Objectives
Priorities for the Year
[Extract from Annual Event, July 2005]
The day was a demonstration of the importance of partnership working.
Linda Hockey explained the objectives for the coming year for the Learning and Skills Council. Linda said that we must continue to improve provision, raise standards and look at how we can improve the offer to people at work and to employers. Of course, widening participation and working to get adults back into learning also remained key priorities.
Steve Ferris from the Learning Partnership talked about the unifying theme of the day as championing learners and building effective partnerships to help plan and deliver high quality learning. This meant working together with planning and funding agencies, particularly the learning and skills council, wherever possible.
All of our activity should be put in context. We are about building learning communities within which individuals, communities and employers can collaborate. Our task is to link planning and funding as strongly as we can to learner needs. To use a bit of jargon, what we want is “demand led learning”.
5 Themes for 2005
Heather Maggs founding Director of the marketing agency Roundhouse and Chair of the Learning Partnership talked about the coming challenge. This last year the Partnership had consolidated itself as a relatively new organisation. Whereas the Partnership had been administered by a host organisation, now it was an independent, autonomous entity with its own board of directors responsible for its own affairs. It had taken time to create new structures, employ staff and agree a three-year strategy. Now the Partnership wanted to move forward, provide partners with a forum for discussing priorities in learning and for taking those priorities up with the planning and funding agencies to strengthen our joint commitment to get the best for local learners.
The Partnership had been consulting on it’s 5 priorities:
- Strengthening the network
- Building learning communities
- Widening access and participation
- Innovation in Learning
- Listening to the voice of learners
What we do in 2005/2006 will be shaped and guided by these priorities. A paper on our priorities will be circulated to every delegate. Please tell us what you think. Join the debate. And remember. Together we can get the job done!
