Concern for apprentices who are fast approaching the end of their apprenticeships is growing, following analysis by FE Week that showed that there are currently 1,460 apprentices on courses for which no end-point assessment is available. Additionally, just under a third of all approved apprenticeship standards – 61 out of 194 – have yet to find a single approved final assessment organisation, while a further 57 have only one. AELP comments ‘this is not a new issue and one which has been regularly flagged across the sector since the advent of the new standards system. Both DfE and IfA have consistently been reassuring that this would not become a point of concern, but as feared, it now is. It is inconceivable that such a situation would have been allowed to arise in the academic (A-level) stream and urgent measures are now required to ensure fair treatment of those apprentices who began their standards in good faith’.
Find out more about how to create successful EPA arrangements at SCTP’s forthcoming EPA seminar on the 7th November.