Ofsted to review students’ and apprentices’ online further education experience

Ofsted is carrying out an exploratory review of the quality of learners’ experiences of online education in further education and skills settings during the COVID-19-affected summer term.

Ofsted is working with the Department for Education (DfE), the Association of Colleges (AoC), the Association of Employer and Learning Providers (AELP) and HOLEX to review further education learners’ experience of online learning during the COVID-19 (coronavirus) lockdown.

The review aims to provide insights into the sector’s experiences of online education and to identify areas of strength and potential for improvement. This will support post-16 providers re-visiting their online education strategies, particularly from September 2020 onwards. The review will look at the online education that providers are delivering in light of the necessary social distancing measures

Her Majesty’s Inspectors will carry out the review during June and will speak remotely to managers, teachers and trainers in volunteer further education colleges and skills providers to discuss their delivery of online teaching and learning.

In particular, inspectors will speak to students and apprentices about their experience of learning online and the support they have received for this. This will be done by phone and a report on the findings will be published in due course.

The review is not an inspection. There will be no inspection judgements and no inspection consequences for the provider. Involvement in the review is entirely voluntary.

Data gathered during the review will be confidential and staff, students and apprentices will not be identified.