Question to the Department for Education:

To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what progress he is making on plans for the safe return of students on heavily vocational BTEC courses to colleges.

To support the return to college of all students from 8 March, the department has worked closely with Public Health England to develop and refresh the system of controls for education settings to reduce and mitigate the risk of transmission of COVID-19. New measures include asymptomatic testing and recommending the increased use of face coverings.

In addition, to prepare for return, colleges should update their risk assessments and ensure they are implementing the system of controls, this includes assessing the risks particular to their setting and provision.

For those students whose courses are more vocational in nature (for example, for courses that require close contact, require access to specialist equipment or are taught in non-traditional classroom environments such as workshops), the further education COVID-19 guidance sets out additional steps and considerations colleges can take, details of which can be found here: https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/coronavirus-covid-19-maintaining-further-education-provision. Colleges are advised to put greater emphasis on the other measures outlined in the systems of controls, such as increased use of face coverings, increased ventilation, in addition to the use of screens or barriers and follow the relevant working safely during COVID-19 guidance to reduce the risk of transmission, details of the guidance can be found here: https://www.gov.uk/guidance/working-safely-during-coronavirus-covid-19.