In May 2024 the Office for National Statistics published its report for spring 2024 into the numbers of NEETs – that is, young people not involved in education, employment or training.
For January to March this year, the figures for 18-24 year olds was 12.5% and for 21-24 year olds that rises to 16%. That is, 16% of young adults are not engaged in education programmes, they’re not in work and they’re not training for work.
I mention this because it is current, it is new information and it continues a pattern of similar data, but also because I have been asked to talk about lifelong learning.
Lifelong learning
We probably tend to think of lifelong learning as being for older people, evening classes, history events in the local library …
But lifelong learning is about learning throughout our lives – so from post-compulsory education age 18, people, all people, should be able to access quality educational opportunities at all levels, from community engagement courses, basic education, English and maths, vocational skills training to higher education at any age.
So when we think about lifelong learning we need to think about post-16 and post-18 options too.
I would like to thank Joyce I-Hui Chen and Ian Duckett of the Learning and Skills Research Network and National Education Union for inviting me to speak more particularly about women and marginalised groups and their access to lifelong learning, but that needs to be looked at in a broader context.
Funding for Adult Learning
Funding has been the greatest challenge to all education sectors over the last fifteen years, but particularly for further education and especially funding for Adult courses. Funding started to be pulled back in 2009 under Labour and the cuts were continued by the Coalition and Conservative governments.
In the next academic year 24/25, the total Adult Skills investment will be 22% less and Adult classroom-based investment will be 40% less than it was in the academic year 09/10. A 40% cut in funding is a huge cut.
I was at an event last year with Darren Hankey, Principal of Hartlepool College and quoting someone else, he said “Lifelong Learning has been fiscally waterboarded”. That’s an awful quote, but it resonates for me, and I can feel the impact of those cuts in funding.
Research from the Learning and Skills Network commissioned for the Trades Union Congress in 2022 shows that from 2010 to 2022, over a period of twelve years the numbers of people enrolled on Adult Education programmes halved with funding and courses cut back, affecting the poorest and most marginalised groups in our society. If you are poor, if you are an adult with low literacy, low numeracy, low social skills maybe, it is harder to climb the learning ladder. Most funding that is still available is for employability courses, but options beyond that become limited.
Reducing spending on Adult Education does not make economic sense. Public Health England published a report they commissioned from the UCL Institute of Health Equity back in 2014 (so the figures are ten years out of date now), but that report showed that for every £1 spent on Adult Education there is a profit returned to the economy – for under 25s of £20 and over 25s £5 for every £1 spent. Spend on Adult Education is investment for the economy.
Funding for Adult Education is provided through the Adult Education budget, National Skills Fund, UKSPF and Adult Loans. Most of the funding that is available for Adults comes from different pots that need to be bid for – so creating competition between providers – and restricted by limiting criteria, limiting creativity in what can be done with that money and used to provide courses to take people off the dole, get them into basic work or undertake further training for work.
Union Learn provided through trade union education was a key source of education and training available for Adults. Of course, the government withdrew funding to Union Learn in 2021.
Union Learn was introduced by Labour in 1999 to support trade unions in providing learning opportunities for their members bringing learning to over 2 million Adults at a cost of £10 million. Many of those who benefitted were from disadvantaged backgrounds, many of them were women or minority groups and in low paid work.
Angela Rayner
Angela Rayner is a prime example of someone who has succeeded with trade union education. Having left school at 16 with no qualifications, employed in the care sector, in low paid work and with caring responsibilities for a young child and her mother, her union supported her to train and qualify – and look where she is now.
Union Learn in the North East
In the North East the North of Tyne Combined Authority continued to fund Union Learn, enabling access to Adult Education particularly for women, who comprise 57% of the people who have completed trainings. That funding has also been used for the Multiply project, taking basic maths skills out to the community and harder to reach groups. Newcastle College has forged partnerships with Suffrage Sisters Alliance, a group of muslim women from across Newcastle’s mosques and with a local GP surgery, targeting harder to reach, more marginalised groups.
We now have a new North East Mayor since the beginning of May and so far, we haven’t had a commitment that funding for Union Learn will continue and it is due to run out later this year. Fingers crossed our new woman mayor sustains this vital funding.
Lifelong Learning Entitlement
Adult Loans have been around for a while now and mostly for level 3 qualifications. The new Lifelong Learning Entitlement – which has been long-awaited – amounts to about four years of post-18 education funding to use across a person’s lifetime. This is separate to other funding. Its function is to enable people to upskill and retrain. This is a loan so it does create debt.
There are two key issues with the Lifelong Learning Entitlement. Firstly, it is limited to courses of 30+ credits, so courses of 300 hours or more, roughly ten hours a week across a 30 week year. So if you are an adult who might be working or have other responsibilities, that is a big time commitment. It also means it can’t be used for an evening class for example or a shorter course.
Funding is capped at age 60
The other key issue is that funding is capped at age 60. Well, this is really limiting – state pension age is 66, people live longer, people want to retrain for different work, maybe part time work in later life. For example, I have students on my caseload in their early 60s who are retraining to be counsellors – now that is something they might get work in, or in some kind of helping role, and that they might be doing in their 70s, possibly even 80s, depending on individuals and health needs.
To write people off at age 60 is limiting. It is also diminishing in terms of wellbeing and in supporting positive health. I am not going to go into the general wellbeing benefits of education here, but we accept that educational opportunities are beneficial.
In America, their National Institute for Ageing promotes education for the over 50s because research shows it stimulates braincell regeneration and reduces the risk of Alzheimer’s by 60%. Now cost that out, and even without the figures to hand, a few thousand on part time courses against the medical costs of medications, medical appointments and providing domiciliary and social care for dementia and Alzheimer’s and it is a no-brainer, quite literally. Investment in training and learning for older people, late career people, retired people, helps keep them well, reduces longer term costs and is an investment.
The point I am making here really is that decisions about cuts to spending on education are not just because the money isn’t there. These decisions are ideological, they are about keeping people pretty much where they are, skilled enough to complete forms and low paid work.
Higher Education
I do just want to talk about Higher Education. We think usually of school, college, university in a linear route, but life isn’t like that. Higher Education is something people should be able to access at the time that is right for them. In fact, and this is a little-discussed statistic, 30% of first year university students are over the age of 21 when they enrol. This feels quite pertinent in my house, with my own son turning 25 in the autumn and about to embark on his first year at university.
Since the 2012 HE funding reforms, mature student participation in part time degrees has dropped by 50% – part time degree students can no longer access maintenance funding which could have been used to top up part time work or add to a household income. So, working to be able to live and then finding time on top to be able to attend lectures and to study is a huge burden of commitment. And it is women who are hit the hardest here, who formed the majority of part time HE students who often continue their education alongside childcare, other caring and commitments they might have. These women either don’t enrol or they feel have no option but to commit to full time degree programmes; many of the mature women students I work with have young families and part time jobs too, making for an incredible task load.
Rose Stephenson, Director of Policy at the Higher Education Policy Institute (HEPI) speaking at a Right2Learn conference on women and lifelong learning last year, said male HE students are twice as likely to be funded by scholarships and three times more likely to be supported by their families to study, than women. Here then, a decision to reduce part time HE maintenance funding, forces a gender-based funding gap into the education system directly through government policy.
About 8% of Higher Education in the UK is provided through further education colleges. In fact, Newcastle College, where I work, was the first college to be awarded Taught Degree Awarding Powers (now awarded Indefinitely). The difference that is made in delivering HE through a further education context hugely impacts on women, disabled students, people who have English as another language and with other social or academic disadvantages, because of easily accessible and targeted academic, pastoral and SEND interventions in an environment that is smaller and able to nurture.
In talking about Higher Education, we also need to discuss access to it. BTECs have been an advantageous level 3 route for particularly Black, Minority and Ethnic students and so the scrapping of these vocational qualifications in favour of less accessible and much harder T Levels is again, a government policy that directly discriminates and disadvantages BAME students. Although the research doesn’t provide for exact numbers, bearing in mind the various disadvantages faced by BAME students on their educational journeys, removing BTECs as a vocational pathway compounds to exacerbate existing racial inequalities.
Traveller communities
Just quickly to mention then, another group that is marginalised and often overlooked; traveller communities. Children in these communities are often absent or moving on from schools because they are moving around, travelling. Opportunities for post-16, post-18 are limited. Adult literacy rates in these communities are estimated to be at around 50% with very poor literacy – that is to not have literacy skills to be able to function and participate fully in society; not being able to read the back of a cereal box, not being able to complete forms or read timetables. A lot of this is systemic and systemic inequalities need systemic solutions: so starting with stopping points with access to electricity and services; maybe classrooms attached; possibly small bursaries to encourage adult participation; flexible study programmes that can be picked up at any stopping point; opportunities for mums to learn alongside their children – and we know from Surestart that teaching Mum is a long-term and valuable investment in child outcomes.
Carers
Carers are a group that has been receiving interest in the press recently, regarding payments to carers and harsh penalties for people earning a penny over the allowed limit. For carers, the benefit rules, the need to earn to top up allowances as well as the physical, emotional impact of caring on top of demands on time, make it very difficult to study. Again, this is a group that is disadvantaged by cuts to part time courses, cuts to part time HE maintenance funding and benefit rules which serve to be punitive not supportive.
Sandwich carers is a term that applies to adults who are caring for parents or elderly relatives as well as children, sandwiched between generations. The issues here we are aware of; lack of community support and daycare for older people, issues with social care and care homes as well as a real need for affordable, funded and free quality childcare options. The majority of carers are women and the lack of quality, accessible childcare, largely created through marketisation in the sector, is again an inequality baked into the system and directly impacting on choices for women.
Refugees and asylum seekers
Immigration rules are constraining and discriminate. Adult ESOL providers receive different amounts in fees for refugees than for asylum seekers. Both groups need to attend English courses to fulfil immigration requirements. At Newcastle College we enrol the person first, not the funding attached to their immigration status, but that is not the same for all providers.
Other education opportunities
For other education opportunities, such as the Multiply project – engaging hard-to-reach groups with maths in the community, immigration requirements are that the provider needs to collect Aspen Card information and details of their immigration status and have this signed off before the course starts. This creates additional and unnecessary workload for providers as well as barriers to participation, directly discriminating against black, minority and ethnic groups, refugees, people asking for sanctuary, poor people usually, who would benefit in many ways from access to these developmental and fun programmes. Again, this is direct discrimination. This is racism baked into the system.
Transport and access to affordable and regular bus routes for adults living in rural communities is another structural inequality. Although there might be support for NEETs with transport, for many the long distances, unreliable bus services and cost of tickets present a barrier to accessing education.
Yasmin Quereshi, former Labour Shadow Minister for Women and Equalities spoke at the same conference as Rose Stephenson, and said “We must recognise the structural barriers women face and ensure they have access to structural support”. The following week her bill on flexible working received Royal Assent and passed into law. This change creates a shift in power dynamic and with an expectation of flexible working as a norm, women should find it easier to study alongside work should they wish.
Faiza Khan, Director of Affairs at City & Guilds, speaking at the same event said “We need a shift in culture from a spend in Skills to investment in Skills’’ – that is vocational education and the sciences. There is no shortage of women training to be doctors and dentists. The Royal Navy have put out dynamic recruitment advertising, promoting technical jobs for women. Research from the Learning & Work Institute shows women are more interested in green careers than men, however that interest doesn’t manifest into presence in green jobs and training. Therefore, investment in Skills has got to include meaningful promotion, and targeted advertising, signposting and advice for women and other groups.
Confidence
A key issue that comes up again and again in research but just working directly with adults and mature HE students is about confidence. And here, role-modelling for women and minority, marginalised groups is really essential. Also needed though, is a nurturing academic and pastoral team to encourage and meet challenges for adults as they arise to mitigate against their barriers to participation. With education marketised as it has been, not much is said about personal growth in the process of completing training and qualifications but it is there, it is experienced and recognised anecdotally.
Linked to confidence, Professor Graeme Atherton founder of National Education Opportunities Network (NEON), says “We need to look at student aspirations against expectations because we need to foster a belief people can achieve”. I agree with this, but aspirations also need to be realistic and achievable with clear pathways. For example, I was asked to provide some functional skills level 1 maths support to a student who wanted to be an astronaut and so his first goals then, would be to achieve GCSEs in maths and English. Just this month a colleague was conducting observations in an introductory Adult Employability session and students who had been out of education, without qualifications and evident social needs, had ambitions they wished to become doctors and midwives. Those aspirations are absolutely fine – but those students need a clear road map, working towards English, maths and science, awareness of health care routes, Access to HE course for more academic students, mapping the steps. Therefore there is a need for skilled careers advisors, signposting to quality guidance and teachers and support staff who can encourage but can also map the steps.
Naomi Clayton, Deputy Director at the Learning & Work Institute said that from her organisation’s surveys carried out over the last 27 years, research now shows women are just as likely to engage in training as men and women are more likely to: earn less at every age; be in insecure work; get stuck in low paid work; be higher qualified than men; undertake job-related training; be more interested in green careers; have less awareness of green career paths and green training opportunities.
In short, to address some of these systemic inequalities we need systemic solutions:
- Remove barriers created by the benefits system
- A long-term plan mapping vocational skills jobs against training needs and delivery
- Affordable, accessible transport
- Remove the requirement to collect immigration information on skills building and community courses
- Promote vocational routes to higher education and save BTECs
- Flexible courses for travelling communities
- Small bursaries to encourage and ease participation that doesn’t impact on benefits
- Lifelong Learning Entitlement to apply to shorter courses and to have age cap removed
- Promote role-models and visibility of marginalised groups
- Make typically low-paid work, care work, women’s work, attractive to men – this will likely raise the esteem, pay and training opportunities
- Quality careers advice and guidance
- Culture shift in respect of and value of the contribution of older people to society
General election
We are on the brink of a general election and the electorate will have the opportunity to vote in a new government, and hopefully one that will, at last, invest in Lifelong Learning.
In early May the Right2Learn campaign, the campaign for Lifelong Learning, published its paper on Future Priorities with a 10-point wish list for an incoming government to address. It’s a pithy read, an excellent paper and having received backing from a number of key organisations, I invite you to read it for yourself here. I would also further like to draw your attention to the Socialist Educational Association manifesto for education, published last year available here.
And also, with an election looming, research over 45 years conducted by the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) shows that globally, the greater the female political representation of a country, the greater the investment in education; there is a direct congruence – so, votes for women, please.
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