Burnham to tell schools in England to adapt teaching to local business needs- what do you think?

This is Mike Tomlinson, twenty years after his report.(via The Rest is Politics newsletter).

Q: What does Burnham need to do to make his plans work?

A: To make Burnham’s plans successful there needs to be three criteria before a school can offer technical education.

The first is they have to have staff who have relevant experience in that particular strand of work, whether it be engineering or manufacturing. Secondly, the school must have facilities which reflect what the young people might need to use in employers' practices. And third, there must be deep links between the school, the pupils, and employers, with employers being very, very much involved in the design and delivery of the technical strand.

If they can't satisfy those criteria and they're allowed to offer the course, then it will be a disaster, and we'll be back to the old days.

The only group of schools that I can point to [doing this] and have been involved in their creation, are university technical colleges (UTCs) that are offering high quality technical pathways with enormous involvement of employers, and are turning out young people that are going into higher education, into STEM subjects, or alternatively are going into apprenticeships, including degree apprenticeships.

The NEETs numbers from the UTCs is minimal compared with the national figures. [Only 5% of UTC graduates become NEETs, compared to the national average of 13%].

So we do have a proven model.

The comprehensive schools did not dumb education down. Its aim was to offer all children opportunities. Unlike the elitist grammar school system, when so many children went to very poor secondary moderns

OF COURSE that should be the plan! But wait, I attended grammar school in Stoke on Trent in the early 60s and the excellent Art Department there included Ceramic Design in its teaching schedule. But of course this was before the Comprehensive system kicked in and dumbed education down.

NotSpaghetti

JenniRen my local college (used to be a "tech") still have bricklaying, car mechanics etc but unfortunately the courses are very short and not at all like a full apprenticeship. When they partner with firms the students can't progress in the apprenticeships without passing English and Maths.

My (car) garage had a young mechanic trainee from the college a few years ago "with the best mechanics hands ever seen". He couldn't pass maths. He went with him and his father to try to sort a different pathway for him. The young man had three attempts - and had to drop out of the training.

My lovely garage owner fought to keep him but couldn't.

He hasn't taken on a trainee since. He has had apprentices for nearly 30 years.

Yes, I think Technical Colleges still offer these types of course but generally students will need to be in employment and attend for day release, learning 'on the job' too.

Colleges of Technology were more like universities, but offering engineering courses leading to HND, degree and Associate Membership of an Institute. Students needed the relevant A levels to apply. The Council for National Academic Awards (CNAA) awarded the degrees.
Some courses were sandwich courses, eg six months at college, six months in industry and there were close links between the colleges and industry.

Our families experience of private schooling is that it concentrates and highlights on the positives. They also encourage self confidence and respect for others.

Whereas state schools have to contend with varying degrees of behaviour and are tied to government decreed curriculum.

Casdon

Wouldn’t the same be true of leaders in other professions too though MaizieD? Private schooling does result in career advantage across the board I would have thought?

Absolutely, look at our parliament…

Wouldn’t the same be true of leaders in other professions too though MaizieD? Private schooling does result in career advantage across the board I would have thought?

I reiterate the last line

Among the whole UK population, 7% went to private schools while less than 1% went to Oxbridge.

Not reflected in the numbers given for ‘media leaders’ is it?

OK MaizieD thanks for that 👍

According to AI between 33% - 50% of top U.K. media leaders went to private school, which means between 50% and 77% didn’t.

Source Google

What makes you think that most journalists are private school/Oxbridge ?

This study from 2025 GG13?

There has been a drop in the number of privately-educated leaders in UK media but the industry remains “highly unrepresentative” of the public overall, a new report has found.

Newspaper columnists have a “particularly stark” class disparity compared to the UK population, with “little sign of progress” among those interpreting the news for audiences.

The 2025 Elitist Britain report from social mobility charity found that the gap is “particularly prominent” among a selection of 100 news media leaders, plus samples of columnists, political commentators, BBC executives and podcasters.

These groups are all “disproportionately more privately educated than the general population” with nearly half having attended a Russell Group university (a group of 24 prestigious institutions) and at least 20% who went to Oxford or Cambridge universities (together known as Oxbridge).

Among the whole UK population, 7% went to private schools while less than 1% went to Oxbridge.

pressgazette.co.uk/news/little-sign-of-progress-on-social-diversity-among-journalists-and-commentators-private-school-university/

Considering that we seem to have de-industrialised so many towns and cities over the years there are very few, what I would call large industrial/technical companies, particularly UK based eg: BAE where this would work. Some medium sized companies can either move area completely due to incentives offered to relocate or they are taken over and moved anyway. The skills necessarily need to be transferable to either self-employment or more than one industry otherwise you will just end up with a lot of school leavers with knowledge of a particular trade but not enough jobs to go round.

A Registered nurse definitely needs numeracy and calculation skills- the consequences of administering a wrongly calculated insulin dose injection to a patient with Diabetes for example can be life threatening etc etc.

JaneJudge

NotSpaghetti

JenniRen my local college (used to be a "tech") still have bricklaying, car mechanics etc but unfortunately the courses are very short and not at all like a full apprenticeship. When they partner with firms the students can't progress in the apprenticeships without passing English and Maths.

My (car) garage had a young mechanic trainee from the college a few years ago "with the best mechanics hands ever seen". He couldn't pass maths. He went with him and his father to try to sort a different pathway for him. The young man had three attempts - and had to drop out of the training.

My lovely garage owner fought to keep him but couldn't.

He hasn't taken on a trainee since. He has had apprentices for nearly 30 years.

which is why they need to stop forcing them to do GCSE Maths and English Many could pass the functional skills tests - bring them back. It's idealistic to think everyone can pass GCSE Maths and English, for a variety of reasons a good % of people can't but they stand a chance with functional skills

If a school leaver simply cannot "see" figures thats a problem, a car mechanic might make a mistake with something simple like inflating a car tyre, you look the pressure up on a chart and pump it up, simple for you and I, not for someone who can't see figures .

Including more technical skills in ordinary schooling is a very good idea, as not all children are, or should be academically minded.

However, if a school syllabus is too finely tailored to the needs of the local businesses, when these needs change, as they will in a very short space of time, a great many workers will be left high and dry without the skills they will need to get new jobs.

When Salazar died (remember that nasty piece of work, ladies?) and it became possible to trade with Portugal, no commercial school in Copenhagen was teaching Portugese and the university had about nine students studying the languague. When the Berlin wall came down, there was likewise no real demand from the military colleges, police and intelligence corps for Russian speakers, and the Arabic speakers they did want, were in short supply. Now we are back to needing Russian speakers, and guess what? They are in short supply.

So be careful when narrowing down the general knowledge schools should, but often no longer are, teaching.

Need to find the local jobs market in the first place. Businesses of all types are closing every week. May wirk in a large city but not all the towns and country areas will cope in trying to identify local business market.

I think it would be good to introduce a curriculum pathway for 14-16 year olds in health and social care, perhaps with an apprenticeship with local care homes- so they have care experience to work as a care assistant on completion at 16.

Then at 18, if they have the aptitude, ability and wish to progress to academic Bachelor of Science Nurse university degree they are deemed to have entry level qualification.

Degree student nurses can currently apply for a £5k a year bursary/Training Grant via the Learning Support Fund-LSF- the amount depends on various factors like whether living at home, on university campus etc. They can also claim further financial support beyond the Training Grant E.g £2,000 a year for child care support, an extra £1,000 a year for a specialist subject like mental health or learning disability nursing , support with travel and accommodation costs for periodic placements during the course, an £3,000 a year from an exceptional hardship fund- so another £5k on top of training grant potentially. This all supports living costs and none of these amounts have to be paid back once the Nurse qualifies.

However there are still University fees for the three year university degree course. Like all university healthcare students, e.g. doctors and dentists, physiotherapists, Dieticians etc university student nurses can apply for a student loan.

There is also an alternative Open University Nurse qualification route a standard nursing programme where the student is employed in a healthcare role by their employer but undertakes the academic nursing degree via the Open University- ie home study. It's a programme run in partnership with Middlesex University and the University of the West of England. Evidently a cheaper route and the student remains in paid employment throughout, at home.

Since Covid applications for degree student nurse placements has declined. In that context it remains to be seen whether the previously more generous bursary scheme will return.

NotSpaghetti

JenniRen my local college (used to be a "tech") still have bricklaying, car mechanics etc but unfortunately the courses are very short and not at all like a full apprenticeship. When they partner with firms the students can't progress in the apprenticeships without passing English and Maths.

My (car) garage had a young mechanic trainee from the college a few years ago "with the best mechanics hands ever seen". He couldn't pass maths. He went with him and his father to try to sort a different pathway for him. The young man had three attempts - and had to drop out of the training.

My lovely garage owner fought to keep him but couldn't.

He hasn't taken on a trainee since. He has had apprentices for nearly 30 years.

which is why they need to stop forcing them to do GCSE Maths and English Many could pass the functional skills tests - bring them back. It's idealistic to think everyone can pass GCSE Maths and English, for a variety of reasons a good % of people can't but they stand a chance with functional skills

Successive governments have tried and largely failed to get parity between academic and technical. We do have technical routes and qualifications already but mainly post 16. Employment needs change all the time- a parents advice to get a good stable job in a bank— and then all the banks close. AI will give a boost to trades that can’t be done with AI.
I want all pupils to have an academic grounding first- education is not just about training for work. Strict schools get great academic results for very underprivileged children. If you can get rid of grade inflation, stupid university courses, woke ideology, then all can go to university followed by a plumbing course!

Good for Andy Burnham ...

Another thing to remember about people doing more manual work ( going by people that have worked on my house) is that they often have to retire quite young. I was asking my plumber how his back was yesterday and he said it isn’t just my back my whole body is wrecked. Especially that people are now expected to work well into their sixties. Also if they are going to give bursaries for other things how about bringing back bursaries for nurses? I’ve always thought how wrong it is that nurses start their working lives in debt especially as they have to learn on the job.

M0nica

The purpose of parenting and education is to bring up our children to be able to earn a living and play a useful part in society. Humanity's continued existence has depended on its ability to provide itself with the food, shelter, clothes and warmth it needs to stop it dying out. The fact that the majority of us work in jobs and industries that could not be further separated from agriculture does not undermine that basic connection between our need to work to justify our place in life.

Countries like Germany, France, Holland, Denmark all have system of technical schools integrated with the secondary school system and also have dedicated technical universities, counted as among the most prestigious in their countries. We have Imperial College - and that is it, Even at Imperial College less than 40% of all students are British. Over 60% are overseas students.

There has been a peculiar snobbishness in Britain for the last 200 years about anyone who gets their hands dirty making or doing anything technical, and professional engineers are rated as much further down the social scale than lawyers or accountants.

DH is a Chartered Engineer. When working in any European country his business card describes him as 'Eur Ing', much as anyone might have 'doctor; or 'Professor' on their card in the UK. In the UK no such title exists

Some years ago i was sorting out insurance for our car, I was asked what my DH's occupation was. When I said 'Chartered Engineer the person behind the counter, looked at me anxiously and said 'Does that mean he works in a garage?'

If we want better technical education and at all levels, we must start treating engineers with the respect they get elsewhere in the world.

I agree, my husband was also a chartered civil engineer specialising in huge water projects all over the world, working on projects funded by the World Bank and the EU amongst others. Many people imagined that this meant he was a plumbler...

Totally agree that a Uni education isn't the way to go for all young people but seem to remember having heard several years ago about how schools should help prepare students for local area workforce. IMO the problem with that is how do teachers split themselves in half to prepare students for further education and students who may decide on tech qualifications - back to the old system of grammars and secondary moderns?

Back to the fifties, 11 plus, kids follow academic path or technical trades path. Should have been left like that but with more flexibility for those kids that got themselves on the wrong path at 11. Ask any secondary school teacher who has had to teach mixed ability classes.

It is about time. For far far too long politicians have followed bloody Blair’s ludicrous idea that 50% of Britain’s workforce should hold a degree. Of course our politicial and media class almost without exception, since Labour stopped choosing MPs from union backgrounds, HAVE held degrees which is why vocational training - FURTHER education rather than Higher education, (which not only trains school leavers but, until recently, also re-trained flocks of women returners and second career folk aged around 35-45 and provided SO MANY opportunities) has been seen as “just painting and decorating”.

A whole generation have been cast into the scrap heap and currently are not only almost unemployable but also do not have the opportunity to find work as all the ‘first job’ starter opportunities have been spun into ‘zero hours contracts’.

I cheer this new fresh approach with every fibre of my being.

I do think we shouldn't forget that not all firms /companies will be able to help. They may not have enough staff or enough spare cash to help . I wonder if there will be financial incentive to get firms interested.