Today’s education in the media blog looks at all the work the department has done to make sure employers understand the new T Levels that are being introduced in 2020.
T Levels
Today, Wednesday 30 May, The Times published an article on a survey by the Association of Employment Learning Providers (AELP) and City & Guild, on the new T Levels qualifications. The survey claimed that a majority of employers did not have a good understanding of the new qualifications, and that many employers have expressed concerns over their ability to deliver the industry placements required by the new qualifications.
T Levels represent a once in a lifetime opportunity to reform technical education in this country so we can rival the world’s best performing systems.
Since announcing our intention to create T Levels in March 2017, we have worked with employers to develop the new qualifications. This included a consultation that we received over 400 responses to, including 55 employers and 86 employer representative bodies/ agencies – more than the 81 employers surveyed by the AELP. As well as this, we have worked with over 200 employers on T Levels panels to design the T Levels content, and have been running pilots this year with 2,000 young people on T Levels style work placements.
In its response to the T Levels consultation the the AELP themselves said that the infrastructure already in place gives a “very firm basis from which to launch the concept of establishing work places on the scale required to meet the T-level policy objectives.”
A DfE spokesperson said:
T Levels are a once in a lifetime opportunity to reform technical education so it matches the best systems in the world. We make no apologies for setting an ambitious timetable to ensure young people have more choice, more opportunities to succeed and fulfil their potential.
We have worked with over 200 employers to design the T level content and have run pilots with over 2,000 young people to trial T level style work placements.
We continue to work with businesses, employers, and post 16 education providers to develop the first three T Levels which will be taught from 2020 and a further 22 being phased in following that.
To read about the latest news on T levels, please see here.