Organisation and Policy: Influencing Public Policy: Selected Policy Papers
The Independent Commission on the Organisation of the School Year
A NIACE Response
Published April 2000
NIACE is a national organisation working in the interests of adults learning. As an organisation we are involved in advocacy in the interests of adult learners; research and development in adult learning, particularly in support of widening participation in learning by adults; and also in funded consultancy work. We co-ordinate a number of national campaigns to promote adult learning, specifically Adult Learners Week which takes place in May each year. We also produce our own publications, including a monthly journal entitled Adults Learning, organise a conference programme and provide an information service to people with an interest in adult learning.
Our purpose in responding to your invitation to submit evidence is to seek to ensure that when deciding upon changes to the school year for children and young people, the commissioners are also aware of the potential impact of such changes on adult learning. Although adult education is organised separately from schooling in most local authorities, changes to the school year could have an impact upon adult access to learning.
Firstly, many adults now study part time in the daytime. Much further and adult education provision has been organised to fit in with caring responsibilities. Those who are parents of young children are able to attend courses and programmes either because the adult education provider also offers crèche provision for children under five or because their older children are in school. When there is a mismatch for some reason between school dates and the course dates, the adults are unable to attend their classes, as they need to be with their children. There is therefore a link between an adult’s freedom or opportunity to attend classes and the pattern of their children’s schooling.
Secondly, many adult education courses and programmes are run in school premises, both during the day and in the evening. As a result the pattern of the adult education terms has tended to reflect the pattern of the school terms. This may actually not be a necessary connection but it has tended to be so. Usage of school classrooms for adult education purposes can for example be more cost effective in term time as heating is already on and standard cleaning schedules are in operation. It may be more expensive to use school premises outside the standard term times. The periods outside term time are also the time when schools traditionally undertake maintenance and repair work or heavy cleaning and this may put classrooms or IT suites out of operation. A change in school terms would therefore probably require a similar change to adult education terms.
However, the current pattern of adult education terms in services run by local authorities may not be the most beneficial to adult learning either. Currently the pattern in conventional adult education programmes is a ten or twelve week autumn term starting mid to late September and ending early to mid December; a ten to twelve week term in the spring depending on how Easter falls; and anything between four to ten weeks in the summer depending on the nature of the course. Courses, which are more recreational in nature, may finish earlier. Accredited courses will continue into the summer term until the assessments or examinations have been completed. Essential life skills subjects such as basic skills or English for Speakers of other Languages or programmes for adults with learning difficulties will continue as long as possible - usually for a thirty six week year or longer. Some adult education services also run summer schools either during the summer term or in the summer holidays. These may be in arts and crafts, languages, or performing arts and there has been an increase in recent years in basic skills summer schools and family learning workshops during the summer holiday period. Less conventional more developmental outreach adult learning programmes may follow completely different patterns.
There is clearly a cohort of adults who have attended mainstream adult education classes for many years who are used to the existing pattern and know their way well round it. They will find a change unsettling but they will have the skills and knowledge to find out about the changes and work their way through them – although some will no doubt find that the changes do not suit and may cease attending.
Adults also learn in further education colleges and higher education institutions and follow the patterns of terms designed by these organisations to suit the needs of their learners. In some further education colleges adults form 60% to 80% of the student population.
However the consideration of a change in the school terms also offers an opportunity to think more widely about the needs of adults and particularly about the needs of adults who do not easily see themselves as learners. These adults particularly need:
 | Access to learning locally and at convenient times (hence the wide use of schools, although the location in schools can itself be a barrier to some adults). |
| A range of different learning opportunities, which can offer a number of starting, dates throughout the year i.e. not only starting in September. |
| Their learning packaged into approachable and manageable chunks – experience suggest blocks of six to ten weeks are seen as less daunting than a full year. Blocks can then be put together in combination to offer accreditation. |
| Some breaks in their learning, but not so many that the pattern becomes disjointed and attendance requirements hard to remember. |
| Not too long a break between terms so that the learning gain achieved in one session is sustained and can be continued into the next – this is particularly true for adults with learning difficulties or disabilities. |
| Learning which is organised in ways, which take account of the other roles they play in their lives as parent, carer or worker. |
| Learning which is organised in ways which take account of the significant festivals, calendar events and cultural traditions of Britain’s minority ethnic communities. |
For these reasons we would suggest a four or five term year, with all the terms of equal length, would not be disadvantageous to adults; although the seven term year as described in your briefing paper may prove too bitty, causing adults to lose momentum in their learning and then to drop out. Whatever changes are considered it is essential that the knock on effect for adult, further and higher education is explored. Timing, length and location of courses are key factors in the design of programmes, which seek to reduce the barriers to learning for adults. It would be most unfortunate if a decision taken in the interest of schools unwittingly reduces access for adults to learning.
There is no doubt that for everyone – schools, colleges and communities – any change will present many challenges and will require considerable forward planning. Providers of adult, further and higher education will want to be kept informed of deliberations and decision so that they can begin to plan accordingly.
NIACE
April 2000
The Independent Commission on the Organisation of the School Year was commissioned by the Local Government Association. The LGA's report will be published in Autumn 2000.
The Commission's Remit (PDF File)
