Common use of Scotland Clause in Contracts

Scotland. Lifelong learning policy in Scotland is shaped by levels of strong economic performance and higher than average employment levels, according to the ‘Scottish economic report’ (SER) (Scottish Executive, 2006c). The report also regarded Scotland’s labour supply as one of the country’s economic strengths, and noted that skills shortages reported by employers were uncommon. Skills gaps, on the other hand, were concentrated among people in low-skilled jobs, where market failure in the provision of training was evident. For example in ‘More choices, more chances’ (Scottish Executive, 2006a), a strategy to tackle the high proportion (13.5%) of young people not in education and training (NEET), the Executive sought to increase demand for learning by increasing the financial incentives offered to young people at risk of social exclusion and by expanding the range and quality of options and support available to them. In common with the rest of the UK, Scottish lifelong learning policies have a strong focus on improving adult literacy, numeracy and ESOL skills levels. These can be seen as essential elements underpinning the Scottish social inclusion agenda. Making the whole workforce more flexible and adept at coping with the ever rapidly changing demands of the economy is also a priority. ‘Life through learning: learning through life’ (Scottish Executive, 2003) is the overarching strategy, bringing coherence to provision beyond school, including basic, intermediate and higher level skills provision. The Scottish Executive is currently consulting on a review of the lifelong learning strategy, the results of which should be available after the election. At intermediate skills levels there has been a drive in Scotland to increase the uptake of apprenticeships, WBL and applied (vocational) qualifications for both young people and adults, as set out in ‘The framework for economic development in Scotland’ (Scottish Executive, 2004c). In addition, entrepreneurialism and enterprise skills were identified as development priorities for the general workforce in ‘Learning to work’ (Scottish Funding Council, 2005). The lifelong learning workforce will need to respond to these and other policy priorities, including: enhanced incentives for individuals to engage in post-compulsory learning, such as the payment of tuition fees for eligible students announced in ‘The Framework for economic development in Scotland’ (Scottish Executive, 2004c); increasing the participation of vulnerable groups at the margins of society such as refugees, announced in the ‘Adult ESOL strategy for Scotland’ (Scottish Executive, 2005a); and opening access to education and training through e-learning, reported in the final report of the joint Further and Higher Education funding councils’ e-learning group (SFEFC/SHEFC e-learning group, 2003). With regard to the LAIS constituency, in 2005 the Scottish Executive published ‘Our next major enterprise: final report of the Cultural Commission’ (Scottish Executive, 2005e). The Commission identified a number of drivers for change in the LAIS constituency, including: • the ‘Freedom of information (Scotland) Act 2002’ (Scottish Executive, 2002) increasing the demand for records managers • the digitisation of family archives, increasing public interest in genealogy and demand for archival services • the need to increase library access and customer care, and to support adults entering literacy schemes. In response, ‘Scotland’s culture’ (Scottish Executive, 2006b) announced a new model for Scotland’s cultural infrastructure, which included the creation of ‘The National Collections for Scotland’. This will involve the National Archives Scotland and the National Library of Scotland in the development of minimum standards for service delivery. A large number of lifelong learning policies in Scotland have focused on system reform – improving the standards and quality of lifelong learning service delivery. Illustrative examples of key initiatives include: • ‘Learning to improve’ – improving the quality of all post-compulsory learning by improving providers’ capacity to listen to learners and by strengthening workforce development (Scottish Executive, 2005c). • In CLD – ‘Strengthening standards: improving the quality of CLD service delivery’ – improving quality by establishing a professional body to ensure high standards of practice, approve training and develop a qualifications framework (Scottish Executive Short Life Task Group, 2006). • In FE – the review of Scotland’s Colleges (RoSCo) – strengthening the contribution FE colleges make to Scotland’s learners, economy and wider society and examining the professionalism of staff as part of a wider review of the FE system. • In FE, HE and WBL – ‘Learning for life: a joined up approach’ – strengthening service integration and collaboration across lifelong learning providers in FE, HE and WBL (Joint Lifelong Learning Group, 2000). • ‘Further and higher education (Scotland) Act’ – merging the FE and HE funding councils (Scottish Executive, 2005b). • ‘Lifelong partners’ – strengthening school and FE college collaboration by investing £40m over three years to enhance the curriculum offer for young people aged 14–19 (Scottish Executive, 2005d).

Scotland. Lifelong learning policy in Scotland is shaped by levels of strong economic performance and higher than average employment levels, according to the ‘Scottish economic report’ (SER) (The Scottish Executive, 2006c). The report also regarded Scotland’s labour supply as one of the country’s economic strengths, and noted that skills shortages reported by employers were uncommon. Skills gaps, on the other hand, were concentrated among people in low-skilled jobs, where market failure in the provision of training was evident. For example in ‘More choices, more chances’ (Scottish Executive, 2006a), a strategy to tackle the high proportion (13.5%) of young people not in education and training (NEET), the Executive sought to increase demand Lifelong Learning Strategy for learning by increasing the financial incentives offered to young people at risk of social exclusion and by expanding the range and quality of options and support available to them. In common with the rest of the UK, Scottish lifelong learning policies have a strong focus on improving adult literacy, numeracy and ESOL skills levels. These can be seen as essential elements underpinning the Scottish social inclusion agenda. Making the whole workforce more flexible and adept at coping with the ever rapidly changing demands of the economy is also a priority. ‘Scotland Life through learning: learning through life’ Through Learning Through Life (Scottish Executive, 2003) set out six high level indicators for measuring success in the lifelong learning sector. These were: • a reduction in the proportion of 16-19 year olds not in education, employment or training; • an increase in support to 16-19 year olds from low income families to stay on at school and/or college, thereby raising the participation and retention rates of this group; • an increase in graduates as a proportion of the workforce; • a reduction in the proportion of working age adults whose highest qualification is below SCQF level 5; • a reduction in the overarching strategyproportion of 18-29 year olds whose highest qualification is below SCQF level 6; • an increase in the proportion of people in employment undertaking training. These performance indicators were not intended to relate to one single part of the lifelong learning sector or organisation, bringing coherence but rather to provision beyond school, including basic, intermediate monitor and higher level skills provisionassess the overall impact of the policy and the success of the sector. The Scottish Executive is currently consulting also planned to monitor performance internationally, by assessing Scotland’s position in relation to the top quartile of other OECD countries. The Scottish Executive has since published the Lifelong Learning Statistics 2005, bringing together comprehensive statistics on a review the lifelong learning sector in Scotland to help assess the effectiveness of the lifelong learning strategy. This document assessed progress against the six indicators above as well as looking at each area of the sector in further detail and drawing international comparisons. In addition the Scottish Executive has published regular strategy updates to outline progress made on the lifelong learning strategy since 2003. These updates include a review of progress, future plans and case studies from learners, stakeholders and service providers among others. Looking specifically at widening access to learning, the results Scottish Funding Council Report Learning for All (SFEFC/SHEFC, 2005) recommends performance can be measured in a variety of ways. The report suggests 3 main outcomes which should can be available after used to measure whether the electiongoal of widening access is working: 1. At intermediate skills levels there has been Patterns of participation would be more even across different groups in society 2. There would be more even demand for learning across all groups in society 3. All learners would achieve and have a drive good learning experience that enhances their life chances Ways of specifically measuring these outcomes include looking at: • School attainment for pupils from different socio-economic backgrounds and by gender • The participation rates in Scotland to increase HE and FE from the uptake schools which currently have the lowest participation • The proportions of apprenticeshipsstudents in HE and FE from each quintile of the population by deprivation • The proportions of mature students from the most deprived areas in FE and HE • The differences in participation in FE and HE by geographical areas • The differences in participation in FE and HE by gender, WBL ethnicity and applied (vocational) qualifications for both disability. • The proportion of young people in the NEET group • The patterns of applications for places in HEIs by socio-economic background, deprivation zone, gender and adultsdisability; • The patterns of school-leavers (as monitored in the Scottish School-leavers Survey) who aspire to go to university by socio-economic background and gender. • Retention and achievement rates in FE and HE for students from different backgrounds • The proportion of students entering HEIs via FE colleges, as particularly with advanced standing • Through the longitudinal survey of students, the proportion of students from different backgrounds that recognised the value of their learning experience. In terms of adult learning in Scotland, measures of success are set out in ‘The framework for economic development specific targets outlined in Scotland’ the Scottish Executive’s Adult Literacy and Numeracy Strategy (Scottish Executive, 2004c2001). In addition, entrepreneurialism and enterprise skills were identified as development priorities These targets focus on increasing the total number of learners supported in Scotland. The Scottish Funding Council has a set of performance indicators for the general workforce FE sector on which it publishes an annual review. These indicators are intended to inform stakeholders about the performance of the FE sector in ‘Learning Scotland and also to work’ (Scottish Funding Councilenable colleges to benchmark their performance against similar colleges, 2005)to assist with their own quality improvement. The lifelong learning workforce will need indicators cover such areas as • The volume of further and higher education being delivered by colleges • The quality of provision reported by Her Majesty’s Inspectorate of Education (HMIE) • Student and employer satisfaction with the service • Student retention rates • Student achievement rates • Staff qualifications • Financial indicators In the CLD sector the HMIe document How Good is Our Community Learning and Development: self-evaluation for quality improvement (2006) is designed to respond to these and other policy priorities, including: enhanced incentives for individuals to engage in post-compulsory learning, such as evaluate the payment quality of tuition fees for eligible students announced in ‘The Framework for economic development services delivering CLD in Scotland’ (Scottish Executive, 2004c); increasing the participation of vulnerable groups at the margins of society such as refugees, announced . The performance indicators outlined in the ‘Adult ESOL strategy document have been designed for Scotland’ (Scottish Executiveself-evaluation, 2005a); and opening access encouraging service providers to education and training through e-learning, reported ask: • What key outcomes have we achieved? • What impact have we had in meeting the final report needs of our stakeholders? • How good is the joint Further and Higher Education funding councils’ e-learning group (SFEFC/SHEFC e-learning group, 2003)delivery of our key processes? • How good is our operational management? • How good is our strategic leadership? • What is our capacity for improvement? For each of these overarching questions there are specific indicators which are evaluated on a six point scale. With regard to the LAIS constituency, in In 2005 the Scottish Executive published ‘Our next major enterprisea report entitled Learning to Improve: final report quality approaches to lifelong learning. This report’s key recommendations for the lifelong learning sector in Scotland were: • that learner’s needs should be at the centre of educational systems, but that all of the Cultural Commissioncurrent quality systems need significant development to make this happen • that even more work needs to be done to make sure that the learner’s voice is heard by educators • that to achieve improvement, ‘tick box’ (Scottish Executiveor ‘compliance’ approaches will be counterproductive, 2005e)and we need a productive relationship between education providers and external quality assurance agencies • that if we are really to make improvements, individual staff and teams of staff have to continue to make the shift from a focus on ‘teaching’ to a focus on ‘supporting learning’, and have to be engaged effectively in reflecting on and improving their performance. These recommendations reflect the fact that in Scotland lifelong learning is not simply driven by economic performance, but is strongly based on a social practice model and focuses on putting the learner at the centre of the learning process. The Commission identified a number idea of drivers for change in social practice is one which is embedded into the LAIS constituency, including: • the ‘Freedom performance of information (Scotland) Act 2002’ (Scottish Executive, 2002) increasing the demand for records managers • the digitisation of family archives, increasing public interest in genealogy and demand for archival services • the need to increase library access and customer care, and to support adults entering literacy schemes. In response, ‘Scotland’s culture’ (Scottish Executive, 2006b) announced a new model for Scotland’s cultural infrastructure, which included the creation of ‘The National Collections for Scotland’. This will involve the National Archives Scotland and the National Library of Scotland in the development of minimum standards for service delivery. A large number of all lifelong learning policies activities in Scotland have focused on system reform – improving the standards and quality of lifelong learning service delivery. Illustrative examples of key initiatives include: • ‘Learning to improve’ – improving the quality of all post-compulsory learning by improving providers’ capacity to listen to learners and by strengthening workforce development (Scottish Executive, 2005c). • In CLD – ‘Strengthening standards: improving the quality of CLD service delivery’ – improving quality by establishing a professional body to ensure high standards of practice, approve training and develop a qualifications framework (Scottish Executive Short Life Task Group, 2006). • In FE – the review of Scotland’s Colleges (RoSCo) – strengthening the contribution FE colleges make to Scotland’s learners, economy and wider society and examining the professionalism of staff as part of a wider review of the FE system. • In FE, HE and WBL – ‘Learning for life: a joined up approach’ – strengthening service integration and collaboration across lifelong learning providers in FE, HE and WBL (Joint Lifelong Learning Group, 2000). • ‘Further and higher education (Scotland) Act’ – merging the FE and HE funding councils (Scottish Executive, 2005b). • ‘Lifelong partners’ – strengthening school and FE college collaboration by investing £40m over three years to enhance the curriculum offer for young people aged 14–19 (Scottish Executive, 2005d).

Scotland. Lifelong learning policy in Scotland is shaped by levels of strong economic performance and higher than average employment levels, according to the ‘Scottish economic report’ (SER) (The Scottish Executive’s Lifelong Learning Strategy for Scotland Life Through Learning Through Life (2003) set out six high level indicators for measuring success in the lifelong learning sector. These were: • a reduction in the proportion of 16-19 year olds not in education, 2006c). The report also regarded Scotland’s labour supply employment or training; • an increase in support to 16-19 year olds from low income families to stay on at school and/or FE college, thereby raising the participation and retention rates of this group; • an increase in graduates as one a proportion of the country’s economic strengths, and noted that skills shortages reported by employers were uncommon. Skills gaps, on workforce; • a reduction in the other hand, were concentrated among proportion of working age adults whose highest qualification is below SCQF level 5; • a reduction in the proportion of 18-29 year olds whose highest qualification is below SCQF level 6 • an increase in the proportion of people in low-skilled jobs, where market failure in the provision of training was evidentemployment undertaking training. For example in ‘More choices, more chances’ (Scottish Executive, 2006a), a strategy These performance indicators were not intended to tackle the high proportion (13.5%) of young people not in education and training (NEET), the Executive sought relate to increase demand for learning by increasing the financial incentives offered to young people at risk of social exclusion and by expanding the range and quality of options and support available to them. In common with the rest one single part of the UK, Scottish lifelong learning policies have a strong focus on improving adult literacysector or organisation, numeracy but rather to monitor and ESOL skills levels. These can be seen as essential elements underpinning assess the Scottish social inclusion agenda. Making the whole workforce more flexible and adept at coping with the ever rapidly changing demands overall impact of the economy is also a priority. ‘Life through learning: learning through life’ (Scottish Executive, 2003) is policy and the overarching strategy, bringing coherence to provision beyond school, including basic, intermediate and higher level skills provisionsuccess of the sector. The Scottish Executive is currently consulting also planned to monitor performance internationally, by assessing Scotland’s position in relation to the top quartile of other OECD countries. Since 2003 the Scottish Executive has published the Lifelong Learning Statistics 2005, bringing together comprehensive statistics on a review the lifelong learning sector in Scotland to help assess the effectiveness of the lifelong learning strategy. This document assessed progress against the six indicators above as well as looking at each area of the sector in further detail and drawing international comparisons. In addition the Scottish Executive has published regular strategy updates to outline progress made on the lifelong learning strategy since 2003. These updates include a review of progress, future plans and case studies from learners, stakeholders and service providers among others. Looking specifically at widening access to learning, the results Scottish Funding Council Report Learning for All (2005) recommends performance can be measured in a variety of ways. The report suggests 3 main outcomes which should can be available after used to measure whether the electiongoal of widening access is working: 1. At intermediate skills levels there has been Patterns of participation would be more even across different groups in society 2. There would be more even demand for learning across all groups in society 3. All learners would achieve and have a drive good learning experience that enhances their life chances Ways of specifically measuring these outcomes include looking at: • School attainment for pupils from different socio-economic backgrounds and by gender • The participation rates in Scotland to increase HE and FE from the uptake schools which currently have the lowest participation • The proportions of apprenticeshipsstudents in HE and FE from each quintile of the population by deprivation • The proportions of mature students from the most deprived areas in FE and HE • The differences in participation in FE and HE by geographical areas • The differences in participation in FE and HE by gender, WBL ethnicity and applied (vocational) qualifications for both disability. • The proportion of young people in the NEET group • The patterns of applications for places in HEIs by socio-economic background, deprivation zone, gender and adultsdisability; and • The patterns of school-leavers (as monitored in the Scottish School-leavers Survey) who aspire to go to university by socio-economic background and gender. • Retention and achievement rates in FE and HE for students from different backgrounds • The proportion of students entering HEIs via FE colleges, as particularly with advanced standing • Through the longitudinal survey of students, the proportion of students from different backgrounds that recognised the value of their learning experience. In terms of adult learning in Scotland, measures of success are set out in ‘The framework for economic development specific targets outlined in the Scottish Executive’s Adult Literacy and Numeracy Strategy (2000). These targets focus on increasing the total number of learners supported in Scotland’ . The Scottish Funding Council has a set of performance indicators for the FE sector, on which it publishes an annual review. These indicators are intended to inform stakeholders about the performance of the FE sector in Scotland and also to enable colleges to benchmark their performance against similar colleges, to assist with their own quality improvement. The indicators cover such areas as • The volume of further and higher education being delivered by colleges • The quality of provision reported by Her Majesty’s Inspectorate of Education (Scottish ExecutiveHMIE) • Student and employer satisfaction with the service • Student retention rates • Student achievement rates • Staff qualifications • Financial indicators In the CLD sector the HMIe report How Good is Our Community Learning and Development (2006) is designed to evaluate the quality of services delivering CLD in Scotland. The performance indicators outlined in the report have been designed for self-evaluation, 2004c)encouraging service providers to ask: • What key outcomes have we achieved? • What impact have we had in meeting the needs of our stakeholders? • How good is the delivery of our key processes? • How good is our operational management? • How good is our strategic leadership? • What is our capacity for improvement? For each of these overarching questions there are specific indicators which are evaluated on a six point scale. In addition, entrepreneurialism and enterprise skills were identified as development priorities for the general workforce in ‘Learning to work’ (Scottish Funding Council, 2005). The lifelong learning workforce will need to respond to these and other policy priorities, including: enhanced incentives for individuals to engage in post-compulsory learning, such as the payment of tuition fees for eligible students announced in ‘The Framework for economic development in Scotland’ (Scottish Executive, 2004c); increasing the participation of vulnerable groups at the margins of society such as refugees, announced in the ‘Adult ESOL strategy for Scotland’ (Scottish Executive, 2005a); and opening access to education and training through e-learning, reported in the final report of the joint Further and Higher Education funding councils’ e-learning group (SFEFC/SHEFC e-learning group, 2003). With regard to the LAIS constituency, in 2005 the Scottish Executive Funding Council published ‘Our next major enterprisea report entitled Learning to Improve: final report quality approaches to lifelong learning. This report’s key recommendations for the lifelong learning sector in Scotland were: • that learner’s needs should be at the centre of educational systems, but that all of the Cultural Commissioncurrent quality systems need significant development to make this happen • that even more work needs to be done to make sure that the learner’s voice is heard by educators • that to achieve improvement, ‘tick box’ (Scottish Executiveor ‘compliance’ approaches will be counterproductive, 2005e)and we need a productive relationship between education providers and external quality assurance agencies • that if we are really to make improvements, individual staff and teams of staff have to continue to make the shift from a focus on ‘teaching’ to a focus on ‘supporting learning’, and have to be engaged effectively in reflecting on and improving their performance. These recommendations reflect the fact that in Scotland lifelong learning is not simply driven by economic performance, but is strongly based on a social practice model and focuses on putting the learner at the centre of the learning process. The Commission identified a number idea of drivers for change in social practice is one which is embedded into the LAIS constituency, including: • the ‘Freedom performance of information (Scotland) Act 2002’ (Scottish Executive, 2002) increasing the demand for records managers • the digitisation of family archives, increasing public interest in genealogy and demand for archival services • the need to increase library access and customer care, and to support adults entering literacy schemes. In response, ‘Scotland’s culture’ (Scottish Executive, 2006b) announced a new model for Scotland’s cultural infrastructure, which included the creation of ‘The National Collections for Scotland’. This will involve the National Archives Scotland and the National Library of Scotland in the development of minimum standards for service delivery. A large number of all lifelong learning policies activities in Scotland have focused on system reform – improving the standards and quality of lifelong learning service delivery. Illustrative examples of key initiatives include: • ‘Learning to improve’ – improving the quality of all post-compulsory learning by improving providers’ capacity to listen to learners and by strengthening workforce development (Scottish Executive, 2005c). • In CLD – ‘Strengthening standards: improving the quality of CLD service delivery’ – improving quality by establishing a professional body to ensure high standards of practice, approve training and develop a qualifications framework (Scottish Executive Short Life Task Group, 2006). • In FE – the review of Scotland’s Colleges (RoSCo) – strengthening the contribution FE colleges make to Scotland’s learners, economy and wider society and examining the professionalism of staff as part of a wider review of the FE system. • In FE, HE and WBL – ‘Learning for life: a joined up approach’ – strengthening service integration and collaboration across lifelong learning providers in FE, HE and WBL (Joint Lifelong Learning Group, 2000). • ‘Further and higher education (Scotland) Act’ – merging the FE and HE funding councils (Scottish Executive, 2005b). • ‘Lifelong partners’ – strengthening school and FE college collaboration by investing £40m over three years to enhance the curriculum offer for young people aged 14–19 (Scottish Executive, 2005d).