Today I was privileged to visit No.10 to discuss FE, disadvantage funding and our new programme supporting young people who are NEET.
I love that further education is on the national agenda. And very excited to be back at work.
#furthereducation #loveourcolleges #NEET #educationpolicy #backtowork
After hearing the Prime Minister commit to making further education a defining cause for the government in his conference speech, I made sure that one of my first actions on returning from maternity leave was to ask advisors how @getfurther.bsky.social can help.
Get Further has doubled in size while I’ve been away, and it's a phenomenal team. Huge thanks to @aliceeardley.bsky.social for a stellar job as Interim CEO (soon to be Deputy CEO) and to our brilliant COO Stacie Bond for driving fundraising and so much more - true keepers of the charity’s values. 🌟
Well, 2025 flew by! 💫
I’m back from mat leave and already this week have visited DWP to talk about @getfurther.bsky.social’s new programme supporting young people who are NEET to gain key gateway qualifications & access jobs & training. Built with care & compassion, I know it’ll be a game-changer.
I also find it shocking that there’s apparently a ~15 percentage point gap between the proportion of girls and boys reaching a good level of development by 5.
I like the report for not shying away from mentioning that this is teacher-assessed - and whether stereotypes/bias is playing a role.
I thought this was going to turn into a story needing its own True Crime Netflix series, but no.
This is quite something.
metro.co.uk/2025/11/18/w...
Crucially, it’s not an alternative to GCSE - it’s about giving students with grade 2 or below the time and teaching to build core skills and re-attempt the GCSE successfully.
This keeps ambition high and focused on the ultimate goal: more young people achieving a standard pass by 19, opening doors.
For 7 years, @getfurther.bsky.social has been focused on improving GCSE resit pass rates. We turned that learning into policy ideas, rooted in a deep understanding of the students & belief in their potential.
Delighted the Gov’t is progressing our proposal for a new L1 English &maths stepping-stone
Imagine if Top of the Pops still existed
Maybe the answer to political apathy, trust, and populism is for everyone to be a local councillor for a few weeks.
Incredibly moving piece.
I have long believed that further education is where the next big transformation in the education system needs to happen. This transformation must include young people from all backgrounds. We’re ready to play our part to make sure it does.
#furthereducation #loveourcolleges #labourconference
At @getfurther.bsky.social, we’re ready to support as many disadvantaged young people as possible to gain these essential qualifications – so they can unlock their aspirations, whether that’s university or an apprenticeship.
Gateway qualifications in English & maths are critical to making this a reality. 9 in 10 university applicants have passed GCSE English & maths – and apprenticeships are no different. 3/4s of advanced apprenticeship adverts ask for these quals. For degree apprenticeships the bar is even higher.
🙌 It’s exciting to hear the Prime Minister commit to ending further education’s ‘Cinderella’ status, with higher standards in colleges – and to set the ambition that two-thirds of young people will go on to university or a gold-standard apprenticeship.
Are 14-16 EHE programmes governed by their own separate funding rules, or 16-19 funding rules (or school age funding rules?)
There’s definitely dodgy ethics in the concept that colleges would turn children away because of a requirement to teach them more hours (we’re talking max 4 hours a week for English, 3 in maths).
They did give additional funding - £150m a year I think. I would argue it’s not enough though (as it coincided with the removal of the £100m 16-19 tuition fund).
Could you dig out some of these and send them my way? Keen to have a read of the international ones in particular.
This is the policy proposal @getfurther.bsky.social developed, which we hope would improve things without detracting from the ultimate ambition of supporting as many young people as possible to progress.
See below for one example of how GCSE resit results could be improved - by stamping out this sort of thing and actually teaching young people!
That is terrible. I think many in the wider education / policy world don’t realise things like this are happening and are partly why results are so low.
I’m pretty sure it’s because of the whopping increase in student numbers overall. It’s driving an increase in NEETs because funding/places isn’t keeping up.
Just sharing an anecdote I saw on LinkedIn:
“whether you're pro or anti-resit policy, it's impossible to deny the incredible impact it can have in FE. Case in point: resits have allowed two of my EHCP learners the time to build confidence, develop autonomy and ultimately achieve their grade 4s.“
Isn’t this because of the demographic boom at 16-19? Colleges are becoming more selective because more young people and not enough places available
I think the reasons are tbh… the policy came about because of research into outcomes for those missing these qualifications at 16.
Nearly every other OECD country has English and maths to 18 for all students, regardless of their level at 16. Why is the idea of studying these subjects alongside a main course such a big deal here?
I don’t think I agree with this, sorry! There’s a study from over a decade ago showing that missing out on GCSE grade C in English by just one mark increased a young person’s chances of being NEET by a third. Pretty much purely because of the signalling power of the qualification.
There’s an argument for that but the point of my post is there is no rule in place for GCSE entry requirements to A levels, T levels, Uni and many jobs - and yet education settings and employers still set passes in GCSE English & maths as entry criteria. No one is forcing them to. But they do.
