Scrutton Bland Education Newsletter - Autumn 2016

Further Education

Howwell are further education and skills providers implementing the ‘Prevent’ duty? (July 2016) The Chief Inspector commissioned Her Majesty’s Inspectors to undertake a survey into how well ‘Prevent’ has been implemented within further education from the time when it was put in place in September 2015. The survey focused on key matters outlined in the ‘Prevent’ duty guidance. The findings were based on survey visits to 37 further education and skills providers and findings from 46 full inspections or monitoring visits between November 2015 and May 2016.

The key findings specific to further education and sixth formcolleges were as follows: 22 of the 37 providers visited had implemented the ‘Prevent’ duty well. General further education and sixth form colleges were the most successful. Leaders at the general further education and sixth form colleges visited were the most successful at implementing all aspects of the ‘Prevent’ duty. The majority had formed strong partnerships with external agencies and stakeholders. Most risk assessments and action plans were of good quality.

The Key findings of the survey were as follows:

• Thirteen providers had been slow in putting the duty into practice. • Two of the eight independent learning providers visited had not implemented any aspect of the ‘Prevent’ duty. • Partnership working was often not effective. • Local authorities had often not worked with providers to build partnership or share information effectively. • Independent learning providers’ arrangements for sharing information were ineffective. • The quality of staff training was ineffective in a third of the providers visited. These providers tended to be over-reliant on staff completing online training packages for ‘Prevent’. • Some senior leaders did not pass on information about strategic developments with external partners to their middle managers. • Leaders in nearly half the providers visited did not adequately protect learners from the risk of radicalisation and extremism when using IT systems. • Vetting and monitoring of external speakers were inadequate in around a quarter of the providers. • The quality of risk assessments and action plans to reduce the risk of radicalisation and extremism was poor in eleven of the providers. • Two independent learning providers had no risk assessments in place at all. Of the other nine providers, most adopted a ‘tick-box’ approach to risk assessment rather than conducting a comprehensive evaluation of risks.

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