OLASS 4
OFFENDER LEARNING GETS SMARTER
How will Learning and Skills help to break the cycle of
offending?
Making Prisons Work: Skills for Rehabilitation
• Why have we re-tendered the Learning & Skills
provision?
• Previous versions of OLASS have seen increased
investment and improvements to skills delivery
• Prisoner participation has also increased
• However,
• The system is inflexible
• Not enough prisoners are moving on into
employment or further training
• Reoffending rates are still high
• Where are we now?
- Review of Offender learning
- Re-distribution of OLASS budgets
- Clusters and Lead Governors
- Co-commissioning arrangements
- ITT, Specification, Bids and Evaluation
- Mobilisation
- Contract start date – 1st August 2012
- In three areas this is 1st November 2012
Making Prisons Work: Skills for Rehabilitation
• The Skills Funding Agency and NOMS have worked
together to ensure the objectives of the Review of
Offender Learning are central to the procurement and
delivery of OLASS 4, inc.
• New service delivery specification with emphasis on
prisons as places of preparation for work
• More vocational training taking place in immediate 12
months before release
• Greater role for lead governors and HOLS in planning
curriculum, meeting local needs and understanding
labour market into which offenders released
Making Prisons Work: Skills for Rehabilitation
• Aim to Implement priorities of Review of Offender Learning
through a “reformed funding model”
• Ensure better value for money and improve focus of
spending
• Move from an output based system (tutor hours) to funding
outcomes (enrolments/achievements/progression)
• Priorities: Skills for Life (English/Maths); vocational skills
training; employability skills
• Personal & Social development budget
• Additional Learning Support
Making Prisons Work: Skills for Rehabilitation
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National Careers Service
Working Prisons
Unitised qualifications
Working towards Apprenticeships
First day mandation – DWP Work Programme
Partnership arrangements e.g. Jobcentre Plus, local
employers, Local Enterprise Partnerships
• Local Labour Market Information
• Employers engaged in designing and supporting
delivery
Working Prisons
• The provider must ensure that skills training in
support of prison work is available.
• The Green Paper “Breaking the Cycle” set out the
aim of seeing prisons as places where prisoners are
meaningfully employed.
• Some partnerships with “Trackworks” for example
can lead directly to employment on release
• Focus on developing employability skills but also
• Work based learning embedded in the workplace
Working Prisons – Progress
• Lunch at work
• Some establishments are operating a 30 to 40 hour
week
• The current competition round will see a further two
prisons where work will be the dominant regime
• 10,000 prisoners per day are employed in industries
• This is not including Kitchens, cleaning etc.
• Average working week has increased from 23 to 25
hours per week
• 11.4 million working hours in 2011/12
Working Prisons – Success measures
• We will be tracking how many prisoners move into employment
or training
• Evidence suggests that employment reduces the likelihood of
reoffending by between a third and a half.
• There is an Employers Forum which is assisting NOMS to better
prepare prisoners for employment and to assist in finding them
sustainable work.
• These aims are fully supported by the new Ministerial team.
• From March every prisoner leaving custody claiming JSA will
engage with a DWP work provider who will be paid to find them
work
Working prisons What should you be looking
for?
• Prisoners working longer hours,
• Undertaking meaningful work resembling as far as possible the
real world
• Opportunities to embed the work ethic across the establishment
• Maximising the opportunities for prisoners to engage in work
• Positive engagement with third parties from private and
voluntary sector
• Governors working with partners to develop local business
growth
• Prisoners properly incentivised towards real work
What other success measures are we looking
for?
• Seamless transition from OLASS 3 to OLASS 4
• Continuous Curriculum Development to ensure that
the right skills are delivered to ensure that they meet
the needs of the labour market and employers
• Ensure that there are clear links with real employers,
especially in the development of Apprenticeships etc.
• Links with Community (Through the Gate) Work
Programme etc.
• Regular Performance reviews chaired by the Lead
Governors which look at delivery against profiled
delivery.
Other Success measures
• Ensure provider continues to develop learning
resources for use on the Virtual Campus
• Full utilisation of budgets which may involve redistribution of the initial budgets
• Providers to work with OMU and other departments
to ensure that the learner journey is properly
sequenced
• Ensure that Providers support the Working Prisons
Initiative
Contact details
• Mike Kirby
OLASS 4 Implementation manager
Offender Services Co-commissioning Group
Clive House
London
Mike.kirby@noms.gsi.gov.uk
Te: 07968-909937