High quality vocational education to help drive economic growth

The Commission for Developing Scotland’s Young Workforce publishes its interim report today. This focuses on the opportunity to significantly enhance vocational education and pathways for young people in schools through partnership between schools and colleges.

It also highlights the opportunities now available to the enlarged regional colleges and the increasing importance of higher level modern apprenticeship opportunities to respond to the demand for higher skills in the modern labour market.

Sir Ian Wood, the chair of the Commission, said:

“Beginning with schools, a key theme in our report is the importance of enhancing our vocational education system alongside Scotland’s acclaimed higher education system. In particular, we believe it is so important for the school pupils who are less academically orientated as they go into S4 to have a clear pathway and destination. Our proposals therefore incorporate accessing a significant range of vocational qualifications in senior school alongside the more traditional academic options.

“This recognises the concern many people in Scotland share that our ingrained culture values higher and vocational education so differently. Our proposals are focused on ‘Attainment for All’ and our recommendations will widen and improve the range of options for all young people and at the same time raise the standard and status of vocational education. We all understand the value of Scotland’s higher education system, but we now need to significantly enhance our vocational system – how we prepare our young people as they progress through to college, apprenticeships and employment.

“The Commission proposes that this be achieved through a close partnership between schools and colleges. A key recommendation is that pupils in the senior phase of Curriculum for Excellence at school have the option to study at their local college for industry recognised vocational qualifications such as National Certificates and Higher National Certificates. Thus a youngster in S4 will have the opportunity of doing an NC and then an HNC at school by part-time attendance at college as well as more traditional qualifications. This will immediately provide the pathway and destination and ensure much better value out of the S4 to S6 period at school as well as producing more youngsters with the higher skills required in the modern economy.

“Building on this partnership between schools and regional colleges, it should also be possible to better prepare young people for entry into Modern Apprenticeships which could provide a credit toward their apprenticeship.

“These proposals are practical, don’t have significant cost implications after the transition phase, and can be fairly quickly implemented with the flexibility the Curriculum for Excellence now provides in S4 to S6 at school and the regionalisation of colleges.

“The other key feature in the schools recommendations is the importance of the focus on employment opportunities and work readiness. The Commission strongly supports the development of a comprehensive careers advice and work experience programme with the careers advice made available at an earlier stage in schools. Young people need to be much better informed about future career options.

“Colleges are central to the development of Scotland’s young workforce and are already engaged in a significant programme of reform. They already account for almost 1 in 5 young higher education students in Scotland and should continue to play a key role in meeting the need for higher level technical and associate professional skills in the changing labour market.

“The new regional outcome agreements will be very important, particularly with the focus on employability. We recommend that colleges should have a primary focus on employment outcomes and on supporting local economic development including aligning the college education offering with the local and regional economic demand. We also recommend that colleges should play a greater role in the development of Modern Apprenticeships, particularly at the higher level.

“Modern Apprenticeships are unique within the education system. They are based on the relationship between employers and employees. The growth and development of the programme must be led by employers. The Commission calls for greater industry leadership of the development of Modern Apprenticeships and their promotion to employers. The Commission also makes recommendations to improve access to and progression within Modern Apprenticeships including introducing some enhanced branding for the higher level apprenticeships.

“In the second half of its work the Commission will focus on steps to encourage many more employers to become involved in education and youth employment. As well as improving links between industry and education, we must focus on getting more employers to employ more young people. Approaching both of these issues is what makes the Commission’s challenge unique and important.”

The report also includes recommendations for early intervention and wide ranging sustained support for disengaged youngsters, with particular focus on a possible access to apprenticeship programme. It also highlights the importance of the focus on the STEM subjects across vocational education and the importance of quality improvement.

The Commission will also make further recommendations on college education and equality issues in its final report which it plans to publish in the spring of 2014.