Gearing up for the run in to the start of term

Last week the calls started to get more and more with each passing day in the office. They peaked on Thursday (maybe A level results meant many teachers were back at school).

This is always an exciting time for me, never quite know how things are going to start iin the new year and surprises are always in store.

Key questions for me to think about are:

Will Diplomas survive?

Will Foundation Learning become the biggest driver for Functional Skills?

Or will it be employability skills - something desperately needed in these uncertain times!

What about the new GCSE curriculum, how will they be judged?

And what about functional skills, will they truly become the qualification of choice or will they be seen as simply too hard and too rigorous by schools with the consequent drop in entries?

Always happy to pick up your thoughts - try putting them on the functional skills forum