21 January 2003

Ladies and gentlemen,

I am the product of several decades of failed New Year resolutions.

In recent years my New Year resolutions have inevitably related to control of the waistline - more exercise, a low calorie diet, more orange juice and less red wine - a year of clean living.

For 2003 it was a resolution of a different type: after four months in this job I made a resolution in three parts:

• I vowed never again to use two certain words together;
• to avoid wherever possible, the use of a particular dichotomy; and
• to talk of stepping stones as often as pathways.

The term I vowed never to use again describes the A-level as having the standard of precious metal. The name of the metal has four letters, it is the colour of Wordsworth's host of daffodils, and is associated with Midas.

There is no term more debilitating to the 14-19 curriculum than the use of the term gold standard - which I use here for the last time ever - to describe just one part of the curriculum, and none of us should ever use it again.

The dichotomy I want to avoid wherever possible is "academic and vocational" and David Miliband might say something about this later this morning.

I don't know what the terms academic and vocational mean when used in juxtaposition.

There are certain subjects or areas of study which should be a part of the general educational diet for all young people: among them are English, maths and science.

There are others which are not part of the core: accountancy, cabinet making, geology, retailing, web design, modern foreign languages, financial services, advanced physics, graphic design, astronomy, car mechanics, psychology, plumbing.

Now, none of these subjects is, in my view, part of what must be a common core of educational experience, but every one of them has its own value, integrity and utility for young people who are attracted to them.

All of these subjects are solidly based in curriculum.

For some - French, geology, psychology - the curriculum has its roots in universities.

For others, cabinet making, retailing, web design, financial services, plumbing - the curriculum derives from industry.

For one group of subjects, the role model for students is the Oxbridge don, teacher and researcher.

For the other, the role model is the senior technician or engineer, the exacting practitioner of a trade or discipline, the creator of fine objects and materials.

Both the technician, and the don, have origins which reach back a thousand years.

From both, young people - whether apprentices in medieval history, or students of plumbing - derive self-esteem and real opportunities for employment and long-term rewarding careers.

Across the western world - and the UK is no better and no worse than other countries - we have not created the conditions in which the occupationally-based group of subjects is valued by students and by society as it should be.

We need:

• more education and training in the workplace, using industry-based and industry-referenced curriculum: it is here that not only cognitive knowledge and technical skills are learned but also the key behavioural skills - problem solving, working in teams, analytical skills, punctuality, presentation, performance, work ethic and so on
• training, conducted in state-of-the-art facilities and using state-of-the-art technology (this is something Germany, Norway and other European countries have to teach us)
• assessment which is fit for purpose; this was a huge battle in Australia
• a qualifications framework, and a system of school and college organisation, which allows young people to take both core subjects and other chosen subjects, and to move between the school, the further education college and the workplace as an employee - taking occupationally-based qualifications.

We have not seized these opportunities and this agenda, although there are some excellent examples of where this can be done. The very successful trial of the Certificate in Financial Services, at Glastonbury School, is an example.

We all lean implicity, and culturally, rather to the left of the schema which sets out the National Qualifications Framework we are all familiar with - the column which sets out A level progression - rather than to the occupationally-based NVQ pathway to the right.

That brings me to the third element of my New Year's resolution, that is stepping stones or paving stones rather than pathways.

By this I mean unitisation, modules, which allow students to supplement their main core education diet with subjects that have a university or industry driven curriculum, rather than some less academically or vocationally-related programmes which are really neither one thing or another.

None of this fits entirely within the National Qualification Framework, as it is.

I think we will hear things today from the Minister for School Standards which will open up the qualifications framework to the great benefit of 14-19 year olds, and make the National Qualifications Framework truly the template for the knowledge economy.

And that is what the QCA is here to make happen.

Ken Boston