The vital linchpin in Scotland’s education ecosystem
Scotland’s college sector is on the brink, says City of Glasgow College CEO Paul Little.
In well over three decades in the college sector, I have rarely known a tougher period. Public finances across the UK – and especially so in Scotland – are extremely stretched. The combined impact of unprecedented real-term funding cuts, recent high inflation and running costs, exacerbated by spiralling pay demands, mean that colleges now have to work exponentially harder to protect student learning, support the wellbeing and livelihoods of our staff, and act as civic anchors for metropolitan, regional, and island economies.
We are also tackling chronic and acute skill shortages, particularly among struggling small and medium-sized enterprises and those economic sectors still blighted from Brexit and the pandemic. As tertiary institutions, colleges play a unique role in safeguarding multiple lifeline pathways for many learners into both college and university education. They provide crucial support for the disadvantaged many rather than the enabled few.
Funding choices have funding consequences
But now, in a period of economic turmoil and compromised by a loss of autonomy, the cessation of borrowing powers to renew our digital infrastructure and estates, and unable to retain year-end surpluses, colleges limp along with characteristic stoicism. They have been ill-served by the lingering inertia of historical funding settlements into which are baked the bifurcated hierarchy of Scottish post-school learning. An ambitious new tertiary system is being held back by protecting a financially unsustainable status quo.
I fear Scotland is sleepwalking into a vocationally light future, an underpowered skills system unable to respond to the next crisis or the opportunities afforded by a renaissance in shipbuilding, green ports, or the transition to net zero.
Previous funding cuts have led to the dismantling of adult learning, teaching training colleges, City & Guilds craft qualifications, and night school. What’s now at stake is the permanent loss of specialist, professional education courses and significant chunks of practical hands-on learning as apprenticeship training slowly declines.
Funding choices have funding consequences. Encouraged by the Scottish Government, colleges are thinking the unthinkable, planning reduced intakes and fewer learner choices. Meanwhile, college trustees are asked to make impossible choices between offsetting core funding with the loss of valuable teaching expertise.
Having had more than their fair share of reform for over a decade, colleges have systematically pared away their management structures. With payroll costs accounting for over three quarters of overall college expenditure, we are being forced into teaching cuts. As the Cumberford-Little report identified in 2020, there are alarming disparities in the historical funding settlements for schools and universities compared with those for colleges.¹ If Scotland continues with lopsided reform of its tertiary funding and tertiary institutions, one can only conclude that vocational education is being deprioritised.
Role of colleges in economic resilience
In a much-contracted college sector, who will step up to tackle future economic downturns, to upskill and reskill at pace, to plug skills gaps and prevent skills shortages, and to reprioritise STEM education and lifetime learning? Will there be sufficient guardians of those ladders of opportunity and those lifeline pathways?
The Institute for Public Policy Research (IPPR) social value report on City of Glasgow College proved we are at the forefront of tackling child poverty,² while Fraser of Allander’s economic impact report spelt out our £6 billion contribution to the Scottish economy over the long-term.³ Meanwhile, the global excellence benchmarking council, EFQM, ranked our college as a ‘7-Diamond’ organisation for global excellence and innovation, with the highest marks ever for any educational institution in their 40-year history.⁴ Most recently, the college secured the Queen’s Anniversary Prize in 2023 – the highest award conferred on a tertiary sector institution – for life-saving research into oxygen depletion in enclosed spaces on-board ships.
As Scotland’s largest and most successful college, we are asking for fewer strings, fewer separate pots of (reduced) funding and for an equitable share of core tertiary funding, befitting our contribution to Scotland.
Dr Paul Little FRSE, Principal and Chief Executive Officer, City of Glasgow College; RSE Education Committee member.
This article originally appeared in ReSourcE summer 2024.
The RSE’s blog series offers personal views on a variety of issues. These views are not those of the RSE and are intended to offer different perspectives on a range of current issues.
References
¹ Cumberland-Little Report, City of Glasgow College & Edinburgh College: bit.ly/cumblittlereport
² A Baseline Social Value Assessment for City of Glasgow College: bit.ly/IPPRsocimpactreport
³ The economic contribution of colleges in Scotland: bit.ly/FAIcolleges
⁴ European Foundation for Quality Management (EFQM) awards: bit.ly/EQFMawardsGCC
