Video transcript: The T Levels Capital Fund

Chris Wright, Assistant Principal, IEA Business and Skills Intelligence: The Manchester College

We applied for T Levels capital funding because construction, which is where we are at the moment, saw an absolute boom open the other side of the pandemic. And to be honest, our estate couldn't keep pace with the demand in applications that we would get in to join our courses.  So we applied for the fund to build the mezzanine that we're standing in now so that we could keep pace with the demand and provide the facilities for the T Levels applications that we were getting.

Alison Leaverland, Deputy Principal for Curriculum and Quality: Strode College

We applied for the T Levels capital funds because we knew if we wanted the kudos that we wanted for the T Level qualification, we needed state-of-the-art facilities. We need them to rival the workplace and also to be in line with universities as well.

Justine Barlow, Principal: Notre Dame Catholic Sixth Form College

We applied for capital T Levels funding because we knew that we wanted to invest in T Levels and the only way to do that was through a capital fund. We didn't currently have the accommodation or the resources to be able to meet industry standards and for this qualification to work it has to be industry standard.

If you're a new provider and you're looking to put in a bid for the first time, my top tip, it really would be to look at your local authority websites, see what their strategic plan is, look at their strategic aims and how you can align your capital bid with those strategic aims.

Chris Wright, Assistant Principal, IEA Business and Skills Intelligence: The Manchester College

The advice I'd give to anybody considering making an application for the capital bid - understand implicitly your estate strategy and understand your facility and its capacities. I would also understand in great detail the T Level curriculum that you're expecting to deliver and undertake some kind of mapping exercise to see where the gaps might be in your existing provision and facilities, to use the fund to best effect and make your application stand out, to say that we need the funds because our existing facility isn't able to deliver the two level in its entirety.  Once you've made that decision, the people like you really need to engage with is obviously your curriculum teams, your estates and facilities departments, an architect or main contractor, and you really need to have that regular communication strategy between all of those elements to make sure that everything stays on track, that the intent of what it is you are looking to build remains true and that everybody is appraised of way or are in that programme.

Matthew Marshall, Deputy Principal: the City of Stoke-on-Trent Sixth Form College

We used the T Levels capital funding in order to develop a digital Center for our students in Stoke-on-Trent. So the focus was on developing spaces that had a combination of classroom for the theoretical parts of the T Levels, but also then the practical work based learning environments. So like the room we're in now which has a rubber floor which has benching which students would experience in the workplace and the room next door is a corporate style boardroom again for a work based learning environment so that our young people are work ready when they go onto their placements, when they enter the workplace. In planning the curriculum, in planning the software that we use, in planning the equipment that students engage with, we worked directly with the university so that that transition for students from the 16 to 19, into the Degree courses, into the workplace, was seamless.

Justine Barlow, Principal: Notre Dame Catholic Sixth Form College

Planning it is crucial.  So think about your accommodation footprint, think about your student numbers, because you will have to justify in order to put a bid together the need for that capital bid. So, get you data and have a look at it and put it together and all that can be done before a capital bid is launched.

Chris Wright, Assistant Principal, IEA Business and Skills Intelligence: The Manchester College

We made sure that the application demonstrated sustainability by designing a space called a T zone, which is an exclusive workspace for students on T Levels programs, but we made sure that that space was multifaceted and could be used by a number of different T Level routes and at the minute we've got three different T Level route students accessing that space.

But within the actual fabric and design of the mezzanine that the funds were used to build, we future proofed that by making sure that the pre work has already been done if we wanted to extend that mezzanine by a further 50% to accommodate future students.

Alison Leaverland, Deputy Principal for Curriculum and Quality: Strode College

The students absolutely love the facilities and what they are doing in those facilities. They feel like they're undertaking a training in a workplace rather than being at college and learning skills and then having to go onto training again in the workplace.

Bandhana, T Levels Student – Assisting Adult Nursing

I think this also equipment is incredible since we've actually got an actual ward and we've got like dolls which we can do practical lessons on to like make mistakes and learn from them.

Tom, T Levels Student – Construction and the Built Environment

The benefits of using industry standard facilities are that I get access to a laptop which allows me to do 3D models, you know like high tech equipment that I will need in the actual workplace.

Bandhana, T Levels Student – Assisting Adult Nursing

My future ambition is to become a family nurse practitioner and I think T Levels have supporting me because I've got to be in a professional environment and the resources equipment I've used, such as the blood pressure machine, it many feel more professional and help you confirm that I actually do want to like be in a nursing environment in the future as well.

Chris Wright, Assistant Principal, IEA Business and Skills Intelligence: The Manchester College

The impact of the capital fund on T Levels has been the industry standard equipment that we've been able to provide to all of our T Levels students. So for example, students studying on the design surveying and planning T Level route - we've been able to provide them with industry standard laptops that ensures when they're out on site on their placements, they're able to work with architects, quantity surveyors and planners on a level playing field because the level of equipment that we've been able to purchase for them.

Alison Leaverland, Deputy Principal for Curriculum and Quality: Strode College

Employers are so excited about what we've got here that we have got employers that are very keen to talk to us about sponsorship and they want to be part of the college. We think the future for sustainability will be working with those employers to support us to do that.

The advice I'd give another provider going on this journey is make sure you really do your research, that you really look at your building, what's going to work for your building, but also that you can do what you want to do realistically. Once you have a plan is then to review that plan regularly at proper planning meetings because things will change because if you do hit a glitch for any reason, there'll be a way to overcome it.

Justine Barlow, Principal: Notre Dame Catholic Sixth Form College

If I was going to give advice to somebody who's going to put a capital bid together, I'd be saying to them yes, it's all about the planning and the preparation, but there's a lot of work to do and you say your finance team will need to put together sort of a financing package and how is college going to be able to afford this. You've also got to submit how you meet new, local national need. There's a lot of arms to putting the capital bid together. Some of it could be pre planned but some of you got to wait until the bid actually arrives and how you will address that. Really, what you need to make sure is that you're all talking collectively on a regular basis to be able to pull that bid together.