Comprehensive Spending Review
Implications for Higher Education
Changes to the HE sector
The CSR implies significant reform of the HE sector, though the word ‘reform’ is not used. Announced changes include:
• Foundation Degree awarding powers for FE Colleges
• It will be easier for private providers to gain degree awarding powers
• Employers can accredit their in-house training and even become awarding bodies (it is not clear whether this will extend to higher education)
• Expansion of HE focused on employer co-financed provision - 5,000 additional employer co-financed places and growth of at least 5,000 places per year to 2010/11. Priority will be for work based learning and provision designed or delivered by employers and Sector Skills Councils
• ‘Bite-sized learning, credit accumulation, flexible and innovative modes of delivery and curriculum design influenced by employers will be key features of the future HE system’
• Building on the Higher Skills Pathfinders to ‘build the higher skills offer’ to employment. The DIUS also commit to ‘increasing interaction between HEIs and employers, including employers clearly articulating their skills needs’
Indicators
Most relevant to higher education is PSA Delivery Agreement 2
Two indicators are of direct relevance:
• 34% of working age adults qualified to level 4 and above by 2011, 36% by 2014.
• Increase in overall HE participation among 18-30 year olds by one percentage point every two years until 2010/11
For the first time there is a PSA indicator for the number of adults of working age who are qualified at Level 4 and above. This target will be disaggregated regionally. Local authorities have responsibility for contributing to this target.
There is clearly some overlap between these indicators. However the second merely implies that the sector is set to expand based on existing models of participation, whereas the first implies a more fundamental changes in the way HE is delivered.
Other news of interest
• Sector Skills Councils will be relicenced to drive up quality in ensuring they are able to articulate employers’ skills needs
• The National Skills Academy Network is underlined as of importance.
• The number of Knowledge Transfer Partnerships will double, and FE Colleges will be encouraged to participate
• Train to Gain will expand to Level 3. There may also be a role for the service at Level 4, this is likely to be related to the roll-out of the HEFCE Higher Skills Pathfinders.
• The number of apprentices is set to expand significantly
• Expansion in Level 3 provision will largely be through Train to Gain
• A single, integrated business support brokerage service will be launched in April 09 via Business Link, and this will include skills brokerage
• This Autumn, the Department for Business, Enterprise and Regulatory Reform (BERR) will publish research communicating the benefits to business of investing in skills at all levels.
Jenny Shaw, 10.10.07