Colleges call for role in reviews

Further education heads have called for funding to allow more college lecturers to join quality review teams assessing higher education in colleges.

The extra money is needed to allow FE staff to be released from teaching duties so that they can provide a college perspective on reviews, the Association of Colleges has said.

Government and higher education funding officials told an AoC conference last week that FE was expected to play a key role in recruiting students from working-class families to higher education courses to help meet widening participation targets.

But Judith Norrington, AoC director of curriculum and quality, said FE would continue to be hampered in its efforts to become more involved in higher education unless it received more support and had more of a say in helping to redefine higher education provision. "It's a problem, because FE wants to be able to take on more HE, particularly in part-time and vocational areas that the government says it wants to support."