WEA Education Blog

An Adult Approach to Further Education

Professor Alison Wolf has continued her critique of government policy around the funding of FE with a new monograph 'An Adult Approach to Further Education'. You can see a short talk on this from her here and also download or buy the monograph.

The summary of the publication says:

'In the UK, further education is a bastion of Soviet central planning that has wholly avoided the market-based reforms that have been adopted in other parts of the state sector. In terms of total spending, further education is important, but hitherto - perhaps because of its complexity - there has been little serious policy analysis of the sector.

Professor Alison Wolf is one of the country's leading education academics. In this study, she explains the disastrous results of current policy and discusses, lucidly but rigorously, how reform of the sector should take place.

The author proposes a new model for funding that is 'student centred', and which can lead to further and adult education once again making a major contribution to the building of a skilled workforce and educated citizenry. In developing her conclusions, the author draws on theory and evidence - including experience of reform in higher education.'

The short film concentrates on her argument for new learning accounts for individuals and this is an issue that is a key part of the Conservatives current consultation document on the future funding of Further Education which proposes a new Further Education Funding Council and a more market approach to meeting demand for provision. The consultation document can be found on the Conservatives Policy pages. The closing date is this Friday.

As we move towards an election the challenge to the complexity of central planning structures and agencies is becoming stronger and from more sources. How much is a issue around reducing public expenditure and how much a sense that policy and funding in post 16 has gone in the wrong direction? The months of genuflection towards Leitch in 2006-07 now seem long gone.

Transactional or Transformational education?

The last edition of Radio 4's Thinking Allowed covered issues of class and social mobility. In particular, it focused on access to higher education and the experience of a number of academics who came from a working class background. "The middle classes still make up the majority of University students. Does education provide a means to social mobility? Has society ignored class barriers in favour of focussing on identity politics?". Towards the end of the recording (which you can access at the moment here) was a brief comment on whether education is transactional or transformative. Ideally both, you would hope. However, given the last few year's emphasis on the transactional side by state policy it's probably well past time for a bit more transformative. Given the state of the climate, the financial and economic system and the revelations that MPs view of a transaction was largely around creative expense claims, it's likely that the drive for transformational learning will have to come from people themselves.

At the same time, there is interesting information available around these issues from government. The Department of Communities and Local Government's Places Database is very useful in showing patterns of disadvantage by place - down to very local levels. For example, you can see the percentage of people with a higher education qualification down to ward level. So, in the WEA, we can see where we would want to prioritise our work. There are probably few surprises in this and an adult education organisation that is well established within communities will know this anyway. It does confirm that the introduction of disadvantage uplift based on postcodes in the mid-90s FEFC made sense and that places are as important in education as individuals.

Can we learn from Copenhagen disappointment?

It is difficult not to be disappointed by the outcome of the Copenhagen Climate Change Summit. Expectations had been high for so long with the urgency and scale of the issue and because, at long last, of the involvement of the United States in the event. The failure seemed all the worse given that, these days, we’re often told we mustn’t fail. We’re used now to working all hours on projects until they’re complete and being told we need to stay in countries we’ve invaded ‘until the job is done’. There seemed no reason for the event to end without a result. Why couldn’t they stay on until they reached agreement? What else did they have to do that was more Urgent/Important in their little priorities matrix? The determination and speed at which the banking system was bailed out in 2008 doesn’t seem to be on offer to the planet as a whole.

 

Perhaps the agreement Obama worked on with China, India and South Africa will start move things. It is irritating for the US (or Europe) to lecture China on reducing emissions when so much of it comes from manufacturing products imported by western corporations to sell to western consumers. This exporting of pollution by the west to developing countries is a ‘market failure’ aspect of globalisation as much as the toxic debt that has crippled the world economy and exposed neo-liberal self-regulation ‘certainties’. Equally, I can’t understand how China, with a significant leadership position in the G77, will explain its reported refusal to move to an agreement to the rest of the group who have pressed for reductions by major economies.

 

It is depressing. However, although it’s taken over 30 years for the issue of climate change to be seriously debated, I do think that Copenhagen shows that governments are taking it seriously now. To some extent, 2009 has been characterised by people recognising that we can’t wait for, or rely on, politicians and we need make changes ourselves, in our homes, communities and workplaces. After all, we are the consumers and I suppose I’m not alone in wondering how I’ve managed to know about this stuff for so long and do so little about it personally. The 10:10 campaign, so far, has been brilliant in making a huge and demoralising issue more manageable, personal and showing it’s possible to act in any organisation.

 

Last year the WEA we made ‘Promoting Sustainability’ one of nine strategic priorities for the period to the end of 2013. We’d made some small steps about it early this year but moved forward more quickly with a ‘Forum for the Future’ Masters Scholar placement attached to the WEA for four weeks in the early autumn. Steven Bland worked with us and, as part of a very busy month, gave us the impetus to sign the WEA up to the 10:10 Campaign. Steven surveyed the views of over 10,000 WEA members, 2700 tutors and 600 staff and we had an overwhelming confirmation of the importance of this issue to people involved with the WEA. Usefully, this survey (the biggest mass e-mail the WEA has undertaken to date) has led to 600 people asking to be part of an e-mail network on Promoting Sustainability across the WEA. Incidentally, it also makes you realise what can be done in four weeks by someone with energy and enthusiasm. Steven’s work had far more impact, resonance and reach into the organisation than an army of consultants could have brought.

 

So, we’re readying ourselves for 10:10; getting our benchmarks in place. The 10% reduction will be tough and that’s why we wanted to be confident it was something that colleagues across the organisation would support. The WEA is a very dispersed organisation using hundreds of venues in communities and neighbourhoods across the country, with thousands of tutors and tens of thousands of students (one reason why the dismal Framework for Excellence ‘learner views’ survey is difficult to promote). We still involve our students and partners in determining the courses we run. We don’t control the energy use of most of our venues and we do have tutors travelling by car some distance to where they teach. On the other hand, the students have shorter journeys because our provision is so local and our classes improve the utilisation (and viability) of many community venues.

 

The relationship to the curriculum is more tricky than the organisational energy issues. Over the year, I feel that the issue for the WEA is how to share ideas and gain encouragement from each other so that sustainability and the personal and organisational responsibility it involves become a permitted and evident part of the Association’s work.

 

In honesty, we are only beginning to look to ways that the small number of courses and activities the WEA already runs on these issues can be linked up and tutors who are involved can share and develop their practice and the WEA can learn from them. However, I’m pretty convinced that this can’t be a centralised, micro-managed initiative. We’ll need some measures for our organisational impact and we’ll need to monitor how we’re doing but, more than that, we need to make this a permitted, encouraged and – possibly - celebrated (but not in a marketing/PR/ ‘let’s look at the communication plan’ sort of way) thread of activity.

 

It’s been quite striking to see how difficult a fit this is for the WEA. I suppose that’s true for all 10:10 signatories. Our finance system isn’t set up to account for our CO₂ ‘expenditure’ and Sector Subject Areas don’t generate the kind of data evidence for this work that we’ve been so encouraged to see as the measure of ‘success’ in the world of post 16 regulation and improvement. Moreover, the other stuff still keeps coming: new agencies, funding audits, procurement, ‘new professionalism’, revised inspection approaches - all the hyperactivity and churn of the last decade zooms past the collapse of part-time adult learning opportunities and the warming planet. Perhaps this issue can be the one where we say this is too important to leave to be directed from the superstructure to meet its ‘deliverables’.

 

In some ways, although I really hope we can progress with the development of the curriculum in a conventional sense, I’m more interested in the possibility that promoting sustainability can be a thread running through – and changing - all our provision. ‘Think Global, Act local’, is an idea that feels fairly modern and yet was coined by Patrick Geddes almost 100 years ago. He also talked of ‘place, work, folk’ and, in education, ‘head, hand, heart’. These ideas together seem a good basis for thinking and taking action for sustainable learning and local future.

 

I admire all the efforts being taken by people and communities taking action on sustainability and climate change through 10:10, transition towns etc. and I hope that the WEA can contribute to these actions in 2010 and beyond.

 

 

The Pitmen Painters and Art in the WEA today

Last Friday I saw the National Theatre production of The Pitmen Painters at the Theatre Royal in Bath. It was a complete sell out and tickets had been hard to get. The play was very warmly received and the audience reaction to dialogue and jokes about the WEA would lead to you think the Association is better known (at least to that audience) than we often think. Jokes about the WEA's 'Region Office' not wearing unauthorised changes to protocol seemed to strike a particular chord with the audience.

But it was odd to see a play about working class experience of art in a theatre like that. The play itself was more the sort of thing we used to get in community centres in the heyday of 1980's radical touring theatre that Banner is almost the last survivor - and I suppose may be seen in local venues in future years as it would suit an local or school production given the simple stage set and number of (mostly male) characters.

How does it relate to the WEA today? We still have a huge programme of creative arts - probably over 18,000 people a year across England. What struck me was the idea of a big hit play that covered some aspects of the WEA that some feel have entirely passed with time: the Art classes for the Pitmen were requested by the local branch (after an Economics tutor couldn't be found by the Region); the relationship between the tutor and the class was less than deferential and operated within a strong framework of expectations including serious education not related to work; a strong collective sense resisting and self-regulating individual advancement; serious peer criticism and support within a widening understanding of the subject as well as a strong commitment to representing the the experience of life in their place and community.

The last point was quite striking; the model that the group and tutor came up with involved agreeing a subject for the week and the students going away, producing a painting and bringing it in the next week for the group to consider and debate. I don't know how closely the script related to the actual discussion in the many years the group met but, if that model was what was happening - assisted by a tutor - then it is an important aspect of WEA provision that doesn't always happen. 

The play is a great success. It's almost unbelievable to see a stage hit based on a WEA class. It's funny, thought provoking and as sentimental as the WEA itself. However, it mostly makes me think about a model of education where working class adults could decide on what they wanted to study; get a good (possibly great) tutor to work with them; set the framework for what they studied themselves together and bring work that that did between classes in to show, discuss and argue with their peers and together change their view of the world and 75 years later, our understanding of them.

Is that model still possible? Have communities and people changed too much, social structures gone, social mobility 'worked' too well? Is the WEA still able to bring together that combination of local enthusiasm, academic commitment and non-conformist teaching approaches to communities in poverty in England today?

Ofsted reliance on 'data and tick-box systems' criticised

Ofsted has come under criticism on the front page of today's 'Guardian' from a number of sources. The points made are around recent school inspections and the application in inspection of judgements around safeguarding and how these are translated into overall judgements on providers.

Whilst the criticisms come from schools and local authorities, the most telling one may be from Mike Tomlinson, the former Chief Inspector. He is quoted as saying:

"The question needs to be asked and answered as to whether Ofsted has the appropriate skills and experience to carry out its agenda,"

and

"Inspection systems that rely too heavily on data and tick-box systems is not what we need. I worry we are heading that way."

These concerns may inevitably surface in inspections of adult provision, too. The understandable emphasis on safeguarding may be accompanied by a standardising data approach to judgements that is intended to speed up inspections and reduce their costs. This is the same issue with the Framework for Excellence where judgements will be made (or, at least, hypotheses will be developed) from very generic, sketchly and largely FE college focused surveys. 

There may be a danger that the perverse outcomes recently emerging from an overemphasis on qualification success rates could be replicated in the areas of learner views and safety. This would be very unfortunate considering the importance of both these issues for good provision and the interests of students.

Skills Investment Strategy proposes funding changes for 2010-11

The Department of Business Innovation & Skills (BIS) has published the Skills Investment Strategy for the funding of Further Education in 2010-11. This is what has been called the Funding Priorities statement. The contents were trailed in the 'Observer' recently. It does include reductions in Adult Learner Responsive funding as well as in adult apprenticeship funding. Skills for Life funding will also be reduced - although with an expectation that volume of provision continues: 

"As capacity and quality of provision has developed significantly since the start of the strategy, this uplift will be reduced to 1.2 for all Skills for Life provision with the exception of Entry Level numeracy where it will remain at 1.4, reflecting the need to build capacity to support more learners at this level."

There are further limitations to the discretionary Learner Support Fund in relation to fees and ther 'assumed private contribution' i.e. fees, rises to 50%.

Two references to Specialist Designated Institutions:

“SDIs will continue to have transitional protection in recognition of their different mission, and how their provision continues to focus largely on activity more aligned with informal adult learning”

and

“We will consider how SDIs should be funded in the longer term as part of the wider Spending Review process”

Speak Up for Lifelong Learning in run up to the General Election

The whole country is getting ready for next year’s general election, but will funding for adult education and lifelong learning be high in the minds, and campaigns, of existing and aspiring MPs? Not high enough as far as the WEA, the National Association for Voluntary and Community Action, the Women’s Institute (WI) and Campainging Alliance for Lifelong Learning (CALL) supporters are concerned.

The WEA is leading an initiative in the run up to the general election to make sure that adult education is firmly on the national political agenda through local constituency work across the country.

WEA and its CALL partner organisations are inviting students, members, volunteers, tutors, and staff to get involved using the publication of the Report of the Commission on Lifelong Learning (see article in current CALL Bulletin) as an opportunity to begin a dialogue around adult education with local prospective parliamentary candidates (PPCs).

The WEA will be organising constituency meetings to quiz parliamentary candidates on their parties’ attitudes to adult learning and what the parties plans are if they form the Government after the election.

The WEA is producing ‘A Speak Up for Lifelong Learning campaign pack’ which will be available for Friday 4th December. The pack will include:
·         What happens in the run up to a general election
·         How to find out about prospective parliamentary candidates
·         How to arrange to meet with local candidates
·         How to send a letter to candidates
·         Pointers on what WEA and partners are asking of politicians
·         Other supporting materials
 

Find out more on the WEA's website.

10:10, Sustainability and the WEA

The WEA's nine strategic priorities include one on 'Promoting Sustainability'. When the 10:10 campaign was announced many in the WEA wanted the Association to sign up straight away. We didn't then, partly because reducing 10% of emissions in 2010 is going to be pretty hard and mostly because hardly anyone involved in the WEA would have been involved in that decision.

We were lucky because we were just about to have a one month placement of a Masters student from Forum for the Future to help us sharpen up our plans for this priority. Steven Bland worked with us for a month and talked with many people across the WEA. In particular, he led an online survey of the views of WEA staff, tutors and members - the biggest survey we've ever done. Out of over 13,000 people we e-mailed we had a high response rate and over 600 respondents agreed to continuing to stay in touch on this issue in the WEA. It also gave us a clear mandate to sign up to 10:10 with over 56% of members, 63% of tutors and 61% of staff in favour and no more than 8% against in any of these groups.

So, we are asking WEA Trustees to sign the Association up to 10:10 and all it involves.

If you'd like to read Steven's report of his placement you can get it here: Download Forum for the Future placement report. 

WEA Conference 2009, Skills for Social Justice

The WEA's conference at the beginning of October was a success. The Friday event, open to many, covered items around Skills for Social Justice and emphasised, to me, how this seems a more real issue in Scotland than it often does in England.

The Saturday was the WEA's business conference and this was greatly speeded up by effective electronic voting. However, as I've felt in previous conferences, the issues being raised were often not fully discussed because of the traditional structure of conference proceedings. Many motions raised issues around older learners, engaging with issues of disadvantage through the downturn, campaigning for lifelong learning as we move towards a UK General Election, the need to reduce paperwork and bureaucracy faced by students, tutors and volunteers and the work of the WEA internationally. However, we didn't manage to group these into the effective debates and discussions that would do credit to the issues raised.

Hopefully, we can look at how other organisations, like the Women's Institute, manage their conferences to develop strategy out of issues raised throughout the organisation at grass routes level.

LSIS - now giving resources to providers

I attended my first meeting of the LSIS (Learning & Skills Improvement Service) Council on 15th October in London. Ruth Silver and Graham Hoyle led the meeting and the new LSIS Chief Executive, David Collins, outlined some of the new direction for the organisation.

LSIS has been given a much reduced budget but, within that, there was good news that, soon, the resource for providers will be allocated into Provider Accounts according to the number of Full Time Equivalent learners they have. This will mean the WEA can access some support resources without the tiresome explanations of why we're not like an FE college. In addition, the services to providers look clearer and you can rate each of them through the website. The Leadership toolkits, including Adult & Community Learning are now free and providers can have free quality 'health checks' two years after inspection from LSIS nine Regional Development Partners. The online Safeguarding Training was presented and several members of the Council indicated that this is a welcome resource.

All these seemed an improvement on what we'd seen earlier when I feared LSIS was captured by General FE and Workbased Learning providers. Finally, the new (elected) Council will be different for LSIS management to work with as the end of the session indicated when a number of people on the Council insisted that sessions need to involve them more in the discussion and less in receiving information.