{"id":42085,"date":"2021-05-12T10:24:58","date_gmt":"2021-05-12T10:24:58","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/icloud.pe\/blog\/?guid=202ee873d919f9bf25e6fefac9e7a0c0"},"modified":"2021-05-12T10:24:58","modified_gmt":"2021-05-12T10:24:58","slug":"uk-gov-pledges-post-pandemic-digital-skills-boost","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/icloud.pe\/blog\/uk-gov-pledges-post-pandemic-digital-skills-boost\/","title":{"rendered":"UK gov pledges post-pandemic digital skills boost"},"content":{"rendered":"


\n Sabina Weston<\/a><\/span>
\n <\/span><\/p>\n

\n
\n
12 May, 2021<\/span><\/div>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<\/div>\n

\n<\/a><\/p>\n

\n

The UK government has unveiled a new policy and funding programme which aims to ensure that all adults have equal opportunities to learn new skills such as\u00a0coding<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Announced as part of the Queen\u2019s Speech on Tuesday, the legislation is aimed\u00a0at\u00a0supporting the UK\u2019s\u00a0post-pandemic recovery<\/a>\u00a0by providing people with the chance to upskill and retrain regardless of their age. This includes facilitating access to student loans, providing employers with a statutory role in planning publicly-funded training programmes, as well as granting the Secretary of State for Education increased influence in monitoring whether colleges meet local needs.<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

\nThe new policies are part of the recently unveiled\u00a0\u2018Lifetime Skills Guarantee\u2019<\/a>, which last month launched 400 free qualifications ranging from engineering and digital skills to social care.<\/p>\n

Available to any adult who has not already achieved a qualification at Level 3, the\u00a0digital qualifications<\/a>\u00a0offer digital skills boot camps\u00a0in computer science, software deployment, systems infrastructure, cyber security, and coding. The courses have already managed to train 3,000 people, with another 14,000 signed up to attend later this year.<\/p>\n

According to the government, the \u2018Lifetime Skills Guarantee\u2019 will allow adults to \u201cchange careers, upskill regularly, and stay up to date with changing knowledge and technologies\u201d.<\/p>\n

BCS, the Chartered Institute for IT described it as \u201ca significant step in the right direction to address the\u00a0digital skills gap<\/a>\u201d.<\/p>\n

BCS head of Apprenticeships, Annette Allmark, said that the government\u2019s plans \u201cwill allow more people to access the training in digital skills they need for their\u00a0careers<\/a>\u00a0\u2013 and to develop the skills the economy needs to flourish and \u2018build back better\u2019 after the pandemic\u201d.<\/p>\n

\u201cHopefully, this funding will also\u00a0increase the diversity<\/a>\u00a0of people learning digital skills now and in the future. It\u2019s important that the government continues to build on the many excellent training opportunities already available, such as the wide range of popular digital apprenticeships,\u201d she added.<\/p>\n

Allmark also stated that \u201cthere\u2019s never been such a significant demand for digital skills \u2013 not just for an increasing number of digital occupations, but across all occupations as a result of businesses having to digitally transform during COVID\u201d.<\/p>\n

According to\u00a0a recent study<\/a>, the majority of surveyed HR decision-makers in the UK said they believed reliance on advanced digital skills was going to increase over the next five years. Despite this, participation in A-Level and further education IT courses has declined, with the number of students taking IT subjects at\u00a0GCSE level falling by 40% since 2015<\/a>.<\/p>\n

However, there is always time to retrain: the new legislative measures aim to assist adults in gaining the competencies required for better-paid employment, which often require candidates to prove that they have the necessary skills. These jobs were found to be notoriously understaffed, with employers unable to fill a quarter of their vacancies due to a lack of employees with the right skills even\u00a0prior to the pandemic<\/a>, according to the government.<\/p>\n

Allmark said that the areas dealing with \u201csignificant shortages of skilled people\u201d are \u201cvital sectors\u201d including\u00a0artificial intelligence<\/a>,\u00a0cyber security<\/a>, and\u00a0software development<\/a>.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cIn addition, the\u00a0digital transformation<\/a>\u00a0in the NHS has accelerated during the pandemic with technology being widely used across the service,\u201d she added. <\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Sabina Weston<\/p>\n

12 May, 2021 <\/p>\n

The UK government has unveiled a new policy and funding programme which aims to ensure that all adults have equal opportunities to learn new skills such as\u00a0coding.
\nAnnounced as part of the Quee…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":627,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-42085","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/icloud.pe\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/42085","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/icloud.pe\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/icloud.pe\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/icloud.pe\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/627"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/icloud.pe\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=42085"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/icloud.pe\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/42085\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":42086,"href":"https:\/\/icloud.pe\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/42085\/revisions\/42086"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/icloud.pe\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=42085"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/icloud.pe\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=42085"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/icloud.pe\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=42085"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}