Many of the young people who arrive in FE colleges have had poor experiences of education; and many of those who have had poor experiences are disabled young people or young people identified with SEN.
In the school years, Ofsted has identified, children with SEND being excluded, absent or missing from school much more frequently than other pupils nationally, and unofficial exclusions being used; in Key Stage 4, the progress of pupils with SEN is consistently lower than that of pupils without SEN and with the same starting points; and many are more likely to miss out the wider opportunities of school life such as school trips and clubs.
A confounding factor for young disabled people is lack of ambition. A number of reports have identified ambition being compromised at an early stage. This, in turn, can affect young people in such a way that, by the time they reach their teen years, their ambition for themselves is compromised. This can cast a long shadow over the opportunities and experiences that present over a lifetime.
Way back, I chaired the management committee for a pupil referral unit. Many of the young people who attended had not had good experiences of school – or schools of them. Many of them, however, went on to the local FE college, did really well and came back to tell us so. Their experience of FE was key to turning their lives around.
Colleges have an enormously important role to play in addressing inequalities: they offer a wide range of qualifications and an even wider range of courses, with mainstream and supported learning opportunities for students with high needs. Many colleges offer a fresh start to young people who have not flourished in secondary school or who have been out of school for some or all of Key Stage 4.
So, while outcomes remain poorer for disabled young people than their non-disabled peers, colleges have a crucial role to play in raising career aspirations, broadening employment horizons, supporting disabled students in obtaining qualifications, enabling them to progress to higher levels of study, securing meaningful work experience and providing a positive experience of participation in wider college life. All in all, a more inclusive experience.
The two new guides, developed by CDC as part of their work for the DfE, are designed to raise awareness of the disability duties in the Equality Act and their importance in addressing the disadvantage that many disabled young people face:
- One of the guides is for FE colleges, sixth-form colleges and 16 to 19 academies. It has detail about the definition of disability in the Equality Act and how the disability duties apply in day-to-day decision-making.
- One is for the governors and trustees who have responsibility for making sure the duties are implemented in their college. This guide includes prompts or checkpoints designed to support governors and trustees in reflecting on how well they are meeting the duties and how they know - what information and data they have that tells them.
Both guides emphasise the importance of responsibility sitting with everyone in the college, rather than being thought of as a specialist area of responsibility that sits with a SENCO and a single governor. Feedback on an equivalent guide for school governors and trustees highlighted improved conversations amongst governors and between governors and the executive.
The Government talks regularly about the importance of inclusion and these guides support that vision. I hope that the guides help colleges to ensure that disabled students emerge from that long shadow and enable them to progress to a more inclusive future with the potential to benefit from those brighter opportunities and experiences that present over a lifetime.
Philippa Stobbs
CDC Associate
30 June 2025
Click here to access the guides
