Last updated 09:45, Tuesday, 29 April 2008

Mick Farley, UCLan director for Cumbria on a landmark piece of legislation

Mick Farley

YOUNG people entering West Lakes Academy in September, like every young person across the country entering secondary school then, will be the first to benefit from the Government’s Education and Skills Bill now going through Parliament.

This landmark piece of legislation raises the learning participation age to 17 by 2013 and to 18 by 2015. In doing so the Government is giving effect to the Fisher Act of 1918, which proposed that young people should remain in at least part-time education until the age of 18. However, this provision of the 1918 Act was never enacted due to the period of austerity after the First World War.

The days when young people could leave school at the earliest opportunity without qualifications and work their way into a fulfilling and rewarding career are now gone and demand for high-level skills continues to increase. Young people need the skills and knowledge to cope with these changes which will continue at an ever increasing pace. By investing in learning and gaining qualifications, a future of better-paid employment is guaranteed. The economic imperative both for the young person and for the country is clear.

So is the social imperative. Young people who are not in education, employment or training (NEET),after they are 16, are less likely to get a good job and more likely to be involved in anti-social behaviour and crime; more likely to be teenage parents and more likely to misuse drugs and alcohol.

Now, since qualifications act as a passport to further learning and work, through demonstrating what a young person knows and can do, changes are needed to the qualifications offered. So last month the Government published a strategy for 14-19 qualifications. The strategy is intended to produce, by 2013, a simpler system, based on just four routes: the general (GCSEs and A levels), the new Diplomas, Apprenticeships and a Foundation Learning Tier for young people working below Level Two (the equivalent of five good GCSEs).

And so that young people are helped to make decisions about the learning choices that would best suit them, high quality and impartial information, advice and guidance will be available.

So, as young people contemplate their futures, they should remember that poverty of aspiration is the worst poverty.

UCLan’s sponsorship of the West Lakes Academy will determinedly seek to raise aspirations and ensure that every young person maximises her/his potential.