To celebrate Colleges Week, I visited Easton College and met with Principal Jerry White. It was fantastic to see the breadth of education the College offers to the community, through further education, apprenticeships, adult education, and higher education.
We talked about the huge contribution the sector does and can make to solving the UK's productivity problems, training young people in areas with some of our biggest skills shortages, and re-training adults as the needs of the economy shift. I was really interested to learn about some of the challenges facing the sector, and how Government could support it better, including:
- closing financial differentials with schools, e.g., in VAT treatment and teacher pay, that make it harder for colleges to compete
- stable capital funding to make routine maintenance easier to manage
- making sure the thought and investment that's gone into T-levels isn't lost in the development of the Advanced British Standard
- making sure colleges are not forgotten in policy development and rollout
I was glad we got a break in the torrential rain to see the grounds and the brilliant facilities students can benefit from.