that they focused on was the lack of awareness of technical-rational approaches they operated in. They reflected on how they accepted the situation they worked in, whether or not it was diametrically opposed to their philosophy of education; by not reflecting on some of the assumptions they worked in they are not able to discuss the real ‘elephants in the room’. They cited a smorgasbord of initiatives that they were expected to initiate to ‘raise standards’ and create spaces for conversations to improve teaching, learning, and assessment. However, nobody had been supported in scaffolding these discussions to create the conditions for conversations. Therefore, they felt that teachers were not becoming ‘powerful democratic professionals’ (Coffield 2010) but engaged in superficial conversations that did not critique practice because individuals felt compelled to say positive things about their practice rather than showing vulnerability. If democracy is a key part of education (if Dewey is right) then democracy should be a key part of the way the curriculum is structured and, therefore, led (Dewey 1916b, 38): We live in difficult times: democracy has been swallowed by the gluttony of neoliberal consumerism regurgitated as an emetic scramble for easy and endless acquisition at the cost of a narrowing vision, a corrosion of generosity and human sympathy, and an impoverishment of much that distinguishes democracy as an enabling way of life.

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It is this current technical-rational policy paradigm which is creating the deficit in activity. In the research we were not seeking to explore or impose ‘top-down’ ways of working, or notions of external views of ‘excellence’ in improvement, but they were designed to encourage reflection on practice within each leader’s own work. Following Eraut (2005) and Carr (1995), the activities tried to put the theory of leadership into practice through inquiry. Thus, leaders were asked to consider how experience influenced their epistemological approaches. The activities also considered how by changing their approach it might serve to change the approach to curriculum design and delivery and to the experience that both staff and students have. The reaction of managers to adapting new approaches to their development was interesting. Managers found the approach enjoyable as it moved ‘training’ from being a narrow and instrumental set of ‘skills’. While there was the realisation that understanding how to do a job successfully, within the frameworks that provide oversight of the sector, is important (without it the full extent of the technical-rational instruments will be deployed in the organisation) but that the need for creative, lateral thinking is also important, and that these are the approaches that they would want teachers to take with students, so the opportunity to model good practice was gladly taken. Managers were asked to express what their ‘calling’ to the ‘vocation’ of leadership within the further education sector. Young (2008, 128) comments on the Review of Vocational Qualifications in 1987 saying it was the start of a movement ‘from a qualification system based on shared practices and professional judgement, to be based on formally explicit criteria, capable of being defined independently of any specific experience or practice’. It seems that the traditional models of development for FE Leaders. Indeed, taking a more pragmatic approach to leadership practice and to challenging the way technical-rational approaches are embedded this could start to generate more of the courage needed to challenge the system that some of the case studies started to highlight. Indeed, Davies (2005, 24) describe these interventions in the above as ‘purposeful, pragmatic and cognisant of the complexities involved’. In 1975 Parlett and Hamilton introduced an approach of ‘illuminative evaluation’, which suggests that other forms of

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evaluation are oversimplified. They suggest that classical methods have too much control and do not reflect reality. The approach outlined above could be extended to ensure that there are longitudinal impact assessments of all of the above. Colley (2007, 22) says: I don’t think you should base your policy on a bunch of anecdotes, but there is a role for anecdotes in sort of presenting things to the Minister and helping them to understand that it is helpful for them; they can sell it onwards.

These approaches can then demonstrate how working with key stakeholders, user outcomes, presentation, meetings, improving teaching, learning, and assessment can work. Just as Young’s work on qualification reform highlights how the market-driven dogma of successive governments has led to the changes in the education and training system, so Gregson et al. (2020), and others detail how market forces have led to managerialist practice in further education which has now become the ‘norm’. While when using public funding minimum standards and approaches should be expected in relation to the expenditure of public funds, so challenging and improving practice should become embedded as a way of working. Furthermore, while the sector focuses on performance measures and ‘hard’ outcomes, it seemingly struggles to create spaces for leaders to reflect and research their practice and the practice of others. This divide means that the ‘intellectual tussle’ needed for improvement is missing. Sarason (1996) gives hope that in the past educational practice has been transformed by insiders rather than outsiders, by those that care about improving practice.

Models Rather as Biesta’s (2010) Venn diagram focuses on three elements, a similar but adapted model could be developed for management development which focuses on (Fig. 8.1):

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Policy

Pedagogy

Practice Focused Research

Fig. 8.1  Biesta’s Venn diagram

To make good leadership practice better the approaches of Dewey (1916b), Hyland (1994), and Gregson and Hillier (2015) need to be adopted. Human experiences of what is actually happening in practice need to be treated seriously and taken into account to ensure that the practice of leadership extends beyond simply demonstrating operational skills and responding to lists, towards a more cooperative, pragmatic epistemic position based on democratic principles, cooperation, and collaboration. I believe that human beings are shaped by their biographies and stories, and the stories of others. The research has not suggested a revised or preferred review or inspection method. The evidence-base points to many aspects of inspection being flawed and many occasions where ‘support’ does not feel supportive, collaborative, or genuine. The research highlights some of this behaviour coming from inspection, funding, and monitoring regimes. Ultimately, to strengthen the sector the way in which it is weighed and measured needs to be altered, and this needs to be reflected in how the value of the sector is measured by the government. The research shows

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that current approaches are having significant unintended consequences for individuals working within it, and this is costly. The research has also shown that new, more pragmatic, and democratic approaches to educational evaluation and improvement and educational leadership might achieve and support better outcomes for students without being detrimental to the human beings who are genuinely trying to lead the sector in the best way they know how, and this in turn might result in some financial savings. This research has shown that there may be some approaches which could respond more effectively than the top-­ down approaches that the technical-rational world view brings, but fundamentally, perhaps a re-work of the 1992 FE and HE Education Act, along with a renewed focus on the practices of curriculum design and teaching, is at least some of the ways we can move forward to improve the stressful situations in which middle managers in FE currently find themselves.

References Ayers, William, Jean Ann Hunt, and Therese Quinn. 1998. Teaching for social justice. A democracy and education reader. New York: New Press. Biesta, G. 2007. Why ‘what works’ won’t work: Evidence-based practice and democratic deficit in educational research. Educational Theory 57 (1): 1–22. Biesta, G.J.J. 2010. Good education in an age of measurement, Ethics, Politics, Democracy. New York: Routledge. Biesta, G., and N.C. Burbules. 2003. Pragmatism and educational research. Lanham: Rowman and Littlefield. Carr, W. 1995. Education and democracy: Confronting the postmodernist challenge. Journal of Philosophy of Education 29 (1): 75–92. Clandinnin, D., and F. Connelly. 2000. Narrative enquiry: Experience and story in qualitative research. San Francisco: Jossey-Bass. Coffield, F. 2010. Yes, but what has Semmelweis to do with my professional development as a tutor? London: Learning and Skills Network. Colley, H., D. James, M. Tedder, and K. Diment. 2007. Learning as becoming in vocational education and training: Class, gender and the role of vocational habitus. Journal of Vocational Education and Training 55 (4): 471–497.

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Denzin, N.K., and Y.S. Lincoln. 1994. Handbook of qualitative research. Thousand Oaks: SAGE. Dewey, J. 1916a. Democracy and Education: An Introduction to the Philosophy of Education. New York: Macmillan. ———. 1916b. How we Think: A Restatement of the Relation of Reflective Teaching in the Educative Process. Chicago: Henry Regnery. Dunne, J. 1993. Back to the rough ground: Practical judgement and the lure of technique. Notre Dame: University of Notre Dame Press. Eisner, E.W. 1969. Instructional and expressive educational objectives: Their formulation and use in curriculum, Instructional Objectives, AERA Monograph No. 3. Chicago: Rand McNally. Eraut, M. 2005. Expert and expertise: Meanings and perspectives. Learning in Health and Social Care 4 (4): 173–179. Fielding, M. 2003. The impact of impact. Cambridge Journal of Education 33 (2): 289–295. London: Routledge. Fielding, M., S. Bragg, J. Craig, I. Cunningham, M. Eraut, S. Gillinson, M. Horne, C. Robinson, and J. Thorp. 2005. Factors influencing the transfer of good practice. London: Department for Education and Skills. Fisher, R. 2013. Teaching thinking: Philosophical enquiry in the classroom. London: Bloomsbury. Geertz, C. 1995. After the fact: Two countries, four decades, one anthropologist. Cambridge: Harvard University Press. Gregson, M., and Y. Hillier. 2015. Reflective teaching in further. Bloomsbury: Adult and Vocational Education. Gregson, M., Nixon, L., Spedding, P., and Kearney, S. 2015. Helping Good Ideas Become Good Practice. London: Bloomsbury Press. Gregson, Margaret, Sam Duncan, Kevin Brosnan, Jay Derrick, Gary Husband, Lawrence Nixon, Trish Spedding, Rachel Stubley, and Robin Webber Jones. 2020. Reflective teaching in further, adult and vocational education. London: Bloomsbury Publishing. Higher Education and Research Act. 2017. https://www.legislation.gov.uk/ ukpga/2017/29/contents/enacted Hyland, T. 1994. Competence education and NVQs: Dissenting perspectives. London: Cassell. Lave, J., and E. Wenger. 1991. Situated learning: Legitimate peripheral participation. New York: Cambridge University Press. OECD. 2014. Education at a glance 2014: OECD indicators. OECD Publishing. https://www.oecd.org/education/Education-at-a-Glance-2014.pdf. Accessed 20 May 2020.

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Sarason, S. B. 1996. The Predictable Failure of Educational Reform. Can we Change Course Before It’s Too Late? San Francisco: Jossey-Bass Publishers. Schon, D. 1983. The reflective practitioner: How professionals think in action. New York: Basic Books. ———. 1987. Educating the reflective practitioner. San Francisco: Jossey Bass. ———. 1991. The reflective practitioner: How professionals think and act. Oxford: Avebury. Sennet, R. 2008. The craftsman. New Haven/London: Yale University Press. Silver, H. 2003. Re-viewing impact. Cambridge Journal of Education 33: 2. Spillane, J.P., and J.B. Diamond. 2007. Distributed leadership in practice. New York: Teachers College, Columbia University. Stenhouse, L. 1984. An introduction to curriculum Research and Development. New York: Heinemann. The Technical and Further Education Act. 2017. https://www.legislation.gov. uk/ukpga/2017/19/contents. Young, M.F. 2008. Bringing knowledge Back. In From social constructivism to social realism in the sociology of education. London/New York: Routledge.

9 So What Happens Now?

In this book we have attempted to describe what the further education sector is and the problems it faces. We will now summarise and suggest what needs to change for the benefit of the economy, the community, those who work in FE, and, most importantly, for the students. This book began by stating that the impact of technical-rational approaches had been little understood and documented in further education. A range of researchers from outside the sector (rather than within) have begun to comment on how FE is gaining political importance. The impact of the financial crash and COVID has ensured industrial productivity has remained low. Further education and the ability to support re-­ training have been seen as one potential solution to these challenges. However, the funding mechanisms have not changed, nor has the complication of a range of Regulators and Primary Legislation. Many of the changes have had contributions from sector bodies and from some principals and chief executives. However, these are in a minority and do not take into account the work of middle managers and ongoing impact on their work. Following the Augar review there was a period of time when colleges and universities were awaiting a response from government (clearly COVID-19 limited some of the immediacy of a potential response). The response came in the form of a Skills and Post-16 Education Bill. However, this did not take into account HERA (see Chap. 2), and it completed its passage through parliament while an HE © The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2022 J. Baldwin et al., Managerial Cultures in UK Further and Vocational Education, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-04443-4_9

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White Paper was being planned. The confused policy landscape remains at large, and those operating in it continue to have the same issues. In Chap. 2 we provided background to the FE sector by describing what it does and its history. We also set the scene by justifying our research methods, providing some definitions, and offering an international context. And we also began to explore the difficulties that FE colleges currently face. Chapter 3 explored the impact of government policy, looking at the perception the current government has about the role of FE and the type of curriculum that it believes should be delivered. We suggested that, philosophically, FE is not providing the best form of knowledge and skills that it could as a consequence of being driven by economic pressures. We started to discuss how this affects FE managers and the styles of management they are forced to adopt. We also explored how this impacts on social mobility and how colleges could play a much greater role in enhancing the outcomes and prospects for students, particularly in its potential to facilitate higher education study. In Chap. 4 we considered how managerialism and neoliberalism have impacted on FE colleges and made them institutions which are focused on the economy, competition, and employers’ needs, and are made to operate in a ‘business-like’ manner. However, we would contend that colleges are not like manufacturing business. Producing chocolate bars or washing powder in a highly competitive marketplace is not the same as providing people with the knowledge and skills that will help them to find employment as well as equip them with the wider skills needed to function well in a highly complex and demanding society. As Mintzberg (1993) suggested, FE colleges are not machine bureaucracies but professional bureaucracies, and thus managers must treat the staff in a college differently to the way managers might treat workers in a factory. The relationship between college leaders, college tutors, and their students is not the same as that between a customer and, for instance, their plumber, window cleaner, or car mechanic. However, the culture imposed on colleges forces them to treat their students as customers rather than clients. Thus, we believe that managerial and neoliberal modes of operation mean that college students are not getting the best education. We suggested that the model of New Public Service described by Milakovich and

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Gordon (2013) is a more suitable framework than New Public Management as students are treated as equals with a common goal. In Chap. 5 we built on Chap. 4 and began to explore the remedies for the challenges that colleges find themselves in and considered alternative approaches to the way that colleges are managed which have the potential to provide better outcomes for their students. This chapter began to describe the case study research that we have undertaken into how FE managers could better manage. It explored collaboration and looked at how students and other stakeholders could be more involved in the design of the curriculum and the running of colleges. The chapter also described how the culture of colleges could be changed to provide a better experience for all. Chapter 6 examined in more detail the role that FE colleges can play in improving social mobility and fair access to higher education. It discussed the particular strengths that college have in delivering higher education to young people and others, who, because of their backgrounds or circumstances, would not normally have the opportunity to undertake higher-level study. However, it also discussed the differences and the challenges involved in studying HE at a college. This was based on the research undertaken by us on how people, particularly young people’s life chances, can be improved if some of the shackles imposed on colleges were removed. In Chap. 7 we looked at the benefits of collaboration between colleges and other organisations but particularly universities. We suggested that the current model of a young person going away to a university to take a three-year degree is not necessarily in the best interests of the young person, society, or the economy. The Skills and Post-16 Education Bill (2021) also considers that alternatives to three-year degrees are desirable and suggests that FE colleges can deliver alternative higher education and training. It encourages collaboration between college and employers but, arguably, in the best interests of employers and the economy rather than the wider needs of students. This also seems to be a forced method of collaboration because if a college does not collaborate and meet the local needs of employers, the Secretary of State for Education can intervene to ensure that this happens (Camden 2021). Universities UK, who represent 140 UK universities, have responded to the Bill by suggesting that

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many of their members will now consider alternatives to three-year degrees - a suggestion of competition with FE colleges rather than collaboration (UUK 2021). However, the Vice Chancellor of the University of Brighton commenting on behalf of the University Alliance suggested that the passage of this Bill into law would ‘build a more integrated tertiary education system that further incentivises HE and FE to work in partnership to deliver flexibility, choice and clear career pathways for all learners’ (University Alliance 2021). Chapter 8 began by offering some democratic and pragmatic responses to the challenges of the time, while the future of FE continues to be debated. It considered in more detail the research outlined in Chap. 5, examining the constraints imposed on college managers by the managerialist culture in which FE operates. In particular (is it possible to summarise these barriers). These constraints being the key to understanding the problems that colleges face and how lessons learned could enable colleges to provide much more effective and better education and training for students, industry, and most importantly the community they serve.

The Future? At various junctures in this book we have mentioned the Augar report along with the Skills and Post-16 Education Bill. Table 9.1 summarises the key features of the Bill. Table 9.1  Key components of the Skills and Post-16 Education Bill Gives employers a major voice in producing skills plans and deciding the education and training that FE colleges should carry out in their area Allocates to the Institute for Apprenticeships and Technical Education the task of reviewing and rationalising the current qualifications on offer Creates a new student loans system which will give every adult access to a flexible loan for higher-level education and training at university or college, useable at any point in their lives Introduces new powers for the FE Commissioner to intervene when colleges are failing to deliver good outcomes for the communities they serve, and to direct structural change where needed to ensure colleges improve Source: Department for Education (2021a, b)

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At the time of writing, the Skills and Post-16 Education Bill is still making its way through Parliament. There have been a number of criticisms levelled at this prospective piece of legislation. First, the Bill itself is light on detail. A number of commentators, in places like the WONKHE podcast (WONKHE 2021), and members of the House of Lords (Times Education Supplement 2021) have argued that the Bill lacks depth and does not create a cohesive, collaborative system for further and higher education in the way Augar envisaged. Looking closer, the Bill includes a section on apprenticeships which, whilst strengthening the role of the Institute for Apprenticeships and Technical Education (and thus providing further regulation to both the higher and further education sectors), does not offer substantive reforms beyond those that have taken place since 2013. There is a section which introduces the notion of high-level technical qualifications, but again, it does not really say what the parameters for collaboration and competition are. It maintains the neoliberal technical-rational approaches that have dominated this landscape. Institutes of Technology feature in the Bill. However, these are seen as separate entities and have to be legally constituted and, therefore, will not change the base fabric of further and higher education. Perhaps they may, in time, provide an alternative model for collaboration. The Bill itself focuses on the link between the economy and education which, given that taxpayers’ money is contributing to a significant account of this work, is perhaps understandable. However, standard three-year undergraduate programmes remain funded through student loans which students take out. Therefore, it could be argued that they should be able to spend this money however they choose. In 2021, there was a reduction in the grant uplift given to some subjects in higher education, with the arts suffering a cut. As Sennett (2009) has argued (and as detailed earlier in this publication), there are key values and approaches that individuals need to thrive in this life. He describes this as problem finding, problem solving, and critique so that people can come up with creative solutions to problems. While in the Foreword to the Bill Gavin Williamson (the then Secretary of State for Education) emphasised the need for creativity, this is the only reference to anything creative within the Bill. Indeed, the Bill does give a

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further 30 plus powers to the Secretary of State. It sets out the role of ‘local skills improvement plans’ as the basis for work being commissioned and developed. However, the increased power awarded to the Secretary of State adds further regulation and potential red tape where there are financial issues within any given further education college. This, alongside the Commissioner and SFA audit regime, the OfS regulatory framework, and other areas of top-down management, will place further pressure on the sector, at the same time that further education colleges remain poorly funded. The Institute for Fiscal Studies (IfS 2020) acknowledges that in the 2020 fiscal year there were an additional £250 million given to colleges for funding 16- to 18-year-old activity but that this does not go anywhere near covering the real terms cut that has resulted from a stagnant base rate of college funding. The Bill itself does not provide a long-­ term sustainable funding model for further education colleges or for higher education institutions. Consequently, some of the solutions that are presented within this book seem a distant dream, although we would argue that they are nevertheless worth striving for - for the sake of the sector, those who work in it, and those it seeks to serve. The Skills and Post-16 Education Bill continues to create complex structures and challenges in further and higher education. For example, there are over 20 increased accountability measures contained within it. With no changes to the funding situation in either further or higher education, it increases costs by developing partnership working and having new structures to develop technical learning (such as in Institutes of Technology), and creates additional administrative burdens by strengthening and increasing the number of bodies further and higher education have to work with. In its introduction to the Bill, the government emphasised that it is being introduced to encourage the use of higher technical qualifications at levels 4 and 5 to meet a skills gap that have been highlighted by employers (Department for Education 2021a, b). However, universities are fearful that this will damage their recruitment onto degree programmes and that the government may shift funding from the HE sector to FE.

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However, college principals do see some benefits in the Bill. The authors asked the principals of two colleges to give their views on the Bill. They replied.

Positives • FE has existing strengths in technical and vocational learning and is well positioned to deliver and to expand provision at levels 4, 5, and 6 (even, potentially, at level 7), given the funding that will be available through the new National Skills Fund (Lifetime Skills Guarantee/student loans) Department for Education (2021b)) • The agenda offers opportunities to build upon a long history of apprenticeship provision at levels 2 and 3 and develop higher apprenticeship programmes within colleges. • More modular delivery of technical and vocational learning will be popular with employers and employees  - it is very much the model used across HE already. • Colleges are already closely linked with their local enterprise partnerships (LEP) and local combined authorities (LCAs) and have strengths in developing employer-led programmes and responding to identified skills needs. Indeed, the devolution of skills funding has resulted in greater flexibility in programme development, allowing providers to target local employers and to meet community needs. This has mostly been at levels 1–3 to date, but it was argued that colleges are ready to take this up to higher-level programmes in dialogue with their LCAs and LEPs. For example, references were made to the potential opportunity to consider an Institute of Technology project, backed by the LEP/LCA which would provide capital investment, alongside revenue funding from the National Skills Fund/student loans. • Colleges are represented on local Chamber of Commerce committees, and the government is hoping Chambers will have a key role to play in developing the Local Skills Improvement Plans that will drive adult training and education, including higher-level provision. However, they also had the following concerns.

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Negatives • The funding ringfenced for this agenda is not enough. It does not even get close to returning FE to the position it enjoyed prior to ‘austerity’. Also, for the imminent Spending Review, the Treasury is asking the DfE to make 4 to 5 per cent budget savings for the next three years (FE Week 2022) - austerity is clearly returning! • The government intends to fund only approved programmes. There can be a gap between local employer needs and what the government defines as a priority for funding. • ‘Employer-led’ no doubt makes a contribution to the relevance of provision, but employers have a tendency to ask for a wide variety of things, not all financially viable, and often respond to immediate rather than longer-term needs. Moreover, the small- and medium-­ sized enterprise (SME) voice is often lost (yet, in many areas SMEs dominate). • The university sector sees the Skills and Post-16 Education Bill as a threat, and they will reposition itself (many universities already doing this) to target traditional FE markets. FE will find it hard to compete with these giant institutions who are cushioned by large financial reserves. We believe that FE colleges have survived because the managers and the staff are invariably optimistic and take advantage of any opportunity that presents itself, as can be seen above.

Remedies Using the research and findings discussed in Chap. 8, as well as Chaps. 5 and 6, a number of suggestions can be made for improving the standing of, and practices in, the FE colleges we have. The overarching theme running through this book has been the impact of neoliberalism and managerialism on the sector. We believe that this impact touches four main areas/levels, as indicated in Table 9.2.

3. Leadership

2. Governance (institutional)

1. Policy (central government, including the funding regime)

Level

Provide opportunities for teaching and support staff, as well as learners, and those in the wider community that are engaged with colleges, to participate in the strategic decision-making process

A coherent education strategy which Work incrementally and creates a single funding system and across-political parties to focuses on quality improvement through create a sustained vision of peer review education and social Curtailed ministerial intervention and an mobility end to initiative overload Implement the measures Removal of the market recommended in the Augar review

Tactics for implementation (how we could get there)

Ensure stakeholder representation on all governing bodies, including members of the local community and trade unions Leaders in colleges Create the conditions to focus on Remove the culture of hampered and restrained pedagogic leadership by: neoliberalism and by managerial and  A single funding methodology overseen managerialism neoliberal culture by one body  A single quality agency which acknowledges innovation and hard work on the part of leaders  Freedom for leaders to focus on the needs of students and the community rather than the economy (continued)

Through successive government bills there has been increased centralisation and regulation Currently, Ofsted, the OfS, the ESFA, and many other bodies, enact policy. All these bodies require resource to manage them Broad range of accountability measures which are not all focused on teaching, learning, and assessment

Summary of current situation (technical-rational Suggested solutions (what thinks should features) look like)

Table 9.2  Levels of impact

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4. Teaching and The curriculum and Have one body for review and evaluation learning teaching and learning are Focus activity on peer review and trust currently focused on the that practitioners want to be dual needs of the economy, professionals and draw on their rather than those of the vocational and teaching skills student and the local Give teachers the freedom to widen the community curriculum they deliver to better meet the needs of their students

Level

Summary of current situation (technical-rational Suggested solutions (what thinks should features) look like)

Table 9.2 (continued)

Implement the recommendations made in the Augar review Move the focus for teaching and learning away from the narrow economic to the wider needs of students

Tactics for implementation (how we could get there)

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Tactics for Implementation We have set out in Table 9.1 the main areas of concern that prevent the further education sector in England from providing education and training that both meets the needs of the individual, employers, the economy, and the local and national community. We are wary of ‘throwing the baby out with the bathwater’. The main role of the sector must be to provide education and training, mostly vocational, in order to provide people from the age of 14 with the knowledge and skills that will help them in their employment and to progress in their careers. These are now discussed in more detail. 1. Policy All governments since the 1970s has taken a neoliberalism and managerialism approach to FE policy. This may be fine for private industry but not for a public service such as FE. It needs governments to work incrementally and cross-party to create a sustained vision of education and social mobility that is not solely focused on the needs of the economy and a market model that perpetuates inequality. A cross-party coherent education strategy for both further and higher education needs to be enacted, and a single simplified funding system should be created for further education. The focus on quality improvement should be significantly targeted through peer review, and the expectations of funding and validating bodies should be rationalised to avoid duplication. There should not be frequent ministerial intervention, and there should be an end to government interference and initiative overload. Although it is accepted that there is too much duplication in the qualifications that are offered and thus rationalisation is important, it is also imperative that niche qualifications that serve the needs of very small industries, or of a small group of people, can continue to exist. The measures recommended by the Augar report (2019) to enhance the role of further education and its funding should be introduced. Similarly, the measures contained in the Skills and Post-16 Education Bill (2021) expanding the role of FE colleges to deliver level 4 and 5 programmes should also be enacted but not the sections limiting FE colleges freedom.

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2. Governance (Institutional) Currently, it is expected that college boards of governors will be dominated by employer representatives from business and industry. This should change so that a wider group of stakeholders representing all areas of the community are involved in setting the strategy and overseeing the management of colleges. Colleges serve particular communities that may be urban or rural, densely populated or widely spread, and with differing demographics of wealth or poverty and varying mixes of local businesses and industry. Therefore, it is important that the governing bodies of colleges reflect that community and give the representatives of these communities the opportunity to shape the type of education and training that colleges provide. In addition, colleges should consult with their students to ensure that their future needs are being met, as well as the current and future needs of trade unions and other employee bodies along with employees. 3. Leadership As we have continuously argued, FE college managers are constrained by an imposed culture of managerialism and neoliberalism. This hampers collaboration with local schools, other colleges, and universities. Their jobs are made far too complex because of the number of funding regimes and different quality expectations they have to deal with. Much of this comes about because of the neoliberal concept of the marketplace, and thus a single funding body should be created by the government, with the various examining and validating bodies working together to create a single quality regime. Managers are continuously expected to respond to new government initiatives often seemingly introduced on a whim which last for a couple of years and then disappear very often with no consultation with colleges. Some of this is highlighted in the Augar report. Leaders in colleges spend too much of their time focusing on matters other than the needs of their students. They should be allowed to focus on providing the best experience and the best teaching, learning, and assessment for their students.

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4. Teaching and Learning Most importantly, tutors in colleges should be able to deliver a curriculum which fully meets the needs of their students rather than the narrow curriculum which is concerned with educating and training students for jobs that the government perceives the economy and employers require. Tutors are often driven to teach solely to the syllabus to ensure that students achieve the highest grades because that is partly what colleges are judged on. Instead, students should be given the broader knowledge and social skills that will enable them to have fulfilling careers and be active contented citizens. Expect tutors to continuously strive to raise their teaching and assessing skills but trust them to police each other in an environment which is concerned with improvement rather than blame. We welcome the focus in the Skills and Post-16 Education Bill on lifelong learning, given the emphasis on part-time education and training, the opportunity to take qualifications in smaller chunks over longer periods, along with the provision of loans to support that type of learning. However, it is also important to remember that acquiring knowledge and skills should not be solely employment based and that adult education courses that provide the opportunity to engage in crafts, sport and leisure, and social skills are also important and contribute to mental wellbeing. Perhaps part of the job that colleges have is to help people to be happy. This book has been written at a time which may be seen in the future as a turning point. Brexit and the COVID pandemic are continuing to have an impact. Further education has the potential to enact real and positive change on the lives of many thousands of people but will not be able to do so if it continues to be constrained and underfunded. Whilst there are no quick fixes, we have argued that there are solutions.

References Augar, P. 2019. Independent panel report to the review of post-18 education and funding. DFE. Camden, B. 2021. Speed read: Skills and Post-16 Education Bill published. FE Week.

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Department for Education. 2021a. New legislation to help transform opportunities for all. Press Release. https://www.gov.uk/government/news/new-­legislation-­ to-­help-­transform-­opportunities-­for-­all. ———. 2021b. Guidance: National skills fund. https://www.gov.uk/guidance/ national-­skills-­fund. FE Week. 2022. Spending review: FE budget fears as Departments are asked to find ‘at least’ 5% savings. (8 September). https://feweek.co.uk/spending-­ review-­fe-­budget-­fears-­as-­departments-­asked-­to-­find-­at-­least-­5-­savings. Institute for Fiscal Studies. 2020. Annual report on education spending in England. Institute for Fiscal Studies, London. Kernohan, D. 2021. The skills and post-16 bill enters the Lords. WONKHE (15/6), https://wonkhe.com/blogs/the-­skills-­and-­post-­16-­bill-­enters-­the-­ lords. Milakovich, M.E., and G.J. Gordon. 2013. Public administration in America. 11th ed. Boston: Wadsworth. Mintzberg, H. 1993. Structure in fives: Designing effective organisations. Englewood Cliffs: Prentice-Hall, Inc. Sennet, R. 2009. The craftsman. London: Penguin. Skills and Post-16 Education Bill. 2021. https://bills.parliament.uk/bills/2868/ publications. Times Education Supplement. 2021. The skills bill: what the House of Lords had to say (15 June). https://www.tes.com/news/skills-­bill-­what-­house-­lords-­had-­say. Universities UK. 2021. UUK response to government plans to introduce a Skills and Post-16 Education Bill, as outlined in the Queen’s Speech. Universities UK. University Alliance. 2021. University Alliance responds to the government’s skills for jobs white paper and interim conclusion of the review of post-18 education and funding.

Glossary

AOC – Association of Colleges 

colleges in England.

The main body which represents further education

APP – Access and Participation Plans 

A document which must be produced annually by higher education institutions in England who wish to charge tuition fees of more than a figure prescribed (currently £9250). The plans should demonstrate how the institution is going to spend part of the fees on supporting students from underrepresented backgrounds. BTEC – The Business and Technology Education Council  An organisation that validates and assesses a wide range of vocational qualifications in England. CHE – College Higher Education  The standard term used to define higher education delivered in further education colleges in England. CPD – Continuing Professional Development  A philosophy of continuous training and development by a wide range of means throughout a person’s life. ETF - Education and Training Foundation  A Department for Education supportive body for FE. They ‘own’ the professional standards on behalf of the sector. FAVE – Further Adult and Vocational Education  An overarching expression for the education sector that delivers education beyond secondary school level. FE Commissioner  A role created in 2013 to have an oversight of further education colleges and support and intervene when necessary. The commissioner

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220 Glossary

assesses the quality and financial health of colleges, and if a college is having difficulties, he/she has extensive powers to intervene. Foundation Degree  A combined vocational and academic qualification equivalent to two-thirds of a bachelor’s degree which can be taken on a full- or part-­ time basis. HND/HNC  A combined vocational and academic qualification equivalent to two-­ thirds of a bachelor’s degree. The HND is usually taken over two years on a full-time basis and the HNC on a part-time basis. JPD – Joint Practice Development  An approach to CPD first articulated by Fielding in 2010. LEPs  - Local Enterprise Partnerships  There are 38  Local Enterprise Partnerships across England that are locally owned  between  local authorities and businesses. LEPs are designed to play a central role in deciding local economic priorities and undertaking activities to drive  economic  growth and create local jobs in their area. Managerialism  The belief that public sector organisations should be managed by professional managers using management tools from the private sector. Neoliberalism  The belief that public sector organisations should operate within a competitive environment. OfS  – Office for Students  A body which acts as the regulator and competition authority for the higher education sector in England. Ofsted  – The Office for Standards in Education  An organisation responsible for inspecting educational institutions including schools and colleges. POLAR  A system operated by the OfS which classifies local areas across the UK according to the participation rate in higher education by the occupants of that area. Polytechnics  Tertiary education institutions offering higher education qualifications which became universities in 1993. QAA – The Quality Assurance Agency for Higher Education  The independent body that regulates standards and quality in UK higher education. STEM  The term used to group together science, technology, engineering, and mathematics. SUNCETT  The University of Sunderland’s Centre of Excellence in Teacher Training who run a research programme for the Education Training Foundation. T Levels  These are new two-year vocational courses which follow GCSEs and are equivalent to three A levels.

 Glossary  Technical Rational 

221

A philosophy that posits that rational decisions to incorporate technological advances into society can, once the technology is ubiquitous, change what is considered rational within that society. TEF - The Teaching Excellence and Student Outcomes Framework  An exercise which is designed to assess excellence in higher education institutions.

Index

A

Academic education, 39 Access and Participation Plans (APP), 55, 56, 59, 61, 107–108, 154, 155, 164, 165 Adult education, 24, 26, 80, 87, 217 Advance HE, 44 A-level, 14, 15, 17, 19–22, 26, 47, 88, 129, 135, 145, 152, 156, 171 Alternative providers, 146, 147, 150, 151 Apprenticeship, 10, 14, 16, 25, 27–31, 80, 104, 111, 115, 125, 162, 163, 167, 171, 188, 209, 211 Assessment, 17, 20, 31, 38, 43, 56, 59, 63, 76, 80, 81, 87, 91, 104, 108, 129, 180, 184, 190, 197, 199, 216

Association of Colleges (AoC), 13–15, 26, 63, 100, 105, 118, 126, 145, 188 Audit, 5, 10, 18, 26, 47, 62, 74, 90, 210 Augar Review, 32, 52, 102, 118, 168, 205 B

Benchmarking, 76–81 Bureaucracy, 7, 24, 47, 70, 75, 77, 86, 91, 103, 117, 170, 206 Business and Technical Education Councils (BTECs), 15, 50, 108, 128, 129, 133, 136, 145, 148, 151

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224 Index C

E

The Centre for Transforming Access and Student Outcomes in Higher Education (TASO), 61, 155, 156 Collaboration, 1, 59, 64, 80, 89, 99–121, 137–139, 145–171, 180, 181, 185, 200, 207–209, 216 Competition, 15, 18, 25, 51, 58, 71, 72, 74, 82, 102, 115, 145, 152, 153, 157, 162–164, 184, 206, 208, 209 Continuing professional development (CPD), 183, 195 Covid-19, 32, 41, 50–52, 58–60, 205 Curriculum design, 17, 108, 111, 180, 184, 196, 198, 201

Economy, 4, 5, 16, 23, 29, 30, 52, 57, 59, 69–92, 103, 205–207, 209, 215, 217 Educational management, 9, 195 Education and Skills Funding Agency, 80, 89, 149 Education and Training Foundation (ETF), 10, 15, 38, 54, 91, 111, 118, 126, 147, 148, 183, 194 Education policy, 5, 8, 18, 188 Effectiveness, 40, 44, 70, 71, 74, 76, 85, 88, 91, 138 Efficiency, 62, 70, 71, 74, 76, 85, 88, 91, 99, 100 Employers, 15–18, 24–26, 28, 29, 49, 81, 82, 89, 91, 101, 105, 111, 112, 118, 120, 125, 128, 148, 160–162, 165, 167–170, 179, 182, 184, 206, 207, 210–212, 215–217 Evaluation, 4, 8, 38, 39, 42, 43, 46, 47, 57, 61, 64, 99–121, 156, 181, 192, 193, 198, 199, 201

D

Democratic, 3, 8, 9, 40–42, 47, 58, 60, 61, 92, 108, 121, 137, 181, 183, 186, 187, 197, 200, 201, 208 Department for Education, 52, 59, 80, 100, 111, 130, 152, 170, 188, 194, 210, 211 Dewey, John, 6, 8, 39, 41, 46, 47, 57, 59, 61, 99, 100, 103, 108, 112, 113, 115–118, 177, 178, 181, 193, 197, 200 Disadvantaged students, 127, 130 Dual Mandate, 26, 27 Dual sector, 126, 130

F

Fair Access, 3, 23, 56, 126–127, 207 Feedback, 42, 78, 105–107, 133, 197 Foundation Degrees, 30, 79, 125, 132, 147, 151, 158, 166–168 Further Adult and Vocational Education (FAVE), 47, 48, 103 Further and Higher Education Act 1992, 62, 73, 81, 91, 105, 145, 151

 Index 

Further Education Commissioner, 80–81 Further Education Funding Council (FEFC), 17, 18, 74 Further education sector, 2, 13–16, 28, 32, 47, 115, 198, 205, 209, 215 Further Education Trust for Leadership (FETL), 10, 101, 118, 151 Further Education White Paper, 2021, 32, 102 G

GCSEs, 14, 19–22, 47, 145 Government policy, 38, 39, 43, 53, 72, 88, 90, 99, 117, 206 Governors, 71, 78, 86, 105, 106, 216

225

Higher National Diplomas (HND), 30, 79, 125, 132, 147, 149, 151, 158, 165–168 I

Improvement, 4, 23, 37–39, 42, 47, 57, 58, 61, 63, 64, 80, 81, 99–121, 155, 187, 189, 192, 194, 196, 198, 199, 201, 215, 217 Institute for Apprenticeships and Technical Education (IFATE), 9, 80, 209 International, 4, 13, 28–31, 47, 50, 51, 53, 58, 148, 206 K

Knowledge transfer, 23, 136

H

L

Higher education (HE), 2, 3, 10, 14, 15, 17–19, 22, 23, 25–27, 31, 32, 39–41, 44–46, 49–52, 54–56, 59, 60, 71, 79–80, 84, 87, 104–108, 117, 121, 125–134, 136–139, 145–166, 170, 171, 177, 180, 188, 201, 205–211, 215 Higher Education and Research Act 2017, 187 Higher Education Funding Council for England (HEFCE), 58, 126, 132 Higher national certificates, 125

Labour market, 29 Leadership, 1, 4, 7–8, 39, 40, 42–49, 55, 63, 64, 81, 90, 92, 99, 101, 104, 109, 118–121, 169, 179–187, 194–198, 200, 201, 216–217 Levelling up, 60, 127, 169 Lifelong learning, 23–24, 26, 32, 91, 170, 171, 217 Local Education Authorities (LEA), 10, 16, 17, 71, 73, 76, 77 Local Enterprise Partnerships (LEP), 4, 31, 111, 147, 165, 184, 190, 211

226 Index M

P

Management structures, 74, 86 Managerial, 1, 3–5, 15, 54, 62, 74, 75, 85, 86, 90, 91, 99, 106, 159, 177, 206 Managerialism, 5, 64, 69–73, 75, 89, 90, 206, 212, 215, 216 Market, 18, 25, 41, 50, 51, 59, 61, 62, 70, 72, 74, 82–83, 85, 102, 168, 171, 186, 199, 212, 215 Monitoring, 77, 121, 182, 200

Performance indicators, 70, 77 POLAR, 147, 148 Polytechnics, 17, 73, 88 Practitioner, 4, 6, 38, 48, 50, 57–59, 61, 70, 110–112, 128, 129, 131, 132, 181, 183, 191, 194, 195

N

Narrative enquiry, 178 National Collaborative Outreach Programme (NCOP), 59, 128, 164 National Union of Students, 106 Neoliberal, 3–5, 15, 18, 50–52, 85, 111, 112, 165, 171, 177, 186, 190, 194, 197, 206, 209, 216 New Public Management (NPM), 69, 71–73, 75–77, 79, 81, 82, 85, 88–92, 207

Q

Qualifications, 3, 14–17, 19, 20, 24–28, 30, 79, 89, 100, 125, 128, 129, 132, 145, 149, 151, 152, 166–171, 188, 198, 199, 209, 210, 215, 217 Quality assurance, 47, 103, 105–107 Quality Assurance Agency, 9, 80, 107, 109, 151–153 Quality improvement, 47, 58, 63, 103, 104, 109, 112, 196, 215 R

Regulation, 29, 33, 62, 72, 77, 160, 209, 210 Regulators, 51, 59, 116, 205

O

S

Office for Qualifications (Ofqual), 9 Office for Standards in Education (Ofsted), 5, 9, 18, 32, 46, 62, 78, 100, 104, 106, 107, 109, 120, 187–189, 196 Office for Students (OfS), 9, 46, 51, 55, 56, 58, 59, 61, 79, 80, 106–109, 127, 128, 136, 147, 149, 152–155, 164, 165, 210

Sainsbury Report, 167 Schon, Donald, 6, 181, 182 Schools, 7, 8, 13, 18, 19, 22, 29, 30, 43, 53, 71, 73, 74, 78, 82, 85, 88, 126, 128, 135, 138, 145, 157, 165, 180, 191, 216 Science, Technology, Engineering and Maths (STEM), 14, 27, 168

 Index 

Skills and Post-16 Education Bill, 2021, 81, 91, 169–171, 205, 207–210, 212, 215, 217 Social mobility, 2, 3, 52–57, 61, 80, 206, 207, 215 Social policy, 109, 120, 189 Stakeholders, 3, 33, 62, 83, 88, 90, 92, 105, 182, 199, 207, 216 Strategic planning, 40, 114 Student experience, 85, 107, 156–159, 196 Students as customers, 206

227

Universities, 3, 13, 15, 17, 19, 22, 23, 27, 30, 31, 51, 53–56, 71–73, 76, 77, 79, 80, 82–86, 89, 90, 92, 101, 106–108, 127, 129–136, 138, 139, 145–167, 170, 171, 205, 207, 210, 212, 216 Universities and Colleges Admissions Service (UCAS), 79, 145, 149 Universities UK (UUK), 51, 125, 207, 208 V

T

Target setting, 74, 76–81 Teaching Excellence and Student Outcomes Framework (TEF), 5, 58, 154 Technical-rational, 8, 9, 37–45, 51, 52, 56, 57, 59, 60, 63, 64, 91, 102–104, 109–115, 120, 121, 179, 180, 186–190, 192–194, 197, 198, 201, 205, 209 T-levels, 40, 50, 184 Tomlinson, Mike, 20–22 Trade unions, 29, 216

Validating body, 79, 215, 216 Vocational, 15, 17, 19, 20, 22, 26–30, 39, 48, 49, 54, 55, 63, 79, 88, 89, 125, 126, 128, 129, 133–135, 148, 149, 155, 160, 169, 181, 183, 186, 211, 215 Vocational Education and Training (VET), 49 Vocational qualifications, 17, 19–21, 47, 88, 128, 145, 168, 198 W

U

Uni Connect, 59, 127, 128, 164–166

Widening participation, 23, 59, 60, 89, 108, 126, 137–138, 148, 152, 154, 155, 164–166