Back in June last year the Withers review – Fit for the future: developing a post-school learning system to fuel economic transformation – made the case for a “cohesive” approach to the regulatory and financial machinery that would make Scotland’s tertiary sector work.
Thirteen months later, the Scottish Government is consulting on some very Withers-informed legislative proposals. It’s a typically thoughtful (if typically slow) Scottish affair – and you have all the way through to 20 September to respond.
Tertiary changes
The big news is on the way funding is directed and managed. Currently, the Scottish Funding Council (SFC) provides funding to colleges and universities and student support to FE students, while Skills Development Scotland (SDS) supports all training providers outside of those two groups and also the support of students at these providers. The Student Awards Agency Scotland (SAAS) deals with all of the HE student support (maintenance) payments, but also funds providers via the tuition fee element.
That last one may need a bit of unpacking for some – although Scotland (famously) does not charge tuition fees to students there are tuition fees within the system, set for undergraduates at £1,820 a year. These are paid on a grant basis by SAAS for virtually all students in Scotland. The other chunk of funding (that comes via SFC) is the bit that involves number controls – it is perfectly possible for providers to recruit on a fees-only basis, they just don’t get the SFC end of the money.
Such is the fascinating world of Scottish funding! The government has three proposals, the first is to keep everything as it is, the second is to move the funding role away from SDS – merging provider funding responsibilities into SFC while all student support responsibilities move into SAAS, and the third is to move everything into SFC (with SAAS being dissolved).
In the two latter proposals SDS would retain its careers information and guidance roles, and may still get involved in the Scottish government’s attempts at skills planning when these plans emerge. The government is also keen to emphasise the impact – and the work it would do to mitigate the impact – that these changes could have on staff in the agencies involved.
Either of the second two proposals would make the system look tidier – but is tidiness the point? According to the consultation, the primary benefits are the way they would simplify the funding of apprenticeships (especially the kind that include a HNC or HND) and the possibility of standardising the approach to student support (something that has been talked about since 2017’s independent review).
What else is up for discussion?
Everything else up for discussion concerns the ramifications of these possible changes in responsibilities for SFC. This isn’t to downplay the impact on SAAS and SDS, it’s more that the governance of SFC is set up in legislation: the 2005 Higher Education (Scotland) Act. The plans are to remove the four year limit on membership, remove the restrictions on reappointment, and update the skills, experience, and knowledge requirements to include stuff on apprenticeships.
We also get some very general stuff on data collection and use. This goes alongside the new approach to regulation and quality we saw earlier this month – posing the question as to whether we have the right, reliable, data (particularly on the poorly understood world of apprenticeships and skills training) to make that work across the whole tertiary gamut.
Finally, does SFC need any more power? Fans will be aware that it already runs on three phase power, but if there’s anything else you think it needs to do, let the government know.
Minister Graeme Dey has put pen to paper in order to introduce this consultation to a willing world: we learn that technical working groups, drawing primarily on public bodies, will work through the summer on realising the two “change” options – while the Cabinet Secretary has established an Education and Skills Ministerial Reform Group to keep things whole-system focused.
Of possibly more immediate interest, Annex A of the letter represents the fullest response to the Withers review that we have received so far. The majority of premises put forward by the report have been accepted – with work underway to clarify delivery. In some cases, work has already started (for instance, the Education (Scotland) Bill, which will establish Qualifications Scotland).
Merely “under consideration” are the development of a digital training record (we’ll hear more in the response to the independent review of quality and assessment), the reform of the careers end of SDS, and links between the education system and employers.
