Evaluation of Individual Learning Accounts: Final Report
7 Providers
7.1 Two methods were used to consult learning providers for the purposes of this report. The first was a telephone survey, conducted by MORI, of 202 learning providers. The second involved two consultation workshops, one in Glasgow and one in Perth, attended by learning providers.
7.2 The following feedback is was collected from the telephone survey but will be supplemented, where appropriate, with qualitative feedback from the workshops.
Geographical coverage
7.3 Learning providers were asked what geographical area they covered. Almost three-quarters of the providers contacted were only operating in Scotland (see Figure 7.1).
7.4 A higher proportion of learning providers with voluntary/charitable status (96%) and those in the Further Education (FE) sector (100%) said that they only operated in Scotland.
Sector and role
7.5 The majority of learning providers contacted were in the private sector and these were more likely to be operating in more than one part of the UK. Voluntary/charitable organisations were more likely to say that training was not their main activity.
7.6 Of the providers contacted, 29% said that training was not their main activity. This included a higher proportion of those in the voluntary/charitable sector (56%) and 'other' category (50%).
Length of operation and staffing
7.7 Anecdotal evidence suggested that some learning providers have been set up to take advantage of the opportunities provided by ILAs, particularly ICT training. Therefore it was important to establish how long the providers had been operating for.
7.8 Figure 7.3 illustrates that almost three-quarters of providers had been providing training for five years or more. All of the FE and Higher Education (HE) institutions contacted had been operating for five years or more, with lower proportions of those in the private sector (63%) and voluntary/charitable sector (80%).
7.9 Only a small proportion of providers have been operating for less than twelve months, and were more likely to have offered ILA-supported ICT training.
7.10 Learning providers were also asked to identify the number of their staff who were involved in training provision. Figure 7.4 shows that over two-thirds of those contacted had fewer than ten training staff.
7.11 A higher proportion of private (78%) and voluntary/charitable (72%) sector providers had less than 10 employees engaged in the provision of training. A higher proportion of providers from the FE (29%) and HE (56%) sectors had a hundred or more.
Learners
7.12 To help identify the impact on learning providers of suspending ILAs in Scotland, they were asked how many people were currently enrolled on their courses in Scotland. They were also asked whether this figure was higher or lower than on 20 th December 2001 when the ILA system was suspended (see Figure 7.5).
7.13 The only organisations with fewer than 10 learners were those within the private, voluntary/charitable sectors and 'other' sectors. These smaller providers were more likely to be offering non-ICT training. All of the HE institutions, and over half of the FE colleges (56%) said that they had over 250 learners.
7.14 Just over one-quarter (26%) of learning providers said that their current number of learners represented an increase on the number enrolled on their courses as at 20 th December 2001. In contrast, 22% said that this represented a decrease. Higher proportions of those who had been in operation for between one and two years (30%), ICT providers (31%) and distance learning providers (29%) currently had fewer learners on their courses.
7.15 Approaching one-half (46%) of providers said that the number of learners currently on their courses was similar to that at the end of December 2001.
7.16 Providers were then asked to estimate what percentage of learners, who were enrolled on courses with them on 20 th December 2001, had been using an ILA to help fund their learning. According to Figure 7.6, almost one-half (49%) of learning providers felt that account holders had represented less than 10% of their learner numbers, with only 20% saying that account holders had represented more than half of their learners.
7.17 However, Figure 7.7 indicates almost three-fifths (59%) of learning providers said that ILAs had led to an overall increase in their student numbers. Only one learning provider said that their learner numbers had decreased as a result of ILAs.
