As the academic year draws to a close our Chief Executive Rob Wye’s latest regional visits provided further opportunity for colleagues in the sector to share their views, and discuss and debate LSIS’s future role.

Rob met with over 80 principals, heads, senior managers and sector partner representatives in meetings in the South West, South East and London.

He shared with them LSIS’s current plans and its objectives for the operational year 2011 – 2012, inviting colleagues who attended to comment on LSIS current performance and provide ideas for growth and development as the service enters a new phase in its work on behalf of the sector.

Rob reassured colleagues about LSIS’s future programme portfolio and what form this would take by outlining the five strategic platforms which will underpin LSIS’s operational plan for next year.

Five Strategic Platforms

1. Improving teaching and learning – inspiring practice, improving effectiveness.
2. Developing capability and capacity for innovative and effective curriculum design and development.
3. Enhancing leadership, governance and management for innovation, improvement and change.
4. Facilitating improvement through efficiency, innovation and new ways of working.
5. Supporting the sector to shape the future – using policy analysis, research and strategic intelligence, locally and nationally.

He invited colleagues to discuss their views on LSIS within their regions and its performance at national level, asking what they felt was going well and what things should be done differently.

Rob‘s first regional visit was in the South West on the 22 June where he met Skills Funding Agency area relationship directors Peter Marsh and Paul Lucken to share updates and discuss continued collaborative working in the region. He also attended an AoC Principals and Heads meeting and met with representatives of Dorset and Somerset Training Provider Network.

South West colleagues were very positive about LSIS’s role and profile in the region. They indicated they wanted the new LSIS offer to be more innovative and discussed the possibility of LSIS offering more bespoke support to organisations rather than themed programme areas. They had a very positive view of peer review and development activity overall but said it was time to refresh and revisit groups and themes in light of new ways of working and sector challenges.

Rob’s next visit to the South East at Sussex South Downs College on 8 July provided the opportunity to meet with representatives of sector partner organisations and leaders from a range of further education, work-based, adult and community learning providers.

South East colleagues were also interested in the idea of developing and extending peer review and development work possibly through on-line systems. They called for LSIS to look into providing on-line continuing professional development opportunities and to consider providing secondment or work shadowing within and outside the sector. There was also a request for LSIS support in brokering partnership and other working opportunities.

On July 11 at the College of Haringey, Enfield and North East London Rob again met leaders from the London local colleges, work-based learning and adult education providers and senior representatives of the AoC and JISC regional offices.

Here colleagues were concerned that the sector could be in an era of maintaining quality rather than improving it and questioned whether we should all be exploring a different quality framework which was more business-minded in exploring all aspects of activity. They suggested looking at how other countries involve stakeholders in developing the curriculum.

Then on July 15 it was a return to the South West for the regional conversation meeting which was at the Flybe Training Academy, at Exeter airport, where Rob chaired an informal session. Attendees included representatives from colleges, and voluntary and community, work-based learning and adult education providers, as well as senior representatives from sector partner organisations.

The role of LSIS regional development managers was praised by colleagues, who also indicated that the regional response fund (RRF) had been beneficial not only in helping to address the region’s priorities, but also in bringing people together in meeting common aims through regional steering and planning groups. There was praise for the style and delivery of the LSIS national policy seminars and colleagues welcomed the move to consult and engage in a dialogue at these events. Innovation and efficiency was seen as a key driver in continued progress and colleagues requested LSIS shared more widely the outcomes and case studies of its Resource Utilisation programmes.

“The whole regional visit programme has proved tremendously effective in informing our role as a sector-owned and sector-led body,” said Rob. “As the current academic year draws to a close, I very much look forward to continuing our dialogue as we work together to meet the challenge of driving quality and improvement across the sector from September onwards.”