Vocational Education and Training

Lord Kirkham Excerpts

Monday 28th October 2019 Lords Chamber

[Lord Kirkham (Con)]

My Lords, perhaps I may remind the House of my registered interests as chairman of the trustees of the Duke of Edinburgh’s Award and deputy patron of the Outward Bound Trust. There can be no dispute about the crying need to strengthen vocational education and training in our secondary schools. In developing our obsession with widening university access, we have overly focused on academic qualifications. As a result, I believe that we have grown to seriously undervalue vocational education and training. But I must go further and point to the desperate need to ensure that our young people—all of our young people—leave school educated and trained in the basic life skills: the essential skills they need to enter the world of work and to develop into responsible citizens; to form successful relationships; to become capable mums and dads who know how to bring up their own children and help to keep our society cohesive.

I am aware that I am going a little off-piste, but this is the area on which I intend to focus. The world of work is experiencing a revolution and in order to keep pace, the way we educate and train our students needs to change too. Our young people need equipping to deal with the new challenges that they will encounter in the workplace, and we all need to recognise that there is so much more to life and to education than formulaic teaching in order to pass exams. Education should be about understanding, not just memory. Growing our wisdom and learning specific skills is clearly important, but of no greater importance than character development. So while we should undoubtedly encourage and support excellence in academia, and expand the opportunities to grow the prestige of vocational education, it is also most important to develop the key qualities and skills—essential skills, not soft skills; I agree with the noble Lord, Lord Young, about that particular term—that help to prepare our young people, whether they have followed an academic or technical route, for success and enrichment in every sense in life and in work. I am talking about the essential qualities that are vital in living a good life, but cannot be measured by academic markers: self-confidence, self-discipline, adaptability and resilience, resourcefulness, emotional intelligence and caring for others. They are all key qualities that ultimately have a much greater bearing on happiness and fulfilment than exam results.

There is little point in preparing a child for the world of work with straight A grades and a fine degree if they have the wrong attitude: no self-belief, minimal communication skills or any real understanding of the work ethic. Many secondary schools and academies strive to provide a balanced, rounded education, but there is undoubtedly a serious and important need to strengthen the focus on robust, enhanced vocational and life skills programmes in secondary schools. In order to achieve that efficiently, effectively and speedily, the future has to involve partnerships in education between businesses, local and national government, our entire educational services and, I contend, external skills providers such as Young Enterprise and the Duke of Edinburgh’s Award—and there are others. Indeed, the Duke of Edinburgh’s Award is already involved in some way with around 75% of secondary schools. These are charities with long track records of proven success and the necessary links and connections with business and industry to provide hands-on, real-life experiences. They are organisations with unparalleled expertise in preparing young people for the world of work and in developing life skills.

Our neglect in providing access to personal development has resulted in many youngsters leaving school or even university with no idea of what employers expect of them and no idea how to speak to a potential employer. They have no idea how to accept a subordinate role as a new starter in an organisation or how to interact with the mix of generations whom they will encounter as their colleagues. They have no financial acumen and little idea of how to manage the money they earn or how best to handle cash, credit cards and loans. In short, for many, the final step off the academic ladder and the transition to actual work come as a very rude shock indeed. Far too many of our young people, who may well have achieved the right exam grades, demonstrate a serious deficiency in these basic life skills.

Thankfully, a no-risk answer is at hand. To inspire, encourage, energise and involve all those necessary in actioning the process simply requires the Government to ease budgetary restraints a little and commit the necessary resources to schools to provide the reliable funding needed to enable them to choose external providers such as the Duke of Edinburgh’s Award, Young Enterprise, or any other expert they prefer, to partner with business and work directly with schools to teach the right life skills and promote social competence and well-being.

I am not standing here presenting an advertisement for the Duke of Edinburgh’s Award, proud as I am of all its incredible achievements over the past 64 years. Rather, it is to emphasise the skills that it teaches and the positive attitudes it encourages—subjects that should be core and standard in every school curriculum if our goal really is to shape and prepare a more rounded, confident and capable generation with the character and attitude to benefit families, community and the country alike.