FE News Podcast: #FutureofEducation News Channel

To mark the launch of Edge’s new grant fund – the Edge Innovation Fund – Jane Samuels, Director of Projects and Operations at the Foundation joined Gavin O’Meara to talk all things funding.

The Edge Innovation Fund is a new approach to funding for Edge. The fund, which opened on 14th September 2021 will stay open until the end of 2025. There is £300k available for the balance of 2021 and then the fund will be refreshed every 1st January until 2025. The minimum amount available is £20k and the maximum for a one year project is £100k. Projects which run for multiple years (up to a maximum of 3 years) can bid for up to the entire amount in the funding pot.

Edge is looking for disruptive innovators with ideas and plans to challenge the current approach to education in the UK. All projects must support Edge’s strategic aim for a broad, flexible and engaging curriculum, providing high quality vocational and professional education which is employer and community engaged. More details about the Fund, the criteria and how to apply can be found here.

In the first episode of Edgy Thinking, Jane and Gavin discussed the new grant fund and how important it is to provide a source of funding for innovative education. They were joined by two organisations previously funded by Edge. Stefano Pacelli, at Blackburn College talked about their two successful bids, one centred on automotive engineering and one on eco-construction. Stefano stressed the Edge funding had allowed the College to not only develop state of the art facilities but also to provide lecturers the time and resources to develop deep and long-lasting employment engagement. This enables the College to put learners at the heart of relationships with local and national employers and engage with their community,

The second guest was Harriet Bird, who is Senior Trusts and Grants Manager at the Barbican Centre. Harriet spoke about Edge’s support for their Careers Rewired programme which looked to raise awareness and understanding of careers opportunity within the creative sector. Edge funding allowed the Barbican to develop a new approach to engagement with local schools which brought inner city students to the Barbican Centre for the first time and took creative professionals into the classrooms.

Both Stefano and Harriet spoke about the challenges of securing funding and of the impact that the projects had had. Measuring the impact and evaluating the success of grant funded projects is key to Edge, who have recently released an Impact Report on the whole of their Grant Funding programme.

In this episode, Aman Merchant, the Co-Founder and Chief Provocateur at Radicle, a futures lab that delivers transformative solutions, discusses why he co-founded the RewirEd Sandbox. This global platform is set to transform education systems and will help bring together pioneers, leaders, and innovators within and beyond the education sector to design ‘RewirEd Provocations’, the solutions to some of the biggest challenges facing the education system globally today.
With 1.6 billion children missing out on an education – the RewirEd Sandbox will help create the RewirEd Provocations, north-star statements or questions that will help to move current thinking from the usual to the unusual and address systemic, complex, and structural challenges impacting the education system. The RewirEd Sandbox and Provocations will help shape the new global narrative for the education sector, and will be presented on a global scale at the RewirEd Summit during Expo 2020 Dubai.
For more information on the RewirEd Sandbox and Provocations, visit: https://provocations.rewired2021.com/home
The RewirEd Summit will be held on December 12th to 14th, 2021 at Expo 2020 Dubai.

Due to the pandemic we have seen drastic changes within the World of Education, changes to the World of Skills, changes to the workplace and new skills required by employers. The pandemic has shone a spotlight on traditional qualifications, employability for young people and disadvantaged groups, mental health and wellbeing and as a result of the pressures of the pandemic, the fourth industrial revolution has become a reality; so Gavin from FE News chats with David Gallagher about the future of education, the future of work and employability.

They also discuss the future of qualifications, the currency of qualifications and what the future could be for qualifications. They also discuss how the sector can come together to offer impactful change to learners, employers and to communities.

Juliet Kyobweine, Deputy Program Manager at Educate talks about the need to equip young people in Africa with the skills to attain further education, overcome gender inequities, start businesses, get jobs, and drive development in their communities.

#NoLearnerLeftBehind - Welcome to the first @FENews #Livestream in conjunction with @CognAssist
We all know that learner dropout is a serious issue. Approx 35% of Apprentices drop out. The big question is, how do we prevent apprentices from dropping out?

Your host is Gavin O’Meara, CEO of FE News and your panelists are:

Dr. Louise Karwowski, Director of Education, Cognassist,
Sally Dicketts, AoC President and CEO Activate Learning, and
Helen Wilson, Science Communication Manager, Cognassist and handbook author of How to Prevent your Apprentices from Dropping out.
The panel explores how recent events have impacted dropout rates of Apprentice completion rates. We explore if non-completion rates are an age old problem and the panel shares successful tactics reduced Apprentice dropout, particularly for learners with Additional Learning Support needs.

The panel then explores the recent updates from the ESFA and the new rules added for August 2021. These are updates from ESFA to Apprenticeship Rules 21-22, the panel in particular focus on the new rules about Additional Learning Support and how the ESFA is discouraging blanket screen learners, which appears counterintuitive.

The panel discuss the new ESFA recommend changes and how this will have an intended knock on effect for learner outcomes and Apprentice drop out rates.

How would the proposed ESFA changes could impact the ability of colleges and ITPs to properly fulfil their legal requirements of the Equalities Act 2010 and how the changes could impact the Ofsted requirement to establish starting points and tailor delivery to all learners?

Check out the livestream with Gavin, Sally, Louise and Helen who explore how to Prevent Apprentice Dropout, particularly with learners with Additional Learning Support needs

#VirtualCoffee podcast with Mims Davies, Minister for Employment

#RewirEdSummit - Dr Tariq Al Gurg, CEO @DubaiCares, joins this @FENews podcast episode to discuss RewirEd; a Dubai Care's led initiative in partnership with Expo 2020 Dubai and in close coordination with the UAE Ministry of Foreign Affairs and International Cooperation (MoFAIC), delivered in partnership with global stakeholders.
This first of its kind global platform is calling on the international community to rethink and reimagine the future of education, for a prosperous and sustainable future, by encouraging disruptive dialogue and empowering new and diverse voices as pillars of a future-ready global education ecosystem.

Dr Tariq Al Gurg discusses the current global problems the education sector faces, the potential solutions to "rewire" education and the current initiatives in place by RewirEd to take action, including the upcoming RewirEd Summit; a ground-breaking 3-day global education Summit taking place in December 2021 in the UAE, which will bring together key education stakeholders from around the world to collectively tackle education challenges by exploring entirely new approaches as well as offering participants a unique opportunity to agree on a shared vision and concrete action.

Welcome to Episode 4 and the final instalment of the #ExploringNeurodiversity podcast, a co-produced podcast mini-series brought to you by @FENews and @CognAssist.
In this episode, your hosts Gavin O’Meara from FE News and Louise Karwowski, Head of Science at Cognassist are joined by Charles Dall'omo, CEO of Train Together and his colleague Nicola Clark, Senior Learning Coordinator at Train Together.
This episode of Exploring Neurodiversity is called Implementing Inclusivity. We are joined by Charles who will share some ideas and tips from a CEO or Leader perspective and Nicola from a delivery and operational perspective. Nicola is an Inclusivity Champion, so it is fantastic to hear from someone who has lived and successfully breathed successful inclusivity implementation.
Charles discusses how communication is key, not just with the team and staff members, but also with key stakeholders. Charles shares some tips on how they successfully rolled out an inclusive model in their Training Provider.
Nicola then shares how to support individual Neurodiverse learners, but most importantly how to equip and support all of the team to support learners.
Please check out the podcast below to hear how Charles and Nicola have Implemented Inclusivity to support Neurodiverse learners, so #NoLearnerIsLeftBehind:

Welcome to Episode 3 of the #ExploringNeurodiversity podcast, a co-produced podcast mini-series brought to you by @FENews and @Cognassist.

In this episode your hosts Gavin O’Meara from FE News and Louise Karwowski, Head of Science at Cognassist are joined by Karl Bentley from RSM to discuss Neurodiversity Funding Fears. Karl has over 20 years in the FE sector and is a funding, data and audit specialist.

We explore what additional funding is available to support Neurodiverse learners and how the funding is available to support all learners from levels 2-7.

Louise explains that from over 100,000 learner assessments completed so far at Cognassist, that on average one in three Apprenticeship learners at level 3, are being identified as requiring additional support for Neurodiversity. So this is a massive challenge and need and highlights the importance of providers utilising the additional funding to support their Neurodiverse learners.

Karl and Louise then explore why Training Providers and Colleges could be hesitant to take this additional funding due to funding clawback. Karl shares some best practice tips to evidence additional support for Neurodiverse learners, particularly around Assessment of Need, Planning and Evidence of Activity for the learner.

Karl explains how colleges and providers should evidence additional learning for Neurodiverse learners and the importance of all of the team working together to evidence additional support and the importance of quality compliance. Karl also explains the importance of data, how long to keep the data for each learner, data security and the importance of planning for the long term security of your data.

We then explore what an actual Audit looks like and what an auditor will be asking for and how to start preparing the evidence and impact of the additional funding support for learners.

Exploring Neurodiversity Podcast – Steps to Outstanding with Marina Gaze
Welcome to Episode 2 of the Exploring Neurodiversity podcast, a co-produced podcast mini series brought to you by FE News and Cognassist. In today’s episode your hosts Gavin O’Meara from FE News and Louise Karwowski, Head of Science at Cognassist are joined by Marina Gaze to discuss Steps to Outstanding. Marina is an expert in quality processes and used to be the Deputy Director for Further Education and Skills at Ofsted.
Marina shares her views and insight for Providers, Colleges, Individual educators and teams to be outstanding everyday when supporting learners with Neurodiversity, not just when thinking of Ofsted of the new Education Inspection Framework.
In this Exploring Neurodiversity podcast we explore what steps we can take to encourage teams to be outstanding when we support learners with Neurodiversity. Marina and Louise explore how to start to remove the stigma and encourage everyone to be open and comfortable talking about Neurodiversity and supporting Neurodiverse learners.
Marina explores Providers responsibilities around quality, particularly with Ofsted in mind whilst supporting Neurodiverse learners. She also unpacks the recent Education Inspection Framework – (EIF), changes, particularly for supporting Neurodiverse learners. As the key changes came in September 2019, which was only about 6 months before the pandemic and the lockdown measures came into force in the UK.
As Covid-19 has transformed education delivery, we explore moving forward into the next stage to the response to the pandemic, how can we ensure that no learner is left behind? We also explore what the future of hybrid learning, online learning and face to face learning could be in FE and Skills, and what lessons can be learned whilst supporting Neurodiverse learners.
Marina then provides some helpful advice and insight as to what happens in an actual Ofsted Inspection (she used to be the Deputy Director for Further Education and Skills at Ofsted) and discusses data and what is a ‘Deep Dive’ when it comes to an Ofsted inspection and what should providers, their teams, so basically everybody be evidencing and keeping as data from now to prepare for this.?
To close the podcast we discuss how we can encourage high quality provision everyday and by everyone across the sector for every learner, particularly neurodiverse learners and to ‘keep it real’, not just for an Ofsted tick box or aiming for the Ofsted quality badge.
Check out the Exploring Neurodiversity – Steps to Outstanding podcast: