We’ve all heard about levelling up and as a college chief executive in London, where poverty lives cheek by jowl with extreme wealth, I can relate to the ambition. London needs to be levelled up too. It is not simply those communities in the red wall seats where the focus currently sits that need the support for levelling up. There is also an issue in our capital.
Child poverty in London is currently the second highest in England with 35 per cent of children living below the poverty line. Out of the top twenty boroughs, Bethnal Green & Bow has the unenviable position of sitting number one in the country with 56.1 per cent of all children classified as living in poverty as of 2020-21 according to Action for Children. These children will soon become the workforce of tomorrow and their life chances will be contingent, in part, on their educational attainment.
Colleges are the anchor in a community; the North Star that has been there and served their communities for generations. In our case, we have been serving Brent, Westminster and Camden for over 130 years from generation to generation.
However, we have seen a steady erosion over the last 20 years of what a community college means to its community. The nirvana of higher education has been the clarion call of both politicians and influencers as it is generally their own lived experience and is therefore easily understood by them.
Colleges have been confined to the ‘too hard tray’ as we do not fit neatly into that higher education box. What our political leaders must understand is that a college is more than a place of learning and skills. It is the anchor institution in their community and no longer simply delivers set-piece events in classrooms.
A college provides that wraparound service to a community that begins long before a student crosses a threshold with advice, guidance and counsel to our prospective students, young or old. We are the workhorse of the educational sector responding to every challenge ahead of us, jumping every fence and galloping towards the ever-moving finishing line. But it is now becoming increasingly difficult for this old horse to respond to the ever-greater challenges within our communities: mental ill-health, child poverty, social exclusion, and in many cases generational unemployment to name but a few.
In my view, colleges are the key to skills and skills are the key to levelling up. This old workhorse needs clear investment in developing our workforce by recognising that these student facing professions and student support professions are delivering for the country and our levelling up ambitions in these post pandemic times. We need investment in our facilities both in bricks and mortar and sector-leading equipment.
However, we face an acute workforce shortage in skills with many staff leaving the sector as the cost-of-living crisis bites. This is particularly evident in those areas of precision engineering, green technologies and the built environment. Colleges are ambitious and understand that our fiduciary duty is such that we must deliver public value.
My plea to the government is clear. For every £1 given to a college to facilitate skills, it will deliver ten times that in return both for the nation and more importantly their community. Continued improvement in investment, in both funding and capital, is needed in our skills agenda to ensure that the one constant in the communities of those children, their college, is well placed to help them improve their life chances and in the end level the playing field for everyone regardless of their starting point.
Key Points:
• Levelling up is needed just as much in the capital as it is across the country.
• Skills are the key to levelling up and colleges are the key to delivering skills.
• However, it is becoming harder for colleges to help deliver skills and drive social mobility as resources are squeezed and cost-of-living bites.
This article originally appeared in The Leaders Council’s special report on ‘The Levelling Up agenda’, published on November 30, 2022. Read the full special report here.
Photo by Element5 Digital on Unsplash
