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In the last four years McKinsey and Company have produced two highly influential reports on how to improve school systems. The first McKinsey report "How the world's best-performing school systems come out on top" has since its publication in 2007 been used to justify change in educational policy and practice in England and many other countries. The second "How the world's most improved school systems keep getting better," released in late 2010, is a more substantial tome which is likely to have an even greater impact. This article subjects both reports to a close examination and finds them deficient in 10 respects. The detailed critique is preceded by a few general remarks about their reception, influence and main arguments. (Contains 4 figures and 13 notes.)

The identification and dissemination of "good practice" has for years been a central part of the Government's strategy for radical change of the education system. "Good practice", however, is no longer good enough, nor is "best practice". The requirement now for post-compulsory education and training (from which all our examples are taken) is nothing less than "excellent practice for all". This article critically examines these highly significant shifts in the rhetoric of policy, finds them wanting and argues that we need to face up to the complexities involved in deciding not only what is "excellent practice" but also in working through all the stages which would be needed to transmit it throughout the sector. In particular, recent documents from the Quality Improvement Agency and the Learning and Skills Council on the pursuit of excellence are critically appraised. The views of those practitioners who are part of the authors' project in the Economic and Social Research Council's Teaching and Learning Research Programme are also explained in relation to "good practice". The authors attempt to explain the frenetic activity of politicians and policy makers in this sector, and end by moving from critique to construction by considering what can be rescued from the inherently contestable notion of "good practice", and, in doing so, draw heavily on the work of Robin Alexander. (Contains 1 figure and 11 notes.)

This article considers what the learning and skills system would look like if, in line with the rhetoric of ministers, teaching and learning really were made the first priority of policy. The author draws out some of the implications for teachers and managers, and reflects on how the relationship between tutors and learners can be enhanced. He discusses how educators can create and maintain virtuous spirals in their relationships with learners. He urges colleagues to drop the current preoccupation with a nonscientific movement, which goes by the acronym of VAKT--the unwarranted belief that learners can be divided by their learning preferences into four groups: (1) visual; (2) auditory; (3) kinaesthetic; or (4) tactile learners. Then he considers the potential for improving learning by concentrating on feedback. Next, he examines briefly what models tutors tend to have of students' minds. Finally, the author briefly introduces a more effective and collegial way of improving practice than attempting to spread "good practice". (Contains a list of 9 books for further reading.)

With the formation of the Learning and Skills Council (LSC) in 2001, a single post-16 learning and skills sector (LSS) was created for the first time in England with huge potential to support lifelong learning. It was this momentous change that prompted the authors in 2004 to begin a study entitled "The impact of policy on learning and inclusion in the new learning and skills sector," funded by the Economic and Social Research Council as part of its Teaching and Learning Research Programme. Three and a half years later, as the authors were completing their research, the unified LSS was being dismantled, to be replaced by an age-based bifurcated system. The Department for Children, Schools and Families (DCSF) took over responsibility for all education up to the age of 19 and the Department for Innovation, Universities and Skills (DIUS) was charged with the education of those over the age of 19. In this article, the authors reflect on the findings from their research and what its relevance might be for the new arrangements.

The TLRP project reported on in this article attempts to understand how the Learning and Skills sector functions. It traces how education and training policy percolates down through many levels in the English system and how these levels interact, or fail to interact. The authors first focus upon how policy impacts upon the interests of three groups of learners: unemployed people in adult and community learning centres, adult employees in work-based learning and younger learners on Level 1 and Level 2 courses in further education. They focus next upon how professionals in these three settings struggle to cope with two sets of pressures upon them: those exerted by government and a broader set of professional, institutional and local factors. They describe in particular how managers and tutors mediate national policy and translate it (and sometimes mistranslate it) into local plans and practices. Finally, the authors criticise the new government model of public service reform for failing to harness the knowledge, good will and energy of staff working in the sector, and for ignoring what constitutes the main finding of the research: the central importance of the relationship between tutor and students. (Contains 3 figures, 2 tables and 6 notes.)

This paper explores the impact of change on tutors and managers in 24 learning sites in England, in vocational courses at Level 1 or Level 2 in further education (FE) colleges and in basic skills provision in adult community education and workplaces. We discuss the views of these participants in the research project, "The Impact of Policy on Learning and Inclusion in the Learning and Skills Sector," funded through the Teaching and Learning Research Programme (TLRP) of the UK Economic and Social Research Council (ESRC), in relation to other research on professionals in the sector. We then consider in turn the diversity in a group of tutors and managers we interviewed; their perceptions of the sources of change in their sector; and changes in the learner groups with whom they work. Three examples of changes affecting staff, and their responses to those changes, are then discussed, one from each of the research contexts: FE colleges, adult and community learning (ACL) and work-based learning (WBL). We raise serious questions about the pace of policy-led change, the management of change and professionals' responses to turbulence in the sector, and stress the need to consider the impact on staff, and to listen to those who work closely with learners. (Contains 1 table and 3 notes.)

One of the stated aims of government policy in England is to put teaching, training and learning at the heart of the learning and skills system. This paper provides a critical review of policies on teaching, learning and assessment in the learning and skills sector over the past five years. It draws upon data collected and analysed in the early stages of an ESRC-funded Teaching and Learning Research Programme project. Using evidence from policy sources, we argue that despite policy rhetoric about devolution of responsibility to the "front line", the dominant "images" that government has of putting teaching, learning and assessment at the heart of the learning and skills sector involves a narrow concept of learning and skills; an idealization of learner agency lacking an appreciation of the pivotal role of the learner-tutor relationship and a top-down view of change in which central government agencies are relied on to secure education standards. (Contains 2 tables and 4 notes.)

This paper sets the scene for a collection of papers based on "The impact of policy on learning and inclusion in the learning and skills sector," a research project funded from January 2004 until July 2007 by the UK Economic and Social Research Council (ESRC) as part of their Teaching and Learning Research Programme (TLRP). We raise some general issues about researching the impact of policy, and offer a brief description of the learning and skills sector in England, highlighting two important features: its turbulent recent history, and the diversity and divisions within the sector. We then outline the scope of our research and discuss aspects of our methodology, which has sought to engage practitioners and policymakers in a variety of ways throughout the project. Finally we introduce the six other papers produced by members of the project team in the second and third year of the research, and the two commentaries from our external discussants, Mary Hamilton and Phil Hodkinson. (Contains 2 figures, 4 notes and 3 tables.)

This paper examines the changing use of policy levers in the English postcompulsory education and training system, often referred to as the learning and skills sector (LSS). Policy steering by governments has increased significantly in recent years, bringing with it the development of new forms of arms-length regulation. In the English context, these changes were expressed during the 1980s and 1990s through neoliberal New Public Management and, since 1997, have been extended through the New Labour government's project to further "modernise" public services. We look here at the changing use of policy levers (focussing in particular on the role of targets, funding, inspection, planning and initiatives) over three historical phases, paying particular attention to developments since the formation of the Learning and Skills Council (LSC) in 2001. We conclude by considering the range of responses adopted by education professionals in this era of "modernisation". (Contains 1 table and 8 notes.)

This is the first paper from a project which is part of the Economic and Social Research Council's programme of research into "Teaching and learning". The project, entitled "The impact of policy on learning and inclusion in the new learning and skills sector", explores what impact the efforts to create a single learning and skills system are having on teaching, learning, assessment and inclusion for three marginalized groups of post-16 learners. Drawing primarily on policy documents and 62 in-depth interviews with national, regional and local policy-makers in England, the paper points to a complex, confusing and constantly changing landscape. In particular, it deals with the formation, early years and recent reorganization of the Learning and Skills Council (LSC), its roles, relations with government, its rather limited power, its partnerships and likely futures. While the formation of a more unified learning and skills system is broadly seen as a necessary step in overcoming the fragmentation and inequalities of the previous post-16 sector, interviewees also highlighted problems, some of which may not simply abate with the passing of time. Political expectations of change are high, but the LSC and its partners are expected to carry through "transformational" strategies without the necessary "tools for the job". In addition, some features of the learning and skills sector policy landscape still remain unreformed or need to be reorganized. The LSC and its partners are at the receiving end of a series of policy drivers (e.g. planning, funding, targets, inspection and initiatives) that may have partial or even perverse effects on the groups of marginalized learners we are studying.

Evaluates a (British) government white paper on postsecondary education. Welcomes community councils, social partnerships, and enhanced resources, while criticizing absence of a change model, inadequate employer training investments, and slavish adherence to business's needs and human-capital theory. Empowerment goes further than endless technocratic reforms. (Contains 24 references.) (MLH)

The Cambridge Primary Review is a monumental achievement, a comprehensive and far-sighted review of the primary school system in England. What possible relevance could a major report on primary education hold for the post-compulsory sector? In this article, the author shares his four answers to this question. Furthermore, he describes briefly the structure, the strengths and the comprehensiveness of this review.

In the four-plus years since the author retired, he has spoken about teaching and learning (T & L) at more than 65 further education colleges, sixth form colleges and conferences. Looking back over these occasions and the emails that he has received from tutors, the author realises that there is one topic more than any other that preoccupies staff, namely, the grading of lesson observations. The grading of lesson observations is a burning issue in further education. While tutors accept the need for accountability, grading lessons can undermine professional relationships and create a climate of fear in institutions, where even experienced staff can be reluctant to take risks in their teaching.

The author never thought he would have to thank Ofsted for a change in its approach that may result in a major improvement in provision; and yet, with the introduction of the revised Common Inspection Framework (CIF), it has made teaching and learning (T&L) the first priority throughout the learning and skills sector. While he wishes to applaud this new recognition of the central importance of teaching and learning, the author also has some serious reservations about the new CIF. First, its sheer size and complexity will severely tax the capacity of colleges to respond. If the author was to judge the CIF's overall effectiveness, he will give it a grade 3, "requires improvement". It is better than its predecessor; it makes T&L the number one priority and it is shorter. But it remains, in his judgement, disproportionate.

The British current model of education has turned schools into exam factories and further education colleges and universities into skills factories for British industry. In their book, "From Exam Factories to Communities of Discovery: the Democratic Route," the authors offer an alternative way of thinking and talking about education, as well as practising it. Their contention is that the current diagnosis simply ignores the main threats to collective wellbeing, such as global warming, rising inequalities, unregulated financial markets and a feral mass media which systematically distorts information. People need to build communities of discovery where learners and educators work together democratically to discover new ways of addressing these threats. Learning has to become the central organising principle of all institutions, but government ministers and the Department for Education have to show that they too are capable of learning. In the communities of discovery, principled dissent by staff and students, far from being stifled, is positively encouraged as a means of improving institutions from within. Above all, introducing democracy into schools, colleges and universities is needed. It is not a subject to be taught. It has to be experienced as the most equitable and harmonious means of living, learning and working together.

One of the most radical actions one can take is to describe, without exaggeration or bias, exactly what is happening. The author has been reading the "Handbook for the inspection of further education and skills from September 2009." The Office for Standards in Education, Children's Services and Skills' (Ofsted's) new handbook promises a "fresh approach" to inspection. But the new framework's excessive and unreasonable requirements are more to do with controlling colleges than promoting improvement. In this article, the author first summarises this "fresh approach" and then makes some comments before asking Ofsted a few questions and coming to a final evaluation of its new approach to inspection. (Contains 1 table.)

Rebuts Pat Ainsley's claims that an article by Coffield had overlooked the (British) government's new lifelong learning legislation's exclusion of higher education and the Learning and Skills Council's glaring deficiencies. Ainsley ignored eight reservations Coffield had made regarding the program's simplistic, probusiness orientation. (MLH)

An analysis of research into the efficacy of some of the most popular learning models used by tutors. The research reveals that a number of the most popular learning models are not particularly effective and it is suggested that tutors should check which learning style they are using so as not to waste their own of their student's time.

The UK Government must ensure that learning goes on throughout life and make policies to encourage business and the whole of society to facilitate education for everyone. The false division between further and higher education should be abolished, people must be permitted to attain knowledge and training from the most appropriate facility. Everyone should have the chance to learn and education should not be seen as elitist. Examinations which only serve to emphasis class differences in the UK should be reformed into a single system.