At the end of last month, we explored the controversial plans that are going ahead in the UK at the moment to scrap part of the post-16 education system, the BTec. The government aims to dismantle the BTec system by 2025 and replace it with a system of ‘T-Levels’, but education professionals across the board have criticised the move as the reckless endangerment of thousands of young people’s futures.
‘BTec’ stands for Business and Technology Education Council. A BTec is a specialist work-related qualification that combines practical learning with assessed theory content. There are over 2,000 BTec qualifications available across 16 sectors, and they’re available from entry level through to level 7 (equivalent to postgraduate study). From applied science and art and design to media, land management, performing arts and travel, there are a lot of different qualifications that provide direct routes into a number of careers.
BTecs are a tried and tested way of garnering skills that will be useful in industry- but they’re also a vital part of some people’s university journey, as they allow A-Level subjects to be studied alongside them for vital UCAS points and the honing of more academic skills. The T-Level system is believed to make it much more difficult to study an A-Level subject alongside a T-Level, and has been seen as creating a barrier in the practical skills route into university.
Eleven organisations that represent staff and students in schools, colleges and universities issued a joint statement urging the government to reconsider the plans to axe the BTec from the post-16 curriculum. The statement emphasises the importance of young people being able to study an applied general qualification like a BTec, as for many of them it represents “a more appropriate route to support progression to higher levels of study or a meaningful job, than an A-Level or a T-Level only programme.”
It also highlights that there’s likely to be the most noticeable effect on students from disadvantaged backgrounds- “the Department for Education’s own impact assessment concludes that students from disadvantaged backgrounds have the most to lose if applied general qualifications are defunded,” and that “the present implementation is not feasible, particularly given the unfolding impact of the Covid-19 pandemic.”
You can read the rest of the joint statement here, and you can find out more about the Protect Student Choice Campaign at The Sixth Form Colleges Association. You can also explore the latest thought and developments on the issue by checking out the #ProtectStudentChoice hashtag on Twitter.
If you want to get involved, you can also sign a petition on parliament.uk that urges the government to reconsider withdrawing BTec funding and guarantee that they will play an ongoing and major role in the qualifications landscape.