Government’s T-level plans are flawed, union says

Young people need high-quality vocational qualifications, but the government’s T-level plans are flawed according to the National Education Union (NEU).

In its submission to the Department for Education’s (DfE) consultation on the implementation of T-levels, the NEU says that while T-levels are desirable, they are not necessarily deliverable.

Mary Bousted, joint general secretary of the National Education Union (NEU), said: “Because the government has given no indication of how many young people it expects to take T levels, it is impossible to know whether sufficient work placements are likely to be available.

“If large numbers of students take T-levels, it is highly unlikely that relevant and good quality work placements will be available in the volume required, particularly as young people will be expected to go on placements of up to three months to gain the qualifications.

“Without knowing proposed student numbers, it is also impossible to know if the funding proposed is sufficient.

“If few students take T-levels, they will just add another qualification to what government has said is a complicated system of vocational qualifications that it wants to simplify. And low student numbers will do nothing to ensure parity of esteem between academic and technical education.”

Mary Bousted continued: “The narrow, academic school curriculum will be a barrier to young people being given the opportunity to take and complete T-levels. This will be exacerbated by the currently poorly funded careers advice and guidance available to students under 16.

“Lessons should be learned from previous vocational education reforms, many of which, such as the 14-19 Diplomas, were subsequently abandoned and failed to create a stable skills system. Otherwise, there is a serious risk that yet another generation of young people will leave college with a qualification that has no value.”

The NEU also states that more robust evidence is required for another reform of the skills system and the review of level 3 qualifications proposed and that unless T-level implementation is properly planned, resourced and funded, there is a risk that their standards will be watered down to make existing level 2 qualifications ‘fit’.