Issue - meetings

The Board received a presentation on the new arrangements being introduced with respect to post nineteen education.

It was noted that the ? Act had now come into affect and that the arrangements for transferring responsibility for delivering post nineteen education from the Learning and Skills Council to ?? would be complete by April 2010.

Under the new structure Local Authorities (LAs) would become responsible for securing the provision of education and training for sixteen to nineteen year olds and nineteen to twenty-five year olds subject to a learning difficulty assessment.

Two new agencies were being created; the Young People’s Learning Agency (YPLA) and the Skills Funding Agency (SFA). The YPLA would support LAs by providing coherence of planning and budgetary control of the money transferred from the Learning and Skills Council.

The SFA would take on responsibility for post nineteen education, including responsibility for securing apprenticeships for sixteen to eighteen year olds and all adults. The SFA would also support employers and individuals obtain the education and skills via a new system that would be led by demand from both employers and service users.

The Board was advised that Local Strategic Partnerships (LSPs) would form a key role in identifying the needs of employers locally. It was anticipated that the LSPs would act as a conduit local networks enabling Partners to align local demand and supply.

It was noted that a briefing paper had also been produced by the Government, entitled ???, which gave a strong indication of the way in which it envisaged the role of LSPs developing with respect to post nineteen education.  There was agreement that this and links to other useful websites would be circulated to Board members.

Following the presentation there was discussion and in response to a query the Board was advised that the youngest age at which it was possible to complete an apprenticeship  was eighteen. However, this would be at the lower level and most employers preferred people to have completed the advanced apprenticeship.

The Council was complimented on the ease with which private sector employers had been able to access apprenticeship schemes and it was noted that this approach had played a large role in the success of these.

The Board discussed funding arrangements and it was noted that projects that had previously submitted bids for funding to the Learning and Skills Council would now need to apply to the SFA. At present details of the process had not been confirmed.

RESOLVED:

That the presentation be noted.