V Levels will come into place in 2027 in an effort to simplify the current system and ‘open up more high quality routes for young people’.
They’ll sit alongside A Levels and T Levels, replacing a wide range of other post-16 qualifications (approximately 900).
While A Levels will continue to offer a more traditional academic route and T Levels a technical one, V levels will provide a vocational pathway, aimed at students who want to explore different sectors before deciding where to specialise.
Will V Levels plug widening skills gap or create more issues?
City & Guilds welcomed the news of the new qualifications on its social channels, noting that V Levels could hold the key to getting more young people into education, training and employment, especially for industries with widening skills gaps.
Amy Wilkinson, food leadership coach and podcaster, shared similar feelings.
“V Levels have the potential to have a real effect on how we attract and retain talent into the food industry in the future,” she told Food Manufacture.
“It is becoming increasingly difficult to recruit into the sector, not least because a lot of young people don’t understand the diversity of the roles and options within the industry (and also may not be as excited by them as other industries).”
Myles McGinley, managing director of Cambridge OCR shared similar optimism, saying that if V Levels are ‘done right’, they could provide a “tremendous opportunity for young people”.
But he noted that the educational sector needs time to collaborate and develop qualifications that meet the needs of students, and must heed lessons from previous vocational qualifications.
Bill Watkin, chief executive of the Sixth Form Colleges Association, was less enthusiastic however, emphasising concerns over funding and gaps that may arise with the new system.
“Today’s proposals do not address the immediate and overwhelming concern among colleges and schools about the planned defunding of applied general qualifications (AGQs) such as BTECs from next year,” he said.
“We continue to urge ministers to allow students to enrol on AGQs while the new suite of V Levels is in development, to avoid a damaging transition to the new qualification system.
“The proposed V levels appear to be limited to one size (equivalent to one A level). That will not fill the gap left by the 97 AGQs, that are available in two and three A level equivalent sizes and which cover broad vocational areas, without being tied to ‘job standards’.”
F&B industry must get involved
Wilkinson also noted threats more closely associated with the F&B sector: “There are some real risks to the industry if the subjects that are created for these more vocational A Level equivalent qualifications aren’t as relevant or don’t have a clear path into the industry.
“So far we can only see (in what’s been published) generic ‘engineering and manufacturing’ or ‘science’ subjects – if food content isn’t visible, we risk further disconnect in that food manufacturing may feel less relevant or exciting than other industries.”
To turn this risk into an opportunity, she calls on for talent development teams from the food and drink industry to get involved.
“Talk to colleges and the sector bodies and make sure the next wave of qualifications reflects the modern food industry,” she urged.
“It’s our chance to showcase that it can be exciting, high-tech, sustainable, and purpose driven. Having served on the Technical Education Advisory Board for NCFE, I’ve seen first-hand how complex it is to design qualifications that truly meet the needs of both learners and employers. So now is the time for businesses to get involved.”
She continued: “The ambition behind both T Levels and now V Levels is to simplify routes and raise quality but there are other factors to consider – such as apprenticeships, which are currently a strong pipeline into the industry for some food manufacturing businesses, so we need to be mindful of how these different further education routes interact and how uptake on each affects the other.”
In short, Wilkinson notes there is a real opportunity for the food and drink manufacturing sector to shape the future talent pipeline by getting involved in the design. If we sit back and do nothing, we’re taking a roll of the dice in an already fragile industry.
As the well-known microbiologist Louis Pastuer once said: Fortune favours the prepared mind.
