West Midlands CETT Advisory Board Meeting
held on 9 December at HoW College
Present:
1.
Maureen Atkinson, Chair
Julie Chamberlain (Project Manager WMCETT) Secretary
Colin Barnett (Worcestershire County Council)
Helena Baxter (WTPA)
Kevin Gillard (North East Worcestershire College)
Helen Kinghorn (Warwickshire College)
Fergus McKay (Director WMCETT)
Apologies
Colin Barnett attended the meeting on behalf of Ros Partridge.
2. Minutes of Advisory Board meeting, 1 July, 2014
They were agreed as a correct record.
3.
Matters arising
These were dealt with during the rest of the agenda.
4.
Director’s update
Working with LEPS
FM talked about WMCETT trying to interact more with the LEPs in the hope of being able to get involved
with joint funding bids, possibly working in partnership with the university. WMCETT had also been
involved with two large but unsuccessful bids to the ETF.
Collaborative project
He was looking into an exchange visit with Germany to look at what different sectors in lifelong learning do.
The German contact said there were now problems being encountered there with teaching of English and
maths. HB and CB said they would be interested in becoming involved. CB said it may also be of interest to
the wider LEAFEA group who may have key specialist areas of interest. MA said there may be interest in the
work on apprenticeships and the new higher apprenticeships too. There was a discussion about the LEPs’
different rates of development and work of their Employer and Skills Boards.
FELTAG
FM said he was interested in whether WMCETT would be able to get involved in the FELTAG initiative. KG
said HoW College was a beacon for this. He talked about how Level 3, year 1 students were studying on line
with a flipped learning approach, with time in lessons spent following up and feeding back. Most of the 28
groups meant to be doing it, are doing it. He said it was time intensive with assessment and quality
assurance, and staff contracts had not been cut. Most staff saw it as a positive move. The college tracked
and monitored what was going on in the learning centres.
KG said the college had put on a Level 4 diploma in an on-line learning programme for staff who wanted to
develop their skills in that area. The internal ILT team were the drivers in the process and there was a team
pushing that agenda. There was a whole infrastructure around creating resources.
1
HK asked if an internal Youtube was used for the flipped learning, and KG said it was moodle and intranet. It
was important to get student feedback to make sure they were making progress. Independent learning
skills had to be at quite a high level which was why the college went in at Level 3. Students did not always
engage as hoped and there was an internal discussion going on about how they could be made to work as
effectively as possible.
HK said City and Guilds had visited Warwickshire College and they were further ahead than other boards.
CB said adult education tutors were a million miles away from getting students to use the VLE efficiently. It
was a culture shock when people had been used to doing it one way and now had to change. He wondered
how the speed of change in adult learning was going to impact on the community.
HB said there was an issue in Worcestershire with disengaged 19-24 year olds with the whole process of
IAG on line and the lack of careers advice. CB said work clubs were often run by volunteers.
Apprenticeships
HB talked about Trailblazers and how funding for apprenticeships will now go to the employers and would
not be triggered until they pay cash. She said she had worked in hospitality before and they would not pay
cash. She was going to monitor the situation to see if it affected apprenticeship numbers. The Training
Providers Associations had done work with 30 schools and there had been a recent rise in 16-18
apprenticeships.
HK said Warwickshire College was working on Trailblazers with Jaguar Land Rover. There were issues with
post-16 maths and English teaching and finding out what qualifications students had, and making sure they
were attending maths and English classes, plus national rules changing all the time. There was also a huge
GCSE programme for adults because they needed maths and English to get on to Access and health and
social care Level 3 courses. The difference between the higher and foundation level D had not been taken
into account. KG said the same issues were reflected at HoW college.
There were also issues with the new SEND rules and the college having to accommodate people with quite
complex needs in a mainstream college. KG said there had been a big increase in students going to his
college with mental health problems and that was having a big impact in providing support to those
students. CB said there was more information now on mental health and also autism.
5.
Project manager’s update
JC reported on the completion in the summer of the first year of the Workforce Development Programme
which WMCETT had been commissioned to work on by ACETT on behalf of the Education and Training
Foundation, and current and future work.
GCSE Maths Enhancement Programme
Set task of recruiting 222 people to 15 courses, recruited 302 to 19 courses. Out of those 265 successfully
completed all six days and did a Personal Development Plan. Of the 37 non-completers some were down to
illness or not completing the PDP, and others missed days. Feedback was extremely positive and a lot of
people said they wanted more.
Maths Fest!2014 conferences
One at University of Warwick, one at Staffordshire University with workshops at both with titles such as
Stimulating Starts, Maths with Meaning, Level 3 Core Maths, Functional Maths and ESOL learners, and
Maths for Vocational Tutors and Assessors. Nearly 70 people paid to attend.
MEP Follow up days
Funding provided nationally to pay for these, held four in autumn term at University of Warwick,
Birmingham Adult Education Service, Walsall Adult & Community College, and Stoke on Trent College. A
total of 68 people registered to attend. The days aimed to help participants explore the needs of learners
retaking GCSE and implications for curriculum design, and shared good practice and resources. Excellent
feedback.
Maths Hub
The strategic level maths group last met in October with participants looking at training and development
taking place or hoped for in 2014-15, and how we could link in with the schools hub.
JC said WMCETT’s current and future planned work included two more subsidised GCSE Maths
Enhancement Programmes, one of which has started with 20 people and the other is still recruiting with so
far 14 recruits. A subsidised English Enhancement Programme, with six training pathways to choose from, is
being run nationally and WMCETT had appointed a Regional English Specialist, Catriona Mowat, to coordinate enquiries and carry out other English-related CPD.
JC also gave a financial update. Spending for the year looked huge, but that was because of money received
from ACETT to pay venues for hosting the Maths Enhancement Programme, most of which went out quite
late in the year. There was more in the bank than our budget predicted spending up until the end of August
2015 as there was more left over from the previous year than anticipated. Payment was still awaited from
this year’s workforce development programme to come through from the Foundation via ACETT but there
was little slack in the proposed funding. We may have enough to keep going until around Christmas 2015
but needed more funded work to continue beyond that.
6.
Any other business
There was none.
7.
Next meeting
The date for the next meeting was set for Tuesday, 12 May, at 5pm at HoW College.