Chapter 8: Social Value of College Learning
As well as the direct economic benefits that learners derive from college courses, there are wider societal benefits.
Colleges are a community resource whether that be, for example, the home of an emergency control centre for the Isle of Lewis or as a venue in Dundee for community participation in dance and drama.
Also, participating in lifelong learning can help individuals take an active part in civic life, help them lead a more sustainable lifestyle, and improve their health and wellbeing.
College learning can help deliver the Scottish Executive's six Closing the Opportunity Gap objectives, which were launched on July 12, 2004, to:
- increase the chances of sustained employment for vulnerable and disadvantaged groups - in order to lift them permanently out of poverty;
- improve the confidence and skills of the most disadvantaged children and young people - in order to provide them with the greatest chance of avoiding poverty when they leave school;
- reduce the vulnerability of low income families to financial exclusion and multiple debts - in order to prevent them becoming over-indebted and/or to lift them out of poverty;
- regenerate the most disadvantaged neighbourhoods - in order that people living there can take advantage of job opportunities and improve their quality of life;
- increase the rate of improvement of the health status of people living in the most deprived communities - in order to improve their quality of life, including their employability prospects; and
- improve access to high quality services for the most disadvantaged groups and individuals in rural communities - in order to improve their quality of life and enhance their access to opportunity.
Colleges' role in the community, working in partnership with other agencies including local authority Community Learning and Development services, and voluntary and community organisations, helps to promote social inclusion and encourages community activities.
As the Scottish Executive's Lifelong Learning Strategy explains, " We live in a society where diversity of background, culture, knowledge and skills should be valued and nurtured. We want a society where people actively engage in their communities, local and national, and learning can enable people to do that. Lifelong learning contributes to the development of society through the achievement of other social goals such as civic participation, sustainable development, improved health and wellbeing, reduced crime and greater social cohesion".
The Leitch Review of Skills - Skills in the UK: The long-term challenge, Interim Report19 found that "there are important links between skills and wider social outcomes, such as health, crime and social cohesion".
Case Study: Closing the Opportunity Gap
As A Smart, Successful Scotland explains, "economic growth and tackling poverty and disadvantage go hand in hand. If worklessness and poverty are not properly tackled, they will act as a brake on economic growth and the potential contribution to the economy of those currently inactive will remain untapped."
Coatbridge College has actively sought to collaborate with partners and to involve itself in various projects that encourage those in the 'Not in Education, Employment, or Training ( NEET)' group into participation. Transition, both into and out of college is a key theme and one which particularly addresses the needs of 'hard to engage' clients.
To help the long-term unemployed the College has adopted a 'Start Anytime' approach, which tailors courses to the needs of the individual student. Students are encouraged to attend at a time that suits them and agreed indicators of success are used to measure progress. Both Jobcentre Plus and Routes to Work staff work with the college on a formal and planned basis. The overwhelming majority of 'Start Anytime' students are on benefits at the start of their college life.
Catherine is a typical example of someone progressing from the NEET group on to college who ultimately wants to gain employment. She joined the college 'Start Anytime' course in 2003 after a long absence from study and work following redundancy. She was very unsure of her career path and knew that she would need additional help in order to succeed.
Early in her study Catherine was referred to Learning Support and after screening it was confirmed that she had dyslexia. She worked with both the Adult Literacy Tutor and Learning Support Manager in order to help her with written work.
With continued learning support Catherine successfully completed other college courses that have led up to her returning in 2005-06 to study for an HNC in Business and Office Administration. She looks forward to gaining employment at the end of her course.
Case Study: Community Regeneration
As The Framework for Economic Development in Scotland explains " Raising economic activity rates in [Scotland's most deprived communities] can contribute to the productive potential of the economy as a whole. Closing the opportunity gap in this way can make a real contribution to economic growth."
John Wheatley College primarily operates in some of Scotland's most disadvantaged communities in Glasgow's East End and Greater Easterhouse. As a consequence of its community development role, it is represented on the Boards of the Greater Easterhouse Social Inclusion Partnership; the East End Social Inclusion Partnership; and the Routes Out (of Prostitution) Thematic Social Inclusion Partnership.
The College's Board of Management dedicates around £500,000 of its staffing budget to address community-based learning. These funds enable local community groups to commission it to provide services which are immediately responsive to community need. The project operates in Glasgow's East End, Greater Easterhouse and parts of North Lanarkshire. It has enabled projects, such as the Hidden History programme run by the Tronda Local History Group to research and to publish an alternative history to Greater Easterhouse.
The College has led in the establishment of an extensive network of community-based learning centres throughout Greater Easterhouse. This is supported by a high quality, high capacity ICT system which is based in the College. This network, the Greater Easterhouse Learning Network, supports initiatives in adult education, vocational training and youth work (provision ranges from provision for local employers in an industrial estate to a joint initiative to support recovering drug users).
In addition the college has operated training programmes for local people that guarantee a job to those who successfully complete their course. For example, a scheme run in association with TESCO specifically targeted those on incapacity benefit (amongst other excluded groups) to prepare them successfully to return to employment in a new superstore in Shettleston. A larger scale project also assisted local people to gain access to jobs created in the Glasgow Fort development. A range of initiatives, run in association with local development companies, enabled local people to secure over 75% of the new retail jobs which were created.
Case Study: Partnerships With Community Learning and Development
Through its extensive engagement with a range of key partners, the College was effective in playing a strategic part in promoting skills development and economic regeneration in the local economies in which it operated.
In November 2000 the first Community Learning Strategy was launched in North Lanarkshire. This first period saw the setting up of the Community Learning Partnership - involving North Lanarkshire Council, local voluntary organisations and a range of other partners - and significant development of partnership activities through joint projects, marketing, celebration of learners' achievements, successful joint funding bids and the creation of strategic and local learning plans. Cumbernauld College and its partner colleges, Motherwell and Coatbridge, were instrumental in promoting and supporting these vital early stages of development. HMIE highlighted this work as good practice as part of its 2003 review of Cumbernauld College.
"The College participated effectively as a partner in a broad range of courses with a variety of agencies and key bodies. It identified that successful partnerships were those where partners had clear objectives, high levels of trust and potentially productive outputs. For example, the alliance with Community Learning and Development and Careers Scotland in North Lanarkshire promoted access and participation, numeracy, literacy training and employability as essential features of the community learning plan."
In January 2004 the Scottish Executive released a major publication Working Together to Build Stronger Communities. This document identified Community Learning and Development as central to the community planning agenda recognising its role in regeneration activities particularly within the most deprived communities and the need to work closely in a developmental way with local groups. Throughout this period Cumbernauld College developed a structure of partnership working, mainly as a result of its location in Central Scotland, recognising the strength of such relationships. HMIE noted further partnerships involving the college across Dunbartonshire:
"The 'Learning in the Community' collaborative Project (with East Dunbartonshire Council and West Dunbartonshire Council, Anniesland College and Clydebank College, as well as Scottish Enterprise Dunbartonshire) demonstrated the value of partnership working underpinned by a close sense of purpose and regular evaluation."
This level of engagement provided enormous benefits to all participants and supported by Communities Scotland, the work continues to develop and grow in stature. HMIE concluded its summary of the good practice identified at Cumbernauld College as:
"Through its extensive engagement with a range of key partners, the College was effective in playing a strategic part in promoting skills development and economic regeneration in the local economies in which it operated."
"there are important links between skills and wider social outcomes, such as health, crime and social cohesion"
Leitch Review of Skills -Skills in the UK: The long-term challenge, Interim Report
The Review concluded that skills can help families manage their finances, and enable parents to help their children with their homework.
They can impact on health either directly, by providing information on improving health, or indirectly, by improving income and making a healthy lifestyle more affordable. The review found that health problems, including depression and obesity, are more common in unskilled and low-income households.
Also, offenders are far less likely to have qualifications and hence tend to have poorer pay and employment prospects: more than half of offenders have no qualifications, compared to 15% in the population as a whole. Skills can affect crime by improving an individual's employment, pay and progression opportunities and hence the opportunity cost of offending, and by impacting on income inequality.
The Review also found while skills were not the whole answer to social cohesion there is " evidence to suggest that those with higher skill levels have, on average, greater levels of racial tolerance and higher levels of participation in the political process."
The case studies in this section illustrate the social value of college in four specific areas of college activity (community regeneration, closing the opportunity gap, support for vulnerable young people and prisoner rehabilitation), though clearly colleges' wider activities contribute to the social impact of colleges too.
It is noted that the work of some colleges in promoting community regeneration and in the provision of enhanced learner support is in part currently supported by financial assistance from European Structural Funds (both European Regional Development Funds and European Social Funds) and Local Regeneration Funds. If colleges are unable in the future to access these sorts of funds, it could reduce their capacity to make as much of a difference.
Case Study: Support for Vulnerable Young People
As A Smart, Successful Scotland explains, "there are too many young people who are not in education, employment or training".
More Choices, More Chances: A Strategy to Reduce the Proportion of Young People not in Education, Employment or Training ( NEET) in Scotland outlines there are 35,000 (13.5%) young people in Scotland between the ages of 16 and 19 who are NEET. Of these about 20,000 will need some additional support to access and sustain opportunities in the labour market.
Aberdeen College works in partnership with Aberdeen Foyer. Foyers provide, in the short term, housing and ancillary services for vulnerable young people (usually 16-25) - the homeless, those with disabilities, those with a history of offending, those leaving care, those recovering from some kind of habituation or dependency.
In 2004-05, the College catered for 315 Foyer clients. The young people were involved in learning experiences that developed their self-confidence and self-esteem, an understanding of healthy and safe lifestyles, and, where appropriate, employability skills. Wherever possible programmes included certificated outcomes so that the participants achieved recognised qualifications in Core Skills or relevant vocational elements.
In 2004 " Tracy" attended a 12 week intensive course designed to increase confidence and stability through lifestyle change. The College delivers training in subjects as diverse as Information Technology training, confidence building, and exercise and fitness to provide routine and develop new skills.
When " Tracy" first joined the course, she was extremely nervous about committing to the programme and meeting other students, as she had cut herself off from other people due to a background of prolonged substance misuse. After a few weeks, confidence in her own abilities began to grow, particularly in Information Technology classes, where she went from being a total beginner to someone confidently using Word to create her own CV, and in the fitness class where she found the motivation to make regular exercise a part of everyday life.
It was through her newly-discovered interest in fitness that " Tracy" took the lead in a number of health initiatives, assisting the health team by providing motivation and support to others.
After successfully completing the programme she returned as an assistant volunteer team leader. " Tracy" has now progressed to full-time employment with an agency dealing with clients from a similar background to her own. In her role as an assistant support worker she now has the confidence to help others and is currently engaging in job-related training at Aberdeen College as part of her staff development.
Case Study: Prisoner Rehabilitation
Gaining the skills and qualifications offenders need to make a positive contribution in society requires that the content and quality of learning programmes in prisons are, where possible, comparable to that of the community. The delivery of 'labour market' relevant, high quality learning, skills and employability education and training within prisons is key to improving this position.
In April 2005 Scottish Prison Service ( SPS) contracts were awarded to Motherwell College and Lauder College to deliver programmes in the following areas:
- Adult literacy and core skills;
- Computing and Information Technology;
- Art and Design;
- Cookery;
- First-Aid;
- Health and Safety;
- General Education;
- Languages;
- Leisure subjects;
- Mathematics, and
- Music.
Approximately 30% to 45% of offenders currently engage in education through prison learning centres at any one time. In addition, limited opportunities are provided for long-term offenders nearing the end of their sentence to attend colleges to undertake day-release courses.
In addition to providing education programmes to meet offenders' learning needs, the colleges also provide support to Vocational Training and Physical Education undertaken by SPS officer/instructors. A new addition to the contract from the previous education contract is that contractors are now also expected to provide employability support to offenders in conjunction with key partners such as Jobcentre Plus.