Steve Besley's Education Eye: week ending 24 October 2025

What's happened this week?

Important stories across the board:

New vocational qualifications, increased tuition fees, a more joined-up skills system.

Familiar themes but given new momentum this week as the government published the first of its long-awaited big education reports – the Post-16 Education and Skills White Paper.

FE Week editor Shane Chowen described it as White Paper with ‘some surprising twists and turns in it.’ The Guardian editorial saw it as ‘a mixed bag.’

Some details below.

In other education news this week, SEND reforms were put back to ‘early next year,’ the Resolution Foundation reported on the growing numbers of NEETs, and the UK continued to be at the forefront of education world leaders.

But back to that important White Paper, described by the Education Secretary when she laid out the details in a Statement to MPs as ‘transformational.’  

Full details were set out in a 72-page White Paper and accompanying consultation.

To some extent an Augar Mk 2 (following Philip Augar’s 2019 post-18 review,) the paper is ‘guided by our industrial strategy’ but also by the pressing needs of revitalising a sluggish economy, updating skills needs in key sectors, and boosting employment prospects for many young people.  

‘It’s not everything we would want of course but it’s definitely a big step forwards,’ the AoC described it, pointing to low pay, adult education and collaboration between FE and sixth form colleges as among the bits missing.

So what are the key features? Arguably they include these four.

First, the new vocational qualifications, V-levels to be precise.

Described by the Education Secretary as “giving young people a clear line of sight into great careers,” these would offer a third, or fourth if you add in apprenticeships, route for young people alongside A levels and T levels, and potentially come in from September 2027.

A number of subjects are proposed in an accompanying consultation and according to OCR’s MD, Myles McGinley, “If we get this right, this could be a tremendous opportunity for young people.”

The Sutton Trust saw them ‘as potentially a game-changer.’ Others are less sure. It depends on how they’re implemented, reckoned the Edge Foundation. The Guardian reckoned the best thing about them was ‘their neat name.’

The aim of it all, to quote the Education Secretary again, is ‘to bring esteem between different qualifications and simplify the qualification landscape.’ Not new ambitions but as past history has shown, difficult to achieve.

The Shadow Education Secretary dismissed it all as a poor alternative for working-class children.

Two immediate questions remain.

What about long-established vocational qualifications like BTECs, and how to manage the transition and funding from one set of qualifications to another? The sixth form college association was particularly concerned about these areas.

“The government’s immediate priority should be to ensure that colleges and schools can continue to enrol students on BTECs until the new V Levels are up and running.”

Second, proposals to tackle the long-standing English and maths GCSE resit problem which demoralises young people, limits progression opportunities and can add to FE pressures.

29.4% and 28.1% of 16yr olds failed to achieve a grade 4 pass in these subjects respectively this summer and the search for acceptable alternatives has failed to deliver so far.

Guided by the current curriculum and assessment review, the paper proposes introducing ‘16-19 English and maths preparation for GCSE level 1 qualification.” ‘Stepping stones’ as the Education Secretary described them along with a package of guidance and support and a clear steer to avoid the treadmill of resits.

“Too many students are entered into resit exams in the November after their GCSE entry the previous summer, without sufficient additional teaching to enable them to succeed.”

Consultation will take place next year. It’s potentially an important step forward.

Third, some important measures for HE, bringing it in, as Dr. Ismini Vasileiou, Associate Professor at De Montfort University described it in a blog on the HEPI site, as ‘a partner in a joined-up skills ecosystem.’

The headline for many was the announcement to increase tuition fees and maintenance loans in line with inflation and with quality standards.

‘Safeguarding the excellence in our universities for future generations,’ as the Education Secretary claimed. Although as Nick Hillman explained, “while the fees will now go up in cash terms, they will not go up in real terms.”

The Russell Group saw it ‘as a good first step’ but didn’t miss the opportunity to take a swipe at the proposed international fee levy. Universities UK said it was ‘a much-needed reset for our education system.’ The UCU was less impressed.’

The fee increase came as part of a package of measures including making sure the money is spent ‘on courses that deliver,’ tightening controls on franchise arrangements, looking into more flexible degrees, working with colleges and setting up ‘a new national access and participation task and finish group.’

Either way, the sense persists that the government now feels it has done its bit to repurpose the sector and is now looking for it to deliver in return as part of a more tightly managed system.

“Universities charge significant fees for their courses. If they are going to charge the maximum, it is right that they deliver the world-class education students expect.”

And fourth, if a sense of co-ordination and control is evident in the paper’s position on HE, it feels even more so when it comes to FE.

Just look at some of the measures for the sector dotted around the paper.

They include new Regional Improvement Teams for FE modelled on the RISE schools model, consultation on ‘a consistent way of measuring performance across all 16-18 learners,’ new in-service professional development courses, an enhanced role over NEETs for Strategic Authorities, and proposed legislation ‘to bar unsuitable people from management positions in FE.’

Not all unhelpful of course.

But the government has signalled its direction of travel and is firmly at the wheel.

On to other education news this week.

In schools, SEND has once again been making the news with the Education Secretary announcing a delay in reporting and the IPPR think tank confirming a support system in crisis.

On the delay, Bridget Phillipson told the Chair of the Education Committee which had issued its own report last month, that they needed more time to test out proposals and would report in the Schools White Paper ‘early next year.’

“To help us deliver the most effective set of reforms we can, I have taken the decision to have a further period of co-creation, testing our proposals with the people who matter most in this reform – the families – alongside teachers and other experts.”

The County Councils Network was ‘disappointed’ with the delay but the Sutton Trust, which recently published a major report on SEND, supported the move. Most people recognised the need for more time. ASCL, for instance, said “we understand the decision.”

As for IPPR’s report, this found a support system struggling to cope with “less than half (46.4 per cent) of Education, Health and Care Plans (EHCPs) issued within the statutory time limit of 20 weeks.”

It called for a new Additional Learning Support system.

In other news, the children’s commissioner blogged about schools attendance -getting better but not fast enough, with “the number of children who are severe absentees the most concerning feature of current attendance data.”

The NFER highlighted the pressures on primary school budgets as pupil numbers fell. “As pupil numbers fall, some schools are finding it harder to balance budgets and sustain the breadth of provision they would like to offer, alongside having to adapt staffing models.” Not a simple issue of savings then.

FFT Education Datalab wondered if the gender balance in A level Physics had improved. It has, but ‘there’s still some way to go.’

The Teacher Development Trust reported that “around £1 billion is spent annually on teacher CPD in England – yet only 1 in 4 teachers say it adequately considers pupil needs.”

According to their latest national survey, teachers want CPD that is ‘personalised, relevant and embedded in school culture,’ not one-off sessions.  SEND, technology integration and leadership development were the top three listed development priorities.

And the government reported that porridge, fruit and yogurt and wheat biscuits were among the top choices for children in the free breakfast club programme as more supermarkets and food companies signed up with new deals.

But no sign of strong coffees for teachers yet.

In FE, the AoC called for a pay increase for FE staff “that exceeds the school teacher recommendation” as it submitted its thoughts to the School Teacher Review Body.

It reckoned the gap between FE teacher pay and that of school teachers is around £12,000, leaving colleges struggling to recruit staff, especially in high priority sectors.

It was an issue raised by the Chair of the Education Committee in parliament this week. The Education Secretary promised to “continue to invest in whole-career professional development for FE teachers” but that was as far as she went.

In other news, the Resolution Foundation with the Health Foundation reported on the growing numbers of economically inactive young people classified as NEET.

“The biggest factor driving this increase is workless young people reporting a disability or ill-health. This has doubled over the past twenty years and now affects over one-in-four young people not in education, employment or training (NEET).”

They called for a wider Youth Guarantee, increased Work Capability Assessments and what they called ‘a national front door’ to help young people-engage.

And the Learning and Work Institute published its Impact Report for last year pointing to some of the many challenges around low skill levels, limited funding and adult participation.

“Our long-running Adult Participation in Learning Survey showed a record one in two adults took part in some form of learning in the last three years, driven by self-directed and informal learning. This is encouraging, but there are stark and persistent inequalities.”

In HE, the skills white paper has remained the main talking point with key players all offering their thoughts over the week.

Some appear in this briefing.

Among the leading others, HEPI’s Nick Hillman reckoned that “there seems to be something of a return to the initiative-itis that plagued Labour governments before 2010” but nevertheless hoped that the forthcoming schools white paper and curriculum and assessment review might bring some coherence to it all.

Wonkhe felt that “higher education emerges as a critical “strategic asset” – but nevertheless in need of reform.”

It suggested much of the heavy policy lifting still needs to be done but that five objectives remain for the sector: economic growth, a high-quality experience, national capability via specific research and skills development, regional impact, and an increase in international standing.

It will all no doubt be further picked over in its forthcoming Festival of HE event in a couple of weeks’ time.

And away from the white paper, the OfS published the arrangements for next year’s National Student Survey (NSS) promising a shorter survey fieldwork period for the year after.

And HEPI/Kaplan highlighted the importance of institutions such as Oxbridge, Sandhurst, the LSE and Manchester in educating world leaders.

“If soft power is fundamental to the UK’s impact and reputation around the world, then so too are the UK’s outstanding universities,” as the V.C. of Manchester said.

Links to most of these stories below, starting with the week’s headlines.

The top headlines of the week:

• ‘New V-level courses to be brought in for students after GCSEs’ (Monday)
• ‘Homicidal Johnson considered sacking Williamson over 2020 exam results’ (Tuesday)
• ‘Reform of special educational needs system delayed until 2026’ (Wednesday)
• ‘Severe absence rates on the rise but overall attendance improves’ (Thursday)
• ‘ASCL and NEU to support NAHT in legal action against Ofsted’ (Friday)

General:

• DfE Report. The National Audit Office (NAO) published its Overview Report on the funding, priorities, associated bodies and work of the DfE over the last year, complete with an intense spider graph of how it spent its money.
• Child poverty. The IfS examined the latest trends in child poverty and possible options should the government consider scrapping the two-child limit, concluding that absolute child poverty had risen slightly for larger families since 2016/17 and that options, such as using a lower element for three or more children, all involved delicate ‘trade-offs.’
• Budget submission. The Child Poverty Action Group (CPAG) submitted its proposals to the Treasury ahead of the forthcoming Budget, calling among other things for the two-child limit to be scrapped, the benefits cap to be removed and childcare to be reformed.
• Free breakfast clubs. The government indicated that 2,000 new schools could join the free breakfast club programme from next April as it announced sponsorship deals for the programme with a number of supermarkets and food manufacturers.

HE:

• Skills white paper. The government published its Post-16 Skills White Paper pledging to strengthen ‘our world-leading HE system’ through such measures as inflation linked fee and maintenance loan increases, incentivised research, tighter efficiency and regulation, more flexible provision, and improved access and participation
• HEPI response. Director of HEPI Nick Hillman offered his thoughts on the Skills White Paper in a piece for the Times Higher, suggesting that the proposed fee increase may not deliver the sustained funding needed and that the paper still left many aspects of HE, such as regulation, either not included not clear.
• Educated here. HEPI and Kaplan reported on where world leaders had studied as part of its latest Soft-Power Index, showing the US and UK continuing to perform strongly with 59 world leaders having studied at Oxford, Sandhurst, Cambridge and LSE among others in the UK.
• NSS 2026. The OfS set out the arrangements for the 2026 National Student Survey (NSS) which will launch at the start of next year using the same set of questions as for 2025.

Tweets and posts of note:

• “If everyone currently on a two week half term could just politely remove themselves from my feed… that would be great” -@HWT_PE.
• “The pressure some teachers are under is absolutely ridiculous, it's like the Wolf of Wall Street in some academies out there - This is what happens when people forget the actual joy of teaching and learning and the reason ppl do it. Just chill the HELL OUT” -@RogersHistory.
• “If you're one of those teachers whose lessons and curriculums are so engaging and exciting that students never disrupt or "need" the toilet the please please TEACH ME” -@adamboxer1.
• “I was just thinking about how so many schools have stopped reading books because “it takes so much time away from other things”. Then I thought about people like Frederick Douglass and Abraham Lincoln who credit the reading of books as the primary source of their education” -@Beanie0597.
• “I’ll be honest, I think it’s absolutely fine to wear trainers as a teacher” -@DeputyGrocott.
• “It takes a lot of dedication and skill to write a job application whilst being solo carer for a toddler and baby” -@bryonydaviesxo.
• “If you want a snapshot of how far food prices have climbed over the past two years, just head into your local newsagent and pick up a bar of Dairy Milk” -@Telegraph.

A selection of quotes that merit attention:

• “My vision for post-16 education in this country is a skills system that drives growth and is more balanced, more responsive and more reflective of the evolving world of work” – the Education Secretary sets out her vision for post-16 education and skills in a new White Paper.
• “Quality costs money” – the QAA responds to the HE proposals in the Skills White Paper pointing out that delivering a quality system comes at a cost.
• “Universities are up for this change” – the CEO of Universities UK offers her response to the skills white paper.
• “Overall, this white paper is a strategy we can really move forward with” – the AoC responds to the Skills White Paper.
• “Today’s proposals do not address the immediate and overwhelming concern among colleges and schools about the planned defunding of applied general qualifications (AGQs) such as BTECs from next year” – the sixth form colleges association remains concerned about the Skills Paper’s proposed shift to V levels.
• “I am acutely aware that our reforms to SEND are some of the most critical this Government will deliver, and that is why it is so essential that we take the time to listen and get it right” – the Education Secretary confirms the Schools/SEND White Paper will be deferred to early next year.
• “In the coming weeks” – the Education Secretary counts down the days to the release of the Curriculum and Assessment Review report.
• “The fall in pupil numbers has been eight times what the government had predicted by this point” – the Independent Schools Council reports on the impact of the VAT policy on independent schools. 
• “I was very much hoping that we wouldn’t have to close schools. I thought it was a nightmare idea” – Boris Johnson gives evidence to the Covid 19 Inquiry.

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Steve Besley

Disclaimer: Education Eye is intended to help colleagues keep up to date with national developments in the education sector. Information is correct at the time of writing and is offered in good faith. No liability is accepted by Steve Besley or EdCentral for decisions made on the basis of any information provided.