Skills bill puts focus on university-college partnerships

Fiona McIntyre reports on early signs of closer FE-HE collaboration as landscape changes

When prime minister Boris Johnson first announced plans for a lifetime skills guarantee in September 2020, he promised that the government’s reforms would end the “bogus distinction” between further and higher education.

His plans involve giving students access to “flexible” loans to fund study from Level 4 qualifications such as higher national certificates up to degree-standard level 6, at colleges or universities. Johnson promised this would fix an education system that has produced “too many graduates with degrees that don’t get them the jobs they want”.