Meeting the support needs of learners in Scotland’s colleges: Supporting transition to further learning and employment

Colleges work effectively with external partners to provide specialist support to learners, including those experiencing mental health issues, or those who may come from a care experienced background. The range of partnerships colleges have with external agencies is wide and varied. These partnerships help colleges to meet learner needs. Many of the relationships between college staff and their partners are purposeful and productive and lead to high-quality support for learners. The development and maintenance of this broad range of partnerships by colleges is a significant strength of the sector.

In many local partnership forums, colleges take the lead in external strategic working groups. They work collaboratively with a wide range of referral agencies to support learners with additional needs. Colleges work extensively on issues relating to housing and homelessness, benefits, challenges created by intergenerational poverty and with local authority housing and tenancy requirements. Providing support in this way assists learners to stay on their college programme.

Colleges work very well with a range of partner agencies to help support learners when they are attending college, including those impacted by social and emotional factors related to their home environment, poverty and personal circumstances. There are many examples of strong partnership working supporting learners, including Career Ambassadors NHS, Bridge to Businesses, the Scholar programme, Through Care and After Care and work with universities.

The cost-of-living crisis has had a significant impact on many learners. In one college, this led to an increase in the number of learner referrals by the college to homelessness support projects. These projects provide valuable services, including advice and guidance on housing and welfare benefits, to ensure learners can access the resources they need to continue their college programme.

Collaboration with agencies such as the Department of Work and Pensions (DWP) and SDS are essential to supporting learners with their transition beyond college. They are effective in supporting key groups of learners, providing them with counselling support, job applications assistance, and work placements. These agencies collaborate well with colleges to bring about improvements that support key groups of learners to achieve their learning goals.

Many colleges encourage external support agencies to promote their range of services for learners. Many learners access career advisors and advice and guidance information from a good range of external partners and this helps them make decisions about their future options. SDS partnership agreements with colleges include regular meetings with learners and representatives from the college management team. These discussions provide helpful opportunities to share relevant data such as anticipated leave dates for school leavers, which helps colleges to plan curricula to meet the needs of learners. SDS also support college initiatives through attendance at open days and helping individual learners with their CV writing skills.

However, in a number of colleges joint self-evaluation and sharing of performance data with external partners is not sufficient to enable reflection on the impact of support provided to learners. This affects the ability of colleges and their partners to evaluate the impact of their collaboration on withdrawal and success rates and to plan future arrangements. Most colleges work in partnership with multiple local authorities and schools but rarely evaluate their programmes jointly

Many colleges have a dedicated team which works productively with local schools to promote college programmes within surrounding local authorities. Enhanced support for learners with additional needs over the summer months and prior to entry to college is an essential component of preparing school leavers for college. In most colleges, LSAs work well with school learners and staff to gauge individual needs and create PLSPs if required. In many instances, extensive online resources are available for those learners who cannot or do not wish to attend face-to-face meetings. However, too often school pupils’ expectations of college life are not accurate. As a result, many school leavers withdraw from their college programme early due to a lack of awareness of the vocational and academic challenge demands of their programme

Each year, Scotland welcomes increasing numbers of people who are seeking asylum. Throughout Scotland, college staff are supporting asylum seekers and refugees, many of whom are traumatised from their previous experiences to access ESOL programmes and progress to become college learners. Some areas of the country are designated areas of sanctuary for asylum seekers. Student support advisors at one college have recently completed training to support learners from the growing numbers of asylum seekers in their area. The student advice and support team have recently completed professional learning on trauma informed practice. This helps improve staff understanding of the support needs of asylum seekers and refugees. However, across Scotland demand outstrips the supply for ESOL provision and many learners have lengthy waits to access this support.

All colleges have engaged with a range of partners to support their work with care experienced learners and learners with mental health concerns. All colleges work effectively with external partners such as Hub for Success for care experienced learners. Through arrangements such as early referrals and support for non-completion of applications, college staff help improve support and outcomes for care experienced learners. Who Cares? Scotland delivers training sessions in many colleges on corporate parenting responsibilities. This helps ensure colleges take responsibility for the welfare and development of their care experienced learners.

Colleges work extensively with agencies such as Women's Aid to provide professional learning for staff on trauma-informed practice and domestic abuse. However, despite the increased focus on and support for learners with a care experienced background, outcomes for this group continue to be significantly lower than the rest of the learner population.

Learners highlight how college links to partners providing mental health services are very positive. NHS mental health liaison officers are able to offer crisis intervention and further support. Learners and their college support workers are able to re-evaluate learning plans and provide tailored one-to-one support helping learners to progress with their studies. However, colleges found some partnerships of limited value and preferred to utilise in-house counselling staff to support their learners.

Increasingly, colleges implement programmes to provide a range of career development resources for the parents of young learners. Participants can access support services to help them achieve their employment goals. For example, delivery of the Multiply Programme helps to boost maths and numeracy skills for work and daily life. Other projects such as homework clubs for parents and secondary school age children are proving successful approaches to family learning. The use of online skills-boost courses allows learners to work at a time and pace that suits their lifestyle

Most colleges have sophisticated management information resources to track learner needs and performance and demonstrate how effective the implementation of support measures have been. This data is also used well to inform staff about learners’ caring responsibilities, helping them to respond flexibly to these needs by extending deadlines or providing resources for learners to work from home. This focus is vital in ensuring there is equity of success for all learners. For example, some colleges can demonstrate lower levels of attainment for learners who have a PLSP in comparison to learners who do not require support. However, this approach is not consistent across all colleges.

Improved collaboration between support and teaching staff is contributing to the successful implementation of improved data tracking and monitoring. In some colleges, strong collaboration between support staff and lecturers to track learners’ progress has led to a reduction in learner withdrawal rates. This approach has helped to reduce the gap in attainment for those learners who have declared a disability and those who have not, which has narrowed in the last few years for both higher education (HE) and further education (FE) learners.

Almost all colleges have well-established internal arrangements for evaluating the quality of provision and to plan for improvement. These arrangements are used well by most staff to assess the effectiveness of support provided to learners. College managers evaluate learner support arrangements well. They draw on these findings to influence policies, implement procedures and deploy staff to meet the needs of a growing number of learners who have a wide range of support needs. They use feedback from staff, learners and key stakeholders to assess the capacity of the college to deliver additional support to meet the needs of learners. Following extensive learner consultation and a comprehensive review of student support, the senior leadership team in one college have established a framework for learner success. This approach allows the college to interrogate data to understand better how learners with additional needs perform and to make improvements based on accurate data. Staff in almost all curriculum teams meet regularly to discuss learner progression to identify those learners who are causing concern, those who may not remain on their programme, or those who are not progressing sufficiently well. These meetings enable staff to follow-up with learners or guidance staff and other staff members where appropriate. Learners and staff value this approach as helping to identify undisclosed learner needs and discuss potential support arrangements.

Learner performance data is evaluated effectively by most staff to provide information on why programmes have significant drop-out or where learners are not attaining their award. In the best instances, college staff combine data relating to the performance of a learner, or a cohort of learners from multiple sources. This coordination of data can include information on learners using the Scottish Index of Multiple Deprivation (SIMD), attainment and retention rates, and whether individual learners have specific additional needs. In this way, colleges can plan support for learners who need it most and put in place interventions which mitigate against low attainment or retention rates.

In many colleges, support staff work alongside teaching staff to reflect on what is working well and to identify trends and improvements in their support for learners. For example, in one college, joint planning for improvement is used well by staff to monitor and evaluate individual learner and programme performance. As a result, college staff understand better the issues around additional support needs. They identify specific support mechanisms that are working well and how they connect to the performance of the learners and the college overall.

In one college, teaching and support staff analyse data to track learners with additional support needs and cross-reference this data with college performance indicators. This is helping to focus support on specific groups of learners. Through this approach staff have been able to highlight the increasing volume of full-time learners who declare a disability, mental health condition, or specific learning difficulty. In colleges where evaluation of support for learners is done well, teaching and support staff work collaboratively to support learner transition between and across education, training and employment opportunities. Evaluation arrangements involve support staff and teaching staff jointly and take good account of the views of learners and partners. However, in a few colleges, staff do not evaluate sufficiently the impact of support services on learner success. In these colleges, evaluative activities do not engage teaching and support staff in jointly evaluating the impact of support on individual learners and learner groups. This reduces the ability of staff to work collaboratively to improve and enhance the quality of learning support services and demonstrate the impact they are having on learner outcomes.

Ongoing development of the curriculum based on reflection and evaluation by colleges and partners and the integration of support for learners is an important element for all colleges. Curriculum review arrangements are used well by managers to respond to performance data such as declining recruitment to full-time programmes and low retention and attainment rates. This can lead to adaptations to the design and content of programmes and in some cases, reduction in their duration. Staff also widen the range of Scottish Credit and Qualifications Framework (SCQF) programme levels available to ease access and improve progression opportunities to help overcome barriers to accessing education. In one college outdoor learning is now prioritised to provide learners with diverse and meaningful learning opportunities which foster critical thinking, problem-solving, teamwork skills, and promote positive mental wellbeing. In another college, the introduction of environmental awareness provision helps learners to connect with nature and gain the benefits of working in a natural setting. These approaches are supporting learners’ wellbeing and improving their mental health, reducing social isolation, and enhancing skills development and progression opportunities.

Formal feedback arrangements for learners to evaluate the provision of support services are used well by staff in most colleges. Through regular course team meetings or the involvement of student associations, colleges capture feedback from learners about the support they receive. Feedback is then shared with faculties and support areas to support planning for improvement to the quality of services to support learning. College staff provide multiple opportunities for learners to reflect and feedback on their programme experiences. Learner feedback is used effectively by support and teaching staff for self-evaluation and action-planning for improvement at a local and institutional level. Action planning in this way ensures good awareness and understanding by staff of emerging learner challenges and the sharing of effective practice. In one college, fidget toys were introduced to all campuses as a result of student feedback on the different measures to support neurodiverse students.

Almost all colleges identify the need for all staff to be adequately trained in specific areas of support, including mental health. However, this is not yet consistent in all colleges and not yet mandatory for all staff, which limits the consistency of staff approach to learners who present with mental health challenges.

Ensuring equity in attainment and achievement is a key priority for colleges in Scotland. While some progress has been made in narrowing attainment gaps, significant disparities persist, with success rates varying widely across colleges and learner groups. Addressing these challenges is critical to improving outcomes and fostering inclusivity across the sector.

Rates of successful completion for learners with a declared disability have declined in the last year, and over the last four years. However, the gap in the rate of successful completion between learners who have a declared disability and those learners who do not, has narrowed

in the last four years. Overall, less than two thirds of learners who declare a disability successfully complete their programme. This is below the rate of successful completion for all learners and for those who do not declare a disability.

Rates of successful completion for learners on full-time programmes who declare a disability fell for both HE and FE in the last year and have declined over time. The overall success rate for full-time learners declaring a disability varies between colleges. This variation is up to 15% for HE and 13.5% for FE between colleges with the highest and lowest success rates for full-time learners with a disability.

Full-time learners declaring a disability related to hearing impairment, or a social impairment have higher rates of attainment. Learners with disabilities related to a physical impairment, a mental health condition or visual impairment have much lower levels of success.

Whilst the rate of successful completion for care-experienced learners has risen by 2.9% overall, the gap between overall full-time FE and HE learner success rates is 7.9% and 10.1%, respectively. Rates of learner completion with partial success have remained steady. The number of care experienced learners who withdraw from their programme has decreased by 2% from the previous year.

Overall, the rate of successful completion for learners from the 10% most deprived postcodes has increased by 2.5% from the previous year, and the gap in attainment between the most deprived learners and the rest of the learner population has decreased by 1%. The rate of learner withdrawal for this group has decreased by 3.6% from the previous year. However, the gap in attainment between the most deprived learners and the rest of the learner population varies in individual colleges.

Whilst some colleges have high rates of learner successful completion, there remains significant variation in learner retention and attainment rates between colleges. Seven colleges are below or significantly below, the sector average for full-time FE learner attainment. The sector continues to have significant challenges around overall learner retention rates and to a lesser extent, overall rates of learner partial success. By addressing the challenges experienced by the increasing numbers of learners with additional needs, the sector can take steps to improve rates of learner successful completion overall.