With immigration minister, Robert Jenrick warning of an ‘intolerable pressure’ on our ability to integrate new arrivals, we need to acknowledge the services that drive settled communities and skills for work – and commit a stable and flexible budget to them.
Going to college is more than a transactional encounter where you learn a trade, take an exam and tick a box. Further education provisions support young people and adult learners far beyond the classroom: providing packed enrichment programmes including sport, societies and cultural learning.
They also provide service links to mental health support, financial services and copious amounts of in-house assistance. English for Speakers of Other Languages (ESOL) programmes are the epitome of these wrap-around services that colleges deliver.
Colleges support ESOL students – many of whom have made difficult journeys to the UK and arrive as refugees – to understand life in Britain, learn the language and prepare to contribute economically. They work proudly with asylum seekers – having done so since the arrival of the first Vietnamese boat people in the 1970s through to Afghan refugees today – teaching British Values, helping them to access services appropriately and supporting social integration country-wide.
