Memorandum submitted by the Royal Forest
of Dean College
1. PROVIDING
THE EXAMPLE
The Skills Strategy comments on the need for
the Government itself to invest in the skills of its staff. The
leadership that the Government can provide in this area is significant.
In particular, I would suggest that the opportunity for Government
staff to understand the imperatives of leadership and management
could be a striking way of providing an example. The other point
the Strategy makes is the importance of the trade union learning
advisers. The trade unions have led the way in providing not just
an example of learning to their colleagues, but also in providing
information and direction to them. Motivating people to want to
learn new skills and to develop their talents is an important
factor in raising the skills base of the UK. It is by example;
it is by leadership that we can encourage and motivate people
to learn new skills.
2. SOLUTIONS
TO THE
PROBLEM
There are various aspects of the Skills Strategy
which talk about ways in which we can deal with the current skills
deficit and encourage people to learn. There is the suggested
provision and support for people to level 2 and also the continuing
support for people at technician (level 3). While I would applaud
these actions and encourage the Government to continue them, I
do have a fear that in meeting the short term needs of the current
situation, we are forgetting to look at a longer-term solution
to eradicate—as far as possible—the problem. That
we have people with low-level skills is very much a reflection
of the way in which we currently value our education system between
5 and 16. We put emphasis on knowledge and not on skills. We reward
academic application and not skills development. Until we can
look at our compulsory education system and change the value set,
I suspect we will always be looking at ways to alleviate a problem
that many people lack evidence of skills at level 2 and level
3. In addition, there are many people who take on employment posts
at, for example, level 2. In the fullness of time, they will be
operating at a level which, if advertised again, would require
skills at level 3. We do nothing to recognise this skills improvement
in people. Perhaps some way of encouraging employers to look longer
term at valuing the development of their staff would be one way
of changing our values.
3. SECTOR SKILLS
COUNCILS
Unlike the authors of the document, I do not
believe that establishing the Sector Skills Councils is a major
plank in improving the skills of our people. As in the preceding
sections, I believe that changing the values and their application
will do more to improve skills. If Sector Skills Councils are
to do anything, then they need to be more like the old Training
Boards. The Training Boards took a levy—a sort of poll tax—from
their members. Their members were then entitled to training for
their employees. This did actually work. Perhaps we could learn
from this and suggest that, if employers wish to be part of a
Sector Skills Council, then they must actually subscribe to that
Skills Council. In return for that subscription, all their employees
will be entitled to training. Everyone loves a bargain!
4. IT SKILLS
As is recognised in this document, IT skills
are the context in which other developments can be made. For many
years, we have successfully been using IT as the vehicle to deliver
Basic (now called Essential) skills. Being able to admit that
one lacks skills in IT is entirely classless, has no basis in
gender, is irrelevant to job position and educational qualifications.
It is today's universal context for delivering learning. We should
expand and make sure that the context of IT is used to deliver
a whole lot of other skills development.
5. ADULT LEARNING
As the Strategy indicates, adult learning is
not just a vehicle for recreation, but also a very powerful way
of engaging adults back into learning. There are many issues with
adult and community learning, not least of which, is the issue
of funding. If the Strategy is determinedly going to recognise
the impact of ACL, then there has to be formed some criteria to
ensure that the provision across the whole country is reflecting
the overall strategy.
6. MODERN APPRENTICESHIPS
The Strategy supports them. This is good news.
But perhaps the Strategy needs also to think about how to ensure
that employers embrace the same developments. Our experience suggests
that employers do not value an MA and do not see the benefit of
this scheme. I doubt that our experience is just local.
7. THE QUALIFICATION
SYSTEM
Yes the Qualification System is fragmented,
arcane and unequal in its distribution. Yes it needs to be simplified.
But that simplification should not reduce the value with which
these qualifications are viewed. City and Guilds—to name
but one—qualification system is still valued as meaning
something. What seems to be lacking is the coherence and the linking
of one qualification system to another. I am very much in favour
of modular and unitised approaches, very much in favour of qualifications
when you are ready to gain them (and not determined by age) but
I am very much against a qualification system that does not set
equivalents in terms of values. The evidence is that people will
learn all sorts of techniques loosely associated with accountancy
if they are engaged in an accountancy technician course. If these
techniques are added—almost as an afterthought—to
a professional qualification in accountancy, they will learn more
reluctantly. The impact of vocational GCSEs needs to be assessed.
If they truly do widen the curriculum for the able as well as
the less "academic" learner, then I will be their greatest
supporter. Simplification is necessary. But this should not be
seen as a lowering of impact and a lowering of standards.
8. INFORMATION
It is easy to say that information is important
in developing skills. It is but one factor in the development
and increasing involvement of people in learning. Information
contains with it a set of values. These values reflect the person
giving the information, the way the information is given and also
to whom the information is provided and directed. These features
of the information process need to be examined as well as the
system. If employers are being given a guide to good training,
then the criteria being employed to determine "good"
will be critical. With so many ways of persuading people to value
one thing or another, the way in which we provide the information
needs to be thought about. There is evidence that the professionals
in the education system (who have been brought up to value academic
learning) are dismissive of skills development. They may not say
this in so many words, but their attitude will betray them. Once
again, it's about changing the value of that. That is what will
make the difference and that is what will genuinely improve the
level of skills of the people employed in the UK.
18 December 2003
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