Diploma passnotes

requires students to achieve six separate qualifications. So should the diploma be simplified, at the risk of the charge of “dumbing down”? Or should it be retained as it currently is, as a “gold standard” for the hardest-working and ablest students — and an unrealistic goal for many? In the wider political and educational

context, the disappointing results come at a bad time for the diploma. Under Labour, the plan was to add three more diploma “lines” in 2011 to the 14 that already exist, a target that the new government has swiftly backed away from. At the same time, the coalition removed

what had been seen as the bedrock on which acceptance of the diploma would be built: the commitment that every 14-16-year-old in the country would be “entitled” to embark on any diploma option by 2013, wherever they lived. That “entitlement” would have required

all schools in England to offer the diploma — including the league-topping grammars. Without it, there are fears the diploma will never gain the critical mass to stand alongside A-levels and GCSEs as a universally valued qualification, leaving it to occupy a niche that some students and parents will naturally distrust - and some schools and colleges might prefer to drop. John Stopani, director of 14-19 partnerships at Croydon College, fears that removing “entitlement” will weaken the diploma. “It’s taken away the pressure for schools to get behind the qualification. But it’s still almost a fledgling qualification, and I really do worry about it in the longer term. The hallmark of the diploma was that it brought employers and qualifications together, and the loss of that would be a disaster to education. The position of the diploma needs to be carefully safeguarded,” he says. Meanwhile, Nick Gooderson, head

of qualifications and standards at ConstructionSkills, lays some of the responsibility for safeguarding the diploma at the door of the industry. “The national entitlement will no longer happen, and schools and colleges will perhaps view things differently because of that. The diploma has to stand on its

So what is the diploma? It’s available at three levels: Foundation and Higher for 14-16-year-olds, and Advanced level for post-16. Younger students could get an all-round introduction to construction, before continuing to the Advanced course, a more vocational BTEC, or pursuing a different subject altogether. 16-year-olds who knew they wanted to pursue a career in construction could reject the narrow A-level syllabus in favour of a vocational diploma that nevertheless had similar academic rigour.

How do you get it? This is where it gets complicated. The diploma is described as a “wrapper” that sits around six discrete elements: Principal Learning; an Independent Project, Additional Specialist Learning; Functional Skills; Personal Learning and Thinking Skills; and Work Experience. To achieve the diploma, students have to tick off all six components. Additional Specialist Learning options include BTECs, GCSEs or AS-Levels.

And what about the students who didn’t manage it? As well as the diploma holders, roughly the same number again completed “Principal Learning”, which is viewed as a qualification in its own right. Holders would be able to use PL as part of their application to FE colleges or even university. And students could also return to school or college to re-sit the missing components without committing to a full academic year’s study.

So they didn’t drop out? If you do the maths, it looks like around 400 students who were originally counted as C&BE diploma students in September 2008 have either fallen badly behind target, or gone missing from the course altogether. It’s thought likely that some were switched onto the less academic BTEC Certificate and Diploma courses, but no one is really sure.

What happened in the other diploma subjects? Four other diploma lines launched in 2008: Engineering; Information Technology; Manufacturing and Product Design; and Society Health and Development. In each, there was a broadly similar picture: for every student who achieved a diploma, another only achieved Principal Learning. The discussions on the future of the C&BE diploma will be mirrored in the other diploma areas.

So construction kept pace with the other subjects? Across the three levels, construction had lower overall numbers than the other four diplomas, with Creative and Media and Engineering being the most popular. At Advanced level, C&BE students got more A, B and C grades than those studying Creative and Media and IT, but achieved poorer grades than those studying Engineering and Society, Health and Development.

Who decided on such a complicated structure? In each subject area, the relevant Diploma Development Partnership, made up of employers and training organisations (including CITB- ConstructionSkills), worked with the government and OfQual to devise a curriculum framework. OfQual then laid out the specifications for exam boards Edexcel and AQA/City & Guilds to follow. However, only two out of the three main exam boards in England and Wales chose to offer the diploma — the OCR board felt the entire diploma was unnecessary.

So what went wrong? There were suggestions in some areas that local construction employers had been slow to get on board to help deliver the curriculum, but it seems unlikely this was a widespread problem. Different consortia had different experiences, with Functional Skills, the Independent Project and Additional Specialist Learning all mentioned as the tripwire.

own two feet and be seen as a worthwhile qualification — and the key to that is support from industry and employers.” But Bruce Boughton, people

development manager at Lovell Partnerships, offers a different view. “I can understand the government’s approach, it doesn’t want to dictate what qualifications schools offer. And from a practical basis, and the degree of employer engagement involved, I’m not sure as an industry we would have coped. I’m happy

for it to grow organically.” The C&BE diploma, launched in

September 2008, was hailed as major boost to the long-term health of the industry. For students of all ability levels, it offered an accessible entry point to the industry. For employers, it promised a steady supply of motivated applicants for apprenticeships and training posts. Many construction firms signed up to formal alliances with diploma consortia, to assist with the curriculum — and to talent spot future recruits (see box, overleaf). The diploma also represented a long- awaited breach of the educational bastions. The industry had campaigned hard for more access to schools and the curriculum, to extend awareness of construction careers beyond the would-be bricklayers, carpenters and plasterers. A piloted GCSE in Construction seemed to be the answer, but this was closed down when Labour opted to back an extension of vocational education in 2005. “The difference with the diploma is that

it embeds construction into schools, whereas BTEC courses are only available at Further Education colleges for post-16 students,” adds Chris Simpson, education liaison adviser at contractor Wates. “A lot of students ‘fell’ into construction, so we wanted them to make a positive choice.” But actually delivering the Construction

& Built Environment diploma seems to have been a source of frustration for many of the teachers and lecturers involved. At Croydon College, where none of the 16 students on the course actually completed the diploma, Stopani says staff struggled with the sheer number of teaching and assessment methods involved. “College staff were very conversant

with BTEC and NVQs, but assessment methods in the diploma were very different,” he says, admitting that many of Croydon’s students simply ran out of time. “But the construction team [at the college] will look carefully at where they can adapt and change,” he adds. A further problem mentioned by teaching staff was that the diploma was used to pilot another innovation — Functional Skills tests in English, Maths >

CONSTRUCTION MANAGER | OCTOBER 2010 | 21