Faiths and further education - Church of England

Faiths and Further Education:A HandbookCurrent developments in FE policy142Sir Andrew Foster (2005) has published a review into the future roleof FE colleges (see www.dfes.gov.uk/furthereducation for details).The Government’s reform plans for 14–19 education and trainingand the Skills Strategy agenda will require colleges to examine theirmission and relationship with other providers and learners andemployers.The Foster review provides a useful insight into currentFE provision. It mentions the importance of spiritual and moraldevelopment, suggests colleges need to develop greater clarity ofpurpose and identifies:• the distinctive contribution colleges make to the learning andskills market• colleges’ long-term contribution to economic development andsocial inclusion• anything else that needs to happen to transform the sector.EU framework:EU directives on equalities, religion and belief144European policy must, in some cases, be incorporated into Britishgovernmental policy. For example, the European directive onreligion and belief has already been enshrined in government policy.Importantly, discrimination on the grounds of religion and belief isnow illegal.There are some exceptions to this, but employers haveto specifically apply for them.The British Government has gonebeyond the directive, in that services provided must notdiscriminate. It can be argued that multi-faith chaplaincy teamsexemplify this law, in that equal provision is made for all students,of all faiths and none. For more details, see the Department of Tradeand Industry (DTI) website (www.dti.gov.uk/er/equality) and theAoC guidance on the directive (www.aoc.org.uk).143Ofsted has also stressed the importance of the overall ethos of thecollege, the need for spiritual development and has commended FEcolleges for moves that some have made in this area.The revisedCommon Inspection Framework (Ofsted and ALI, 2005) for the firsttime asks inspectors to monitor the provision for the spiritual,moral, social and cultural development of students.Action point:The FE sector is constantly changing.Watch the education websitesfor policy developments. Read The Times Education Supplement andits special sections on further education (FE Focus). The Guardianhas an Education Supplement on Tuesdays, that includes an FEsection, and The Independent has an education section onThursdays.