Informed Scotland February 2016 – Apprenticeships, announcements & action plans

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During any pre- ‘pre-election’ period there’s always a rush for those in power to make announcements before business goes into temporary stasis. With the Scottish Parliament Elections approaching in May, learning & skills activity has been ramping up for a while; there was no let-up in February.

The Education (Scotland) Bill was passed, and the Scottish Parliament’s Committees were busy publishing reports on Race, Ethnicity & Employment, Work, Wages & Wellbeing, and Post-Study Work Visas.

Scottish Apprenticeship Week took place earlier than usual, presumably to avoid the elections. As well as the latest Modern Apprentice statistics from Skills Development Scotland, there were surveys by Scottish Gas and Prudential, a summary of the role of colleges from Colleges Scotland, and a new APlayer video channel from Apprenticeships in Scotland.

Then there were action plans from Scottish Enterprise on Manufacturing and the Scottish Funding Council on Gender. Plus UCAS’s annual statistics and lots of new courses, centres of excellence, toolkits and partnerships…

Reports worth delving into this month include FSB’s School Ties on business engagement with schools, Nesta & Tech City’s Tech Nation 2016, Eurydice’s review of Entrepreneurship Education in Europe, and NCUB’s Changing State of Knowledge Exchange.

Favourite tweet from a subscriber: @tonyfinnA ‘Well done. Issue 37 is a mine of information.’

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