Skills for Life in Colleges:one year on

Ofsted report on the Government’s Skills for Life Strategy

The report aims to offer key findings and recommendations on progress since the publication, in September 2003, of the Ofsted and the Adult Learning Inspectorate (ALI) report: ‘Literacy, Numeracy and English for Speakers of Other Languages: a survey of current practice in post-16 and adult provision’, which evaluated the implementation of the Government’s Skills for Life strategy.

The new report highlights:

• a continued serious shortage of specialist teachers
• the fact that vocational tutors often lack the necessary skills and knowledge to develop their students’ skills in literacy and numeracy

The report concludes that ‘a lack of skilled teachers is at the heart of the continuing difficulties with effective implementation of the Skills for Life strategy. This is exacerbated by short-term and uncertain funding arrangements to support the necessary teacher training.’

The report also makes a number of recommendations, including the need to:

• tackle the shortage of specialist teachers
• address the uncertainty caused by the funding arrangements
• improve the knowledge and skills of new and experienced vocational tutors
• improve assessment and target-setting across a range of contexts
• improve management and quality assurance, especially in Independent Specialist Colleges

The summary and full reports can be found on the Ofsted website.