Why are you focusing on skills and employment?
Why should we do anything for offenders?
What about prisoners who are women and members of minority groups?
What is being done to develop lecturers and other education staff who work in prisons?
What are you doing to support prison staff to become more aware of learners educational needs?
Why are you spending money on offenders rather than law-abiding people?
Does overcrowding mean that education provision is reduced?
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Why are you focusing on skills and employment?
We know that a stable and quality job is a key factor in making someone a contributing member of society. We know that offenders generally have skills levels below that of the general population. We also know that some employers need workers. We’re trying to bridge that skills gap in the most efficient way, by tailoring training that correctional services offer to the local employment opportunities.
But training someone with low skills – who perhaps had a poor experience at school – is also the right thing to do in a civilised society – equipping them for all areas of life such as, paying bills, reading letters etc.
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Why should we do anything for offenders?
It is better to have ex-offenders in work and making a positive contribution to society than committing more crimes. Employment is one of the key factors in reducing the risk of reconviction.
This is not an easy option. We will offer opportunities to get trained and move into jobs. But individual offenders have to play their part too. They have an obligation to improve their skills and employment prospects, and we know that many want the chance to do just that.
We also know that there are wider implications of crime; with family members of convicted offenders being more likely to go on and commit crime themselves. Breaking the cycle of crime will offer the opportunity not only to reduce the social and financial costs to society today but also to reduce the chances of future crime. This is a prize worth working for.
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What about prisoners who are women and members of minority groups?
We recognise that we need to take a flexible approach when looking at the barriers to participation in education, employment and training for particular groups of offenders. As part of the consultation process we particularly welcome views on how to overcome such barriers.
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What is being done to develop lecturers and other education staff who work in prisons?
There is some evidence that those working with offenders have to some extent felt like a Cinderella service, working in relative isolation from the broader learning and skills sector, with poor access to development and support networks. The review of the prison curriculum by the Learning and Skills Development Agency reported “teacher expertise is an important factor in the curriculum offered, yet staff development opportunities are often insufficient”.
Prison education contractors are obliged to provide in-service training, but this element of the contract often has not been adequately monitored. There are also many part-time staff who may work in several prisons and lack time to attend staff development meetings. Rates of pay for these in-service training events are usually very low, providing little incentive to encourage part-time teachers to attend. This position has begun to shift in recent years and the introduction of a new Star award for offender teachers reflects the fact that they are now accepted as an integral and important part of overall post 16 teaching workforce.
Bringing delivery of offender learning within the mainstream of Learning and Skills Council delivery offers the opportunity to do better in developing the learning workforce, giving those working with offenders the support their challenging role merits. Providers need to offer support for the career progression of all staff delivering learning and skills.
As resources allow, the Government intends to place a new emphasis on the development of the offender learning workforce. Teachers, trainers, assistants and officers who are working with offenders in education programmes, vocational training, industrial workshops and offending behaviour programmes need the opportunity to:
- be supported to embed units of accredited literacy, language, numeracy and wider key / personal development into their programmes
- be part of a regular inspection regime
- develop coherent approaches to supporting individual learners
- take advantage of national quality improvement, training and support initiatives, such as the Skills for Life Quality Initiative, the Key Skills Support Programme and Success for All.
Under the new arrangements we can expect an important part to be played by:
- Lifelong Learning UK - providing a teacher qualifications infrastructure which enables both initial teacher training and continuing professional development to be tailored to the needs of individual staff, with the aim of developing an appropriately skilled workforce which can provide a quality service to offender learners. LLUK will also provide workforce intelligence data to enable offender learning providers to benchmark their progress towards employing appropriately qualified staff; and
- Centre for Excellence in Leadership - CEL provides research-informed leadership development and tailored leadership support to post-16 provider organisations. CEL will also prompt sector-wide strategies and partnerships for building leadership and management capacity in the sector.
Teachers must be appropriately qualified to teach. From September 2001, all new entrants to teaching in Further Education, regardless of subject, have needed an approved initial teaching qualification. New full-time appointees to FE teaching must therefore now have a full Stage 3 FE teaching qualification within two years of the first available course and permanent part-time staff must achieve an appropriate qualification within four years of the first available course. The new Learning and Skills Council led arrangements mean these requirements now apply – for the first time – to the offender learning workforce.
Strode College and the University of Plymouth have developed a specialised, accredited module for staff working with offenders in custody or in the community. 32 experienced prison educators with teaching qualifications have begun working towards their Certificate in Advanced Professional Studies. The two Masters-level modules they have successfully completed will enable them to teach the module, An Introduction to Tutoring, within HM Prison Education Departments, thereby spreading good practice in an organic way.
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What are you doing to support prison staff to become more aware of learners educational needs?
The DfES has produced in-service training courses specifically designed to raise the awareness of prison and probation officers; the training is being trialled with prison, probation and Skills for Life staff.
DfES has also funded action research in order to develop guidance for mainstream teachers on improving listening and speaking skills among offenders.
Prison staff have also been actively involved in the Move On in Prisons and Probation project. In the scheme, they become ‘recruiters’ who signpost and support offenders to take national literacy and numeracy courses and tests.
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Why are you spending money on offenders rather than law-abiding people?
It costs the criminal justice system £65,000 to reconvict an offender and £40,000 for each year in custody. In 2002 it was estimated that the cost of crime committed by people who had previously been in prison was £11 billion a year. And we know that offending affects the families of criminals – for example, a boy with a convicted parent is twice as likely to be convicted himself.
We would prefer to invest in steering offenders away from crime and into productive employment. That will help protect the public as well as benefiting the individuals and employers who need workers.
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Does overcrowding mean that education provision is reduced?
It is the case that prison populations are higher than ever. There were 77,300 prisoners in England and Wales in September 2005. In prisons, education must be delivered in the context of all the services prisoners need. This includes factors such as security and population levels. Prisons have a duty to provide a safe environment for those imprisoned and working there.
The new arrangements under the Offenders’ Learning and Skills Service (OLASS) give the LSC and the Regional Offender Manager a co-commissioning role for educational services. Under this arrangement, the LSC can hold its learning providers to account if delivery is not in line with what has been commissioned.
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