THE BASIC SKILLS CHALLENGE
On Friday January 18th Susan Pember, head of the Adult Basic Skills
Strategy Unit will lead an ACM seminar on our collective progress in
tackling the nation’s basic skills problems. In particular Susan
will focus on colleges’ contribution to this vital national initiative.
The seminar is sponsored by learndirect, and there will be a display
of learndirect’s plentiful and high quality basic skills learning
materials at the seminar.
The lack of basic skills is a stubborn deep-rooted problem with no easy
answers. In the past colleges have put a great deal of skill and energy
into supporting students with basic skills needs, often transforming
individuals’ lives. We didn’t come close to cracking the problem,
because in the past there was not the political will – and therefore
neither the resources nor the national strategies - to rise to the scale
of the challenge. But the economic imperative of the knowledge economy
has quickened this government’s determination to deal with the
basic skills issue. Increasingly productivity and prosperity depend
on the contribution to the production process made by people’s
knowledge and skills. Knowledge and skills have overtaken raw materials,
land, capital and unskilled labour as the dominant factor of production.
To put it very bluntly, in economic terms, when the economy could absorb
lots of unskilled labour, it didn’t matter too much that a significant
proportion of people couldn’t read, write, or use basic number
functions, because there were plenty of manual jobs that didn’t
require those competences. Of course poor basic skills have long mattered
a good deal by personal or social yardsticks, but like the man said,
it’s the economy, stupid. Times have changed then and the needs
of the 21st century economy have propelled workforce development to
the top of the political agenda. The knowledge economy isn’t only
about basic skills of course - it’s also about curiosity, innovation,
can-do approaches, lateral thinking, problem solving, a thirst for learning.
So those who lack even basic skills are profoundly disadvantaged.
Susan will be discussing with us how colleges can maximise their contribution
to the basic skills challenge. This Association has a proposal that
we will be discussing at the seminar: are we addressing the needs of
those people who work in colleges who lack basic skills? They might
be the colleagues who clean, who cook and serve in canteens, who maintain
the exterior of the buildings, or work on security. A collective concerted
sector-wide effort to reach our own staff would yield dividends for
those employees, and demonstrate our recognition of a political priority.
We could go further and team up with other education sector employers
we have links with – say universities and local LSCs; a politically
astute move from which many learners would benefit.
Ring ACM about Susan Pember’s seminar: 0116 275 5076
Visit the learndirect website for more information about their basic
skills learning materials:
http://www.learndirect.co.uk
Visit the Adult Basic Skills Strategy Unit website for more information
about national strategy, targets and progress towards those targets:
http://www.dfes.gov.uk/readwriteplus/
ACM IN THE HOUSE
On 22nd November, John Healy replied to a question from Tory FE spokesman,
Alistair Burt, on recruitment in the FE sector. The Minister stated
“We have both met with the Association of Colleges recently and
my Right Hon. Friend spoke at the association’s conference earlier
this week. My Hon. Friend the Minister for Lifelong Learning met with
the Association for College Management earlier this month. Work is underway
to ensure that the FE sector benefits from similar recruitment initiatives
to those already proposed for schools”.