David Willetts, the Minister for Higher Education and Science, recently laid out his ambition for Britain to be the best place in the world to do science. After a tough 2011 battling over undergraduate funding and being accused by some of neglecting post-graduate researchers, the Minister clearly hopes to start 2012 on a more positive... Read on

 Introduction Yesterday the Government set out its policy on encouraging more young people to participate in education, training and employment opportunities in the shape of an overall participation strategy for 16-24 year olds. It brings to a head a number of important papers and proposals starting with the Wolf Review and Social Mobility Strategy at... Read on

Introduction We’re likely to see some important changes coming through in 2012 to both the funding and the operation of the adult skills system. This will be driven by an increasing need to try and stimulate economic and employment growth. Much of the focus will be on simplifying the skills system and granting greater ‘ownership’... Read on

Introduction The £1bn package of proposals announced today to help ease the plight of youth unemployment is the latest in a flurry of announcements that have been coming out in the build up to Tuesday’s important financial and growth stock take. It follows announcements on business mentors, incentives for small businesses to take on more... Read on

Introduction The quality of teaching has become a high priority for the Government and was further highlighted in Ofsted’s Annual Report published this week. The issue, in the Report at least, seems to be twofold. Firstly that too much teaching is variable: “just 3% of secondary schools (inspected) and 4% of primary schools were judged... Read on

Last week, along with many colleagues at Pearson, I spent some time at the annual Colleges Conference organised by the AoC. The Conference is an important event in the calendar not just for colleges and those who work with them such as ourselves but also for policy makers and practitioners who often use the occasion... Read on

Introduction A week away from the launch of the next instalment of its Growth Plan and on the back of yet another round of disappointing economic figures, the Government is doing what it can to help create the conditions for growth. As indicated below, there’s been a flurry of announcements over the last few days... Read on

Introduction This week’s unemployment figures have brought further depressing news about the prospects for young people. Last week, exactly seven days before the latest figures were released, MPs held an Adjournment debate on youth unemployment. It was an interesting debate that set the policy dynamics in context. Opposition members, who had called the debate, urged... Read on

Introduction The FE Minister was as passionate as ever when he came to address the annual gathering of the FE world in conference this week. But it seems we’ll have to wait a little longer before the Government announces the detail of some of the changes it has in mind for the sector following its... Read on

This month we’re undertaking a major campaign to go out and talk to school leaders about some of the key changes happening as part of the Government’s school reform programme. The format we’ve chosen is an hour long breakfast briefing held at various locations around the country. The advantages of such a format are that... Read on