The Future Skills Unit, announced in February’s levelling up white paper, is set to be launched this month.
With a brief to look at the data and evidence of where skills gaps exist, it is hoped the unit will contribute towards creating a more employer-led skills system, according to the government.
Skills minister Alex Burghart announced the unit’s imminent creation during a keynote speech for the think-tank Policy Exchange on the future of skills.
He also described a series of policy reforms to be led locally via employer representative bodies.
These initiatives included employer-designed apprenticeship standards and T levels, alongside the lifelong loan guarantee, upcoming lifelong loan entitlement and local skills improvement plans.
“I think it’s important that we don’t just seek to present better choices” Burghart said, “but we also give clarity to people about what those choices might offer.”
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Burghart said that the current way of evidencing the success of education was too limited and that measures such as qualification grades, progression to university, whether students become NEET would in future not be good enough.
The minister shed light on some elements of the future unit’s work, explaining that data provided through a government dashboard will tell prospective learners “whether taking a certain qualification in health and social care will go on to work in health and social care, or whether they’re going to work in retail”.
He added that parents would gain: “It’s also about showing parents that certain technical choices have fantastic outcomes that should be taken seriously.”
In response to a question from Lib Dem peer Sue Garden about how schools could be encouraged to celebrate the achievements of students who secured apprenticeships in the same way as they did students getting in to universities, Burghart said data would play a key role in enabling “more well-informed conversations about destinations.”
Burghart said his department would start releasing data this month, but this would be on an “iterative basis” and would only be “an indicator of the sorts of things we can start doing over time.”
“Before anyone gets too excited, it’s just the beginning. It won’t give you all the answers you’re looking for.”
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