Saturday, May 14, 2016

SELMAS #SELM4S2016


 
Thanks to @selm4s for image

Provocation SELMAS  

I was asked to provoke a gathering of around 140 School leaders from Scotland. I thought I would share my points here and add some web-links.  There wasn’t a fight.

 
If you are given the opportunity and privilege to talk at a SELMAS event grab it with both hands. I was humbled by the aspiration and experiences of the other speakers and by the commitment of all the education leaders present to improving the life chances of Scotland's young people. 

 
Thanks to all at SELMAS for the kind invitation.

 
Provocation - 

I wonder how hard it is to provoke school leaders
If I said that for almost half of my  30 year career I left the classroom and  I worked for SQA and that I’ve worked with HMIE, Education Scotland and SFC, the Scottish Funding Council and many of the agencies that work around schools.

– that is often provocation enough in the kitchen of a party with any teachers present.

 
But the truth is and like me – many of the staff who work in these organisations come from the classroom – and you can change them and get involved with them. The choice to engage and make changes for the better is yours. 

 
But I appreciate how busy landscape is. 

For school leaders it is often about squeezing in another change on top of changes that are already in train
CfE
Wider Achievement
Developing Scotland’s Young Workforce
Closing the Attainment Gap
Getting it Right for Every Child
The named person scheme
The next school inspection
While managing all the challenges of running a complex organisation with competing demands – and being a role model at the same time.

 
Currently in the  senior phase of CfE you are getting heads around new national qualifications at SCQF 4 and 5 and looking at a re-aligned curriculum in Highers and Advanced Highers,  while taking a look at the ways schools can work more closely with industry on one hand and with the wider community on the other.

 
There is always a raft of policy changes and never enough people or re-sources to get everything moving forward – but it is achieved – and thanks to the dedication of you as leaders and your teams.

 
And we are in a much better place that we were 30 years ago.

 
Let’s reflect …

 
I taught in schools in and around Glasgow, in many there was a larger cohort of non-certificated classes finishing their school career in 4th year than there were classes preparing for their O’grades .

 
In 1986 the system had decided that it was ok to allow large cohorts of learners to leave school with no certification and with precious little engagement.  As a trainee English and History teacher  I was asked to show them videos but not to try and teach them English as they would rebel.

 
On another occasion, in another school armed with lots of inspiring ideas – I was advised to lower my expectations of learners -  as they were from around here .  The Head of Department hadn’t picked up I was from around the same area and this led to an interesting conversation. 

Expectations were too low at all levels in the system. 

 
There was never a golden age. There is now and the future. 
We are in a better place and we can make it better still for learners. 

 
I met the same learners in the local college, now on first name terms and doing courses they were interested in – they performed and were model learners and citizens.
Schools are more like this now or should be.

 
Often too in those darker days I was more concerned about bullying in the staff room than bullying in the playground. I think we have more professional respect for our peers now and we make decisions based on evidence. Not on who is shouting the loudest.

 
Things have moved on – expectations at all levels are now in a different place and learners have responded– though the challenges of poverty and in some cases chaotic lifestyles remain in many of our communities and the chasm in achievement among learners from different social economic groups – remains Scotland’s shame.

 
But the bill of fare in our schools should now be much more appropriate for all of our learners

 
Now, there should be appropriate choices for all learners and not just more of the same academic fare.

In Colleges we spend a lot of time listening to what learners want and measuring not just their achievements but their satisfaction with the choice available to them and the standard and quality of their learning experience. Do schools really listen to the learners voice ?  And do you adjust your provision in response to this ?

 
I want to talk about widening achievement – with my YouthlinkScotland hat on
How many school are really using – Saltire Awards , John Muir Awards , SQA Leadership Awards , Duke of Edinburgh Awards  and all the other options that are available across the School

With less funding it will be that route where young people get their first international experience , their first experience of planning an expedition or community project, out with formal education, their first position of responsibility. There are still different sources of funding in the community for these activities and youth groups work hard at raising funds to be inclusive. 

 
How tuned in is your school to the amazing opportunities , commitments and achievements  young people have through  youth work,  volunteering out with normal school and do you give it adequate recognition ?

 
Scout story – My volunteers were told – school does offer awards there – but these are only for the thick kids. Their words and perception rather than what they were probably told. But message was clear school still not really valuing wider achievement.

 
How hard is it for a community group to get notices up inside a school ?  
How aware is the school of opportunities for learners in the immediate community ?

 
If schools are to be judged as part of a community learning experience how good are you at reaching out and how far are you confident in letting the community reach in to your school ?

 
If you or someone in the community is doing something good and innovative how aware are you that it can be SCQF credit and levelled and put on Insight Tool and given formal recognition.

 
I want to talk too about school and employer links :
Things are moving on at pace – Skills for Work programmes give learners an important taste of an occupational area, there are new standards for work experience and many learners embark on Employability awards ( shouldn’t all school leavers do this ?)

 
School College partnerships should be seen as more than a convenient place to park learners who for one reason or another are not coping with school

 
A College is a really useful gateway to develop relationships with multiple employers – How good is your relationship with your local College? I couldn't make the whole talk an advert for how College changes peoples lives and plays a major part in closing the inclusion and attainment gap. - but they do. 

 
Have your teaching staff spent any time in your local College.

It would be a great venue for the next in-service day !

 
There are new and more complex offerings on the horizon -
Foundation Apprenticeships in 6 key industries are currently rolling out – funded by Skills Development Scotland.
  • Children and Young People
  • Construction
  • Engineering (energy)
  • Engineering
  • Financial Services
  • Social Services and Healthcare
  • Business
  • Software Development
  • Hardware and System Support

These are very different programmes at SCQF 6 – same as higher as exit point . My concern is that this may be too high and that you will struggle to persuade your peers that learners would be better doing this programme,  rather than re-sitting your normal academic fare. These are 2 year programmes – aimed to fit in alongside other school classes – that lead directly into work or can be used as a bridge to College or Higher Education.

Aimed too at a different cohort – the learners who may already be on their way to College or may just get the qualifications they need to get into University. The message has to be clear – as it stands this is not a programme for those you may have traditionally sent along to the College.  

This is for  learners who you might have traditionally offered another academic course or encouraged them to re-sit something in 5th and 6th year .

Foundation Apprenticeships – open up new opportunities delivered in College with an extended workplace component in many cases they cover the main elements of a full apprenticeship.

Schools too can offer too PDA awards that link to industry competencies and in some parts of Scotland schools are now offering HNC qualifications.  Have you a rich and varied enough offering across your local authority for senior phase learners and are you making enough of learning technology to deliver these. Rather than busing or taxiing everyone around at great expense.

I could speak at length on how the learners in the know are now accessing massive open on-line courses and open educational re-sources. Schools still have some way to go to both embed the on-line offerings that are already available or to make similar on-line offerings available.

I am still amazed that there is not a national offering in the Higher Computing space that is largely delivered on-line . It would in one step make computing available to many schools where there is no computing teacher and be a cost effective national solution. For minority languages too or indeed anything that learners could cope with on-line when you can't create a viable class size in your own institution. 

Striking too that the global teacher of the year from England – is a maths teacher – simply up-loading useful lessons on to YouTube as revision aids for his learners – the world started using this re-source – we need more of this ambition in Scottish classrooms.

Are you encouraging your teachers to be content creators and to publish their learning materials openly on the internet with an appropriate creative commons licence ? If this is all in a different language. Find out about Open Scotland and Creative Commons licensing. Every teacher should be an open practitioner.

I asked my first year daughter what one piece of advice I could give you and unprompted ‘ it was find a way to let us use the internet in class – I know everyone does not have phones and the teachers don’t want to embarrass anyone  – but we are allowed to use the school wifi when not in class  – but hardly ever in class. Why doesn’t the school find a way to give everyone a browser’  
Me : A kindle fire is about £49 , a tablet – we need to stop teaching a letter box view of the world and give learners tools to explore the world of knowledge.
How are you closing the growing digital divide – ignoring it is not the answer .
The attainment gap will just grow wider ! and Scotland’s shame grow deeper.


But more change is on the way -

There is a seismic change coming from Whitehall – the industry training levy will impact on every employer with more than a £3million pound pay bill – that includes public sector employers like local authorities and even Colleges . From April 2017 they will pay a 0.5% annual levy effectively a tax.
I’ll say this again – as it seems very surprising.

 
The UK Government is raising taxes to pay for an improved investment in learning.

 
Raising Taxes to pay for education !

I'll say that again as it seems in current times a strange concept - the Westminster Government is raising taxes to pay for training from the largest employers to re-distribute to smaller employers to pay for more employee training. 

 
This will raise 3 Billion pounds across the UK and will in England fundamentally change the relationship that employers have with work based training.

 
Employers will have training accounts and will get money back based on the training they give their staff .  Small employers will make a contribution and get more back from the pot than they put in. Employers will choose who they contract with to provide the training

 
Large and small employers will want to either get their money back or in the case of small employers tap in to this funding resource.

 
The CBI in Scotland finally raised this challenge in today's Herald and I expect new administration will start responding -

 
I expect next year will be the year when employers start beating on the doors of schools and colleges for learners that are ready to start an apprenticeship so they can benefit from payments from the training levy.


I hope rather than to have provoked you I have given you some some food for thought ! and you don’t get indigestion. 

Friday, May 13, 2016

The Training Levy in England




I'm doing a bit of work in the English market at moment - but the Training Levy will impact across the UK - so I thought it was worth sharing this report on how policies are shaping around  how employers access their training accounts in England.

CBI  noticed in yesterday's Herald that it will have an impact on Scotland
 http://www.heraldscotland.com/opinion/14486442.Hugh_Aitken__Time_for_a_radical_re_think_on_apprenticeship_levy/ 
Report on Webinar hosted by FE On-line Nick Linford interviewing Keith Smith BIS on Operation of Levy

Keith has moved across from the Skills Funding Agency to BIS to mastermind this large scale transformation in the revenue raising and funding model for apprenticeships.

On 6th of April 2017 the new levy system will come into being and all UK employers with a pay bill of more than £3million PA will be required to pay a 0,5% levy. The collection will be through a monthly payment ( for organisations with seasonal employees there will be in-year adjustments) .  The system will be a standard one and will impact all employers across the public and private sectors that are on or above the £3 million pound threshold.

Yes, this includes Colleges, Local Authorities , Health Boards and any large public sector employer.

While I am aware that there will be a displacement effect - less public money going directly from the exchequer in to training. This is an interesting policy direction for the current UK government. In effect this is a tax on large employers to pay for training with a redistribution to the smaller employers,  who while making a contribution will benefit from access to this pot of money.  It should make employers more engaged in the standards and quality of training subsidised by the public purse and hopefully play a significant part in closing the productivity gap that exists across the UK.

The treasury expects to raise £3 billion pounds per annum through this levy and around £2.5 billion will be available for training in England.  The remainder will be available in Scotland , Wales and Northern Ireland ,  who will have their own mechanisms for disbursement. However , the changed collection model  is likely to have a  net  impact on the budgets of Wales , Scotland and Northern Ireland.


But there will be a series of additional publications between now and the end of the year to provide additional guidance and clarification.

What next?

June 2016
In June 2016 there will be information about:
• provisional funding bands, which will set the maximum amount of
funding which is available for each apprenticeship from April 2017
• the provisional level of the government support that will be available
towards the cost of apprenticeship training if you aren’t a levy paying
employer, from April 2017
• the provisional level of the extra payment you can get for hiring 16 to
18 year old apprentices, from April 2017
• the provisional amount that will be paid for English and maths
training for apprentices who need it, from April 2017
• eligibility rules that set who you are able to spend apprenticeship
funding on and where
• more information on who can provide apprenticeship training and how
you can set up your organisation to deliver apprenticeship training


October 2016
In October 2016 there will be information about:
• the final levels of funding, government support, 16 to 18 payments,
and English and maths payments for apprentices starting from April
2017 full
• draft funding and eligibility rules

December 2016
In December 2016 there will be information about:
• final detailed funding and eligibility rules
• further employer guidance from HM Revenue and Customs (HMRC) on
how to calculate and pay the apprenticeship levy 

Large and small employers will have access to a digital account and be able to commission training activity from this account . They will only be able to commission training from providers on an approved list.  ( this in England )

This  approved list  of training organisation will be known as the  register of apprenticeship training providers .  The aim of this new list is to make it simpler for employers to find and contract directly with training providers and to drive out unnecessary sub-contracts from the system. There will be new contractual terms and conditions for entry on to the approved list - these terms and conditions  will appear in June and the register will open this summer.

From January 2017 Employers will be able to open negotiations with the suppliers on the list in preparation for system coming into operation in April 2017

Between 850-950 providers support apprenticeship delivery at moment - it is likely that number may stay around the same but that more employers will become training providers and come on to the new list.  So there is an anticipation that some training providers will step back from apprenticeship delivery

Employers who come onto list will be inspected by Ofstead as will all providers delivering up to QCF Level 3

ROTO will remain in place for other training activities https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/register-of-training-organisatio…

The model will still be one of co-investment for small non contributing employers they will make a contribution to their account and in return they will be able to access additional funds .  The current pilot model is that for every £1 a company invests in their training account they will be able to access £2 in return.  A cap will be in place for each framework  - the only additional payments that will remain in place are the £471 funding for both the English and Maths components.

The current pilot includes incentive payments for smaller employers , for taking on 16-18 year olds and there is a completion payment.  There is no commitment currently on incentive payments and there is still a broad discussion underway around the phasing of payments back to employers . The current system created a huge number of transactions and the hope is that a more simplified system can be put in place .  Details of this will appear in new Employer and Providers Guides that are scheduled for publication in June

From June a lot of work will start with employers so they understand how their training accounts will operate .

The Government in confident that system will be in place and be operational for April start. 

Tuesday, May 03, 2016

Digital Skills , Digital Literacy and Apprenticeship Frameworks



I've been doing a bit of homework today on all things Trail Blazer Apprenticeship Frameworks - picking out specifically the opportunities to embed digital skills and where digital tools can be used in assessment, tracking and related processes.

Wales have already moved to an essential skills framework that includes digital literacy rather than IT as a core component. Based on  Jisc and many otherswork around digital literacy.  I like this piece on Move over ICT

In Scotland we have at the moment : Core Skills , Essential Skills , Skills for Learning Life and Work.

Perhaps it is time, with new apprenticeship frameworks on the horizon  and an all employer training levy about to arrive,  to do a bit of thinking in this space in Scotland too. Is it time to think Digital Literacy rather than Information Technology ?

As a first pass on Document Future of Apprenticeships in England 

Key Sections From Future of Apprenticeships in England 
Page 7 Future of Apprenticeships in England 

• The English and maths criterion has been extended to cover digital skills, to the
extent that Trailblazers are now required to consider whether digital skills should
be built into the standard(s) they are developing (criterion F at paragraph 85).

Page 30 

In this context, “digital” encompasses the very broad set of skills that individuals need in order to
understand, use or create the software and services we all access through devices such as computers,
tablets and ‘smart’ phones.

Page 19 

Criteria for apprenticeship standards
50.To ensure every standard is high quality there are seven criteria that all
apprenticeship standards must meet. These, together with the kind of evidence
needed to demonstrate compliance with the criteria, are set out fully at paragraph 85
but, in summary, a standard must:
A. Be short, concise and clear.
B. Set out the full competence needed in an occupation, so that, on completion,
the apprentice is able to carry out the role in any size of employer across any
relevant sector.
C. Have the support of employers including smaller businesses.
D. Be sufficiently stretching so that it will require at least a year of training (before
the end-point assessment) with off-the-job training accounting for at least 20%
of the apprenticeship.
E. Align with professional registration where it exists.
F. Contain minimum English and maths requirements and any digital skills
required.
G. Only include mandatory qualifications under certain circumstances. 


Page 30 
As a key underpinning skill set, you should also consider whether any digital skills
are required to achieve full competence in the occupation, and include them in the standard if appropriate. 

Delivery Page 51
For all standards, the amount of off-the-job training mandated is a minimum of
20% or equivalent. We expect that all apprentices will benefit from genuine training away from their day-to-day job, but this does not necessarily need to take place away from the employer’s premises. 

EPA = End Point Assessmeent 
Assessment and a Good Assessment Plan Page 71 
• Explain what will be assessed (i.e. which skills, knowledge and behaviour
listed on the standard, and giving more detail if needed).
• Explain how the apprentice will be assessed (i.e. which method or range of
methods will be used at the end of the apprenticeship to judge competency),
• Indicate who will carry out the assessment (i.e. who will be the assessor(s) for
each aspect of the end-point assessment (EPA)),
• Propose internal and external quality assurance arrangements to make sure
that EPAs are reliable and consistent across different locations, employers,
and training and assessment organisations

Tuesday, April 26, 2016

Foundation Apprenticeships in Scotland




As part of Developing the Young Workforce in Scotland  Foundation Apprenticeships are rolling out across Scotland following a pilot phase , these will create many  more opportunities for young people in Schools to engage directly with employers and colleges.

 From August 2016 these new qualifications  "Foundation Apprenticeships" will be available in the following subjects and will be available in more schools in more parts of the country.

  • Children and Young People
  • Construction
  • Engineering (energy)
  • Engineering
  • Financial Services
  • Social Services and Healthcare
  • Business Services
  • Software Development
  • Hardware and System Support.

If you work in Education you will see a dignified scramble to get these programmes up and running and learners recruited over the next month or so and Foundation Apprenticeships will increasingly figure in the subject choices available in many schools from this year onward.

These courses will be the bridge between school , college and the workplace that really change the relationship between schools, colleges  and employers.

What are the benefits ? 

The programmes involve a not inconsiderable time either in College or in the workplace. This dependent on programme but could be 2 days per week. So this is not a taster it is the real thing. 
The programmes are designed to both have a knowledge component and a component too of the Vocational workbased delivered qualification that makes up part of the full modern apprenticeship. If positioned well  this will give young people a real head start into a career if they want this,  or at least an in-depth work experience combined with workplace recognised qualifications that they can use to gain casual labour and/or use as part of their College or UCAS application. 


What are the challenges :

They will only work for the learners if schools , colleges and employers work closely together. You can see they may need a customer relationship management system if they do not already have one. 

This is changing the relationship between schools and colleges ; a foundation apprenticeship is not a taster session of the College experience for those with low national qualification grades  as many previous school/college  programmes have been in the past. 
The programmes last two years 4th and 5th  or more likely 5th and 6th year,  given the academic demand of the Foundation Apprenticeships (SCQF6), the same as a higher - the target group of pupils is a different cohort from those who may have traditionally attended College within a school college partnership arrangement. For some Colleges this will involve linking with schools that have not traditonally sent learners to College and/or working with a new cohort of teachers and learners within schools they have worked with in the past. 

The 'Foundation' is in many frameworks the core components of the full apprenticeship and this could be hard to explain to teachers and to learners and their parents. 

There will be some learners who will  wish to take the 'Foundation' but perhaps do not have the necessary National passes to secure a place and may be disappointed not to secure a place on the Foundation programme. 

The progression routes between HNC/D are well chartered,  if not always fully recognised by all universities in Scotland,  the routes from SVQ into HND and Degree are less well mapped out and the system needs to improve recognition of SCQF credit and level here. 

Its the right thing to be doing - but it will be a challenging one for many in the system. Schools will need to be prepared to support learners continuing with nationals, higher and advanced highers while allowing learners time to complete their foundation apprenticeships. Colleges will use their networks to find the employers where the work-based learning component will take place and co-ordinate the reporting of the learners progress - to schools and to parents. 

Young people will enjoy the challenges and opportunities these programmes will bring and the range of progression routes.

Progression for some will be to complete their apprenticeship , for others it might be HNC/D at a College and for others who have completed a Foundation Apprenticeship along with the necessary highers their aim will be University. 

So before I get asked - what is a Foundation Apprenticeship ?  here is part of the answer. 

Acid test,  is that if I had someone who the school was keen to get to re-sit a couple of nationals in 5th year ( but not English or Maths )  and who had an interest in one of the areas above - then a Foundation Apprenticeship would be a good option. 




Friday, April 22, 2016

#oer16

#OER16 Quick Overview and Some important links for Scottish FE

#OER16 Quick Overview and Some important links for Scottish FE

A quick overview of a superb two days thinking time.

  1. Open Educational Resources for those still wondering what #oer means.
  2. This conference has been going since the inaugural conference at the University of Cambridge in 2010 . It was a great privilege to be once again on the organising committee and chairing some of the sessions this year . This storify captures some of the sessions I attended . The event was supported by the great folks of alt.ac.uk/ co-chaired superbly by twitter.com/LornaMCampbell and twitter.com/HoneybHighton and attracted delegates from 29 different countries to two wonderfully sunny days in Edinburgh.
  3. I am prejudiced but I do think some of our most creative educators are interested in open education. I enjoyed the action-bound challenge and I made full use of the excellent and well organised on-line programme
  4. ActionBound would make a great platform for student induction sessions.
  5. @Catherinecronin did a great job of unpacking the issues around open learning and the digital identity dilemma to being open .
  6. All of the sessions I attended inspired me and showed way forward for all of us in rethnking what education could be . Many of the sessions were recorded you can access them all on the conference web site oer16.oerconf.org There was something for everyone from policy makers to practitioners.
  7. I'll focus here on picking out a few sessions and links that I think further education should tune in to . Every session had something superb wrapped up in it so this is a tough task.
  8. In no particular order and for those teaching computer games development have a look at
  9. RAGE hoping colleges and universities teaching programming or games development tuned in to this #oer16 @EU_H2020  http://rageproject.eu/ 
  10. All of the sessions from Wikimedia offered something for Colleges and adult learners - I can't do them all justice in a post . But Colleges should be using Wikimedia tools not just as reference materials but as active learning tools. Learners should be authoring content for all of the wikimedia platforms
  11. If you haven't discovered DS106 and you teach anything creative then have look - that primary learners all around the world are now doing some of the assigments should tell you something startling.
  12. @jimgroom #oer16  http://ds106.us/open-course/  open course aimed at HE and lots of primary kids do the open assignments .. Tells you something
  13. I am assured that all of the BBC RES and other re-sources will be available to Scottish Schools through GLOW I hope similar thought has gone into how Colleges will access these probably through JISC services
  14. The research and education space (RES) | RIchard Leeming BBC great session on new resources for learning #oer16  https://www.jisc.ac.uk/rd/projects/research-education-space 
  15. I saw a whole new academic discipline open up as David Kernohan set out his thesis on Blogs as now being more accessible, authoritative, accessible and capable of citation than traditional research. All pointing to new ways of evaluating the impact of academic publishing.
  16. Evaluating blog corpus on open education nice work from @dkernohan  now on to semanometrics and citation metrics https://t.co/rI98Nt78jN
    Evaluating blog corpus on open education nice work from @dkernohan now on to semanometrics and citation metrics pic.twitter.com/rI98Nt78jN
  17. Dublin City University student success tool box - give Colleges a range of customiseable re-sources for induction and much more . Every College in Scotland needs access to this . Perhaps one for CDN to have a look at . Available for download from github
  18. These two superb characters - are driving global changes in Educational blogging and content creation SPLOT is just one of a range of tools they demoed splot.ca/about/ watch their session carefully I liked NSCloner which gives teachers any kind of Wordpress blog they want quickly and easily
  19. Check out too how American Community Colleges use OER across the curriculum
  20. And finally if you want a closer to home example check out Edinburgh University open.ed.ac.uk/ Every College should have its own modest ambitions in opening up learning . There are 210,000 learners no longer in Scottish FE . How are you reaching out into your communities and local businesses and offering real support.
  21. If you missed out - think about becoming a member of ALT and/or book your place or better submit a presentation idea to next year's conference
  22. And remember too to read and comment on the Scottish Open Education Declaration !