UK government set to pull plug on MBA apprenticeships

A controversial MBA apprenticeship scheme that allowed companies in England to send out senior executives to small business school with funds earmarked for on-the-task training is established to be axed.

The move to scrap the qualification was revealed when the Institute for Apprenticeships and Technological Schooling, which administers apprenticeship criteria, revealed a revised listing of apprenticeship criteria pursuing responses from companies with all reference to MBAs eliminated.

The selection is predicted to be verified in early June when the authorities is because of to publish a overview of MBA apprenticeships. 

The inclusion of MBAs as element of the government’s apprenticeship scheme was widely criticised as it diverted a massive proportion of the funding away from workplace training. The funding for apprenticeships will come from a levy launched in 2017 that demands companies with once-a-year wage costs previously mentioned £3m to established aside an equivalent of .five per of their payroll.

Less than levy rules, companies are given regulate about which skills can be classed as apprenticeships. Authorized strategies variety from stage-two GCSE-equivalent programs for school leavers, these types of as training for store workers, to degree-stage roles, these types of as legal professionals and nurses.

Much better administrators is what this region desperately requirements

The MBA was incorporated as a element of the stage-seven senior chief occupational normal.

Less than the variations, companies will nonetheless be allowed to invest the levy on high-stage management training but it would be fewer interesting as contributors would no for a longer period acquire a masters degree at the conclusion of the programme.

Critics argued the MBA scheme was an abuse of the apprenticeship levy. In the initially whole year soon after the levy was launched in April 2017, there ended up 375,800 new apprenticeship commences, a 26 per cent drop on the very same interval in 2015/16.

However, the proportion of better-stage apprenticeships, equivalent to bachelor’s degrees and previously mentioned, enhanced from five.three per cent to twelve.eight per cent throughout this interval.

A examine by FE 7 days journal calculated that there ended up 6,387 commences on MBA apprenticeship programmes up to the conclusion of the initially quarter of 2019/20. Offered that every single of these programs can acquire up to £18,000 from the apprenticeship levy pot, up to £115m experienced been expended on the standard in that fiscal year.

Jennifer Coupland, main govt of the institute, experienced as lately as January defended the MBA programme, which she said loaded abilities gaps identified by companies.

However, the most current responses from companies has revealed a change in belief. “The employer team have produced a clear advice, which we are now consulting on,” the IfATE said.

The Office for Schooling said: “The training secretary is committed to preserving an employer-led method, but is not persuaded the levy should be employed to pay for staff members, who are generally already really skilled and really paid out, to acquire an MBA.”

Organization educational institutions, which have benefited most from the progress in bachelor’s and masters-stage degree apprenticeships, expressed disappointment at the selection to take away the ability to acquire an MBA as a result of levy funding.

“Better administrators is what this region desperately requirements,” said Anne Kiem, main govt of the Chartered Affiliation of Organization Schools, which signifies the Uk sector.

“Taking the qualification out of the senior chief normal will make it quite unattractive for most of those people who have signed up for it to day.”