Foundation degrees, and their use by the Services

What are foundation degrees?

Launched in 2000, there are currently about 150 foundation degrees (FDs) validated by UK universities. The Higher Education Funding Council is responsible for the central funding of 25 pilot FDs, and there are over 100 others that are not centrally funded. Numbers are expected to increase rapidly in response to demand for this government-backed initiative.

As Dr Derek Pollard, from the Open University and Chairman of the Council of Validating Universities, points out, 'An FD must award 240 credit points for a two-year full-time course (four or more years part-time). This leaves the graduate 120 points to gain (one year full-time, two or three years part-time) to top it up to a full honours degree through a linked programme. There has, to date, been great interest and good take-up rates in sectors and areas where they have been offered.'

FDs are employer-driven with a company or group of companies deciding the outcomes required by the occupational sector or organisation. As degrees they need to be awarded by a university that also monitors and validates the qualifications. The third element is the delivery of the learning in the local area - and that will usually be provided by a further education college.

'Most of the current batch of FDs are based on initiatives that were already in the pipeline and that have been adapted - mainly in IT, business studies, art, design and the electronic music industry,' says Pollard. 'However, they will become much more widely available as they become more known. They are technician-level qualifications and have relevance for all three Services, each of which is looking at its own potential to deliver FDs, including LEC officers in the Army and Dartmouth graduates in the RN. In this context, the Service is the employer, Service education is the FE college, and the selected university provides the HE element.'

How do FDs equate with other qualifications at the same level?

The government sees FDs as a major new category of technical qualification that would confer degree status and help to solve significant skills shortages. But many other qualifications of varying usefulness are already offered at this level, including National and Scottish Vocational Qualifications (NVQs/SVQs) Levels 4 and 5, Higher National Certificates and Diplomas (HNCs/HNDs), and other diplomas.

Some of these are extremely good and offer the 240 points towards an honours degree that is an essential element of the FD. But, explains Pollard, 'Others are less relevant and provide much less exemption from the honours degree syllabus that will be many people's target. It can be very difficult for an outside observer to know which have value and which do not. There will undoubtedly be resistance from some employment sectors to the introduction of a new and untried qualification when they are quite happy with what exists at present.'

So it is unlikely that FDs will become the only technician-level qualification in the short to medium term, despite government enthusiasm and the clear advantage of having fewer qualifications overall. However, the kudos of having a degree awarded by a university may lead some youngsters to prefer FDs to more established qualifications awarded by Edexcel or BTEC or the like. Undoubtedly, the large number of sectors without adequate qualifications at Levels 3 to 5 will welcome FDs to improve their overall skills development and workforce retention.

FDs and the Armed Forces

'The first drive towards Service adoption of FDs came from an RAF officer suggesting them for aeronautical engineering technicians,' explains Lieutenant Colonel Alan Munro, the newly created Director General of Education and Training in the MoD. 'Much was already in place for officers (degrees) and for JNCOs (Modern Apprenticeships)'; however, there was a gap in between, with Warrant Officers and Sergeants who had undergone significant education and training but who had very few qualifications appropriate to that level of expertise - particularly in technical trades. 'In aeronautical engineering, for example, a highly trained and skilled individual could be holding an HNC or HND. This simply does not match their expertise; therefore they are being undersold when they leave, with the consequent effect on marketing the value of military training and experience.

'The idea is to offer them a qualification that matches their training and fulfils their self-esteem, as well as one that meets Service requirements. It would also offer a route that the Armed Forces could influence and one that provided an avenue to further qualifications, including a full honours degree. In other words, the newly evolving FD. Because it was a new concept, the Centre (MoD) could take a lead role in conjunction with the single Services, and before external civilian organisations could monopolise the development process. In this way the Centre could facilitate a joined-up approach as opposed to individual Services developing them.'

The aeronautical engineering FD is the MoD's pilot, with a target start date of October 2003. A Kingston University team is currently assessing the training done by all three Services, establishing how much can be accredited straight away and finding the gap between Service courses and the degree. Filling this gap to reach FD levels is elective training that individuals must choose to do in their own time. Incidentally, it is hoped that the award will include JAR 66 - the key licence for civilian aviation engineers.

'Students will have to fund themselves through the FD - perhaps around £350 per annum - but they can use the Standard Learning Credit and, from April 2004, the Enhanced Learning Credit. The intention is to minimise cost since the university can access funding for any gap in training. The course itself, taken part-time and through distance learning, could take between three and five years to complete,' explains Munro. Individuals may well have different entry points into the scheme depending on what is covered in their single Service training.

Longer term, there are aspirations - plans is too definite a word - to 'make these qualifications available in many other Service disciplines and to fund them fully, just like honours degrees for officers' (Munro again). The justification is that the Service gains a more rounded person, who has gained in knowledge and maturity, who is better trained and more likely to be retained for longer.

The Dartmouth FD in Naval Studies with Plymouth University, mentioned earlier, is open to every trainee but is especially relevant to those who do not already have a first degree. (There are no FDs currently on offer at other officer training establishments.) The Navy is also taking the lead, on behalf of all three Services, looking at FDs in mechanical engineering with Kingston University.

The Army is developing an FD based around business and management with Leeds Metropolitan and Bournemouth Universities and E-Universities UK World-wide with a target start date of September 2003. This will be an elective degree in which students from all three Services and students at the universities will choose their own modules from a menu. Colonel Tim Moore of the Army's Education and Training Services is clear that 'the aim is for it to be delivered electronically as far as possible', and it may be that it will eventually be possible to study for it entirely over the Internet.

Longer-term intentions are to expand the concept of FDs into technical areas like engineering, communications and transport; and then into less specific areas like management, personnel management and public services. The question hanging over these aspirations will be the same one as for FDs in other sectors: 'Will the various employer groups wish to change a qualification that is working well for them into one that may not be as satisfactory?' In other words: 'If it ain't broke, why fix it?'

Another difference for the Services is that they are both the employer and in many cases the equivalent of the Sector Skills Council. Very often they will be the provider of the learning as well; or at least for considerable chunks of it. The only thing that they are not is a higher education organisation; although an argument could be made that they should become one, particularly with the development of the Defence Academy and Defence Training Establishments.

The counter-argument - and the one currently favoured by policy-makers - is that it would be a mistake to have any qualification that could entirely be seen as being defence-oriented and defence-generated because this would lead to it having less currency in the eyes of the outside world. Far better, they say, to become involved in the standard-setting and accreditation process so that key civilian qualifications can be earned through military activity.

The problems with this view are that Service representatives have not always been fully involved in the development of standards and qualifications, and that the quality and quantity of Service training may not always be fully recognised. In addition, with a workforce of about 200,000 and 50,000 part-timers, to say nothing of another 100,000 MoD-based civil servants, the Services form a significant national employment sector in their own right. Any comparable sector would have its own national standards and seek to export its qualifications into other areas of employment.

However, this argument can wait for later phases of the FD operation. In the short term, these pilot schemes will point the direction for further refinement and open the door for their wider application. The most difficult area will inevitably be for the generalist, whose achievements are hardest to log and whose key activities are furthest away from civilian practices. But commandos, snipers and anti-aircraft gunners should take heart from recent accreditation and awards initiatives at Levels 2 and 3, which suggest that an FD (Level 3/4) qualification may become available before too long.

FDs are technician-level qualifications and have relevance for all three Services

Sectors without adequate qualifications at Levels 3 to 5 will welcome FDs to improve their overall skills development

Far better to become involved in the standard-setting and accreditation process so that key civilian qualifications can be earned through military activity