The period saw continued collaboration with the TUC to provide union representatives and their members with a wide range of bespoke provision, such as the Chartered Institute of Housing professional courses delivered for employees of Blackpool Coastal Housing. Bespoke courses were also developed for the following employers: Blackpool Airport (return to work and interview techniques), Blackpool Council (presentation and assertiveness skills), Blackpool Sixth Form (manual lifting) and engineering firm John Huddleston (risk assessment), while our NVQ provision attracted a sizeable chunk of both the local public and private sector markets.

The College’s HERO (Holistic Enterprise Realising Opportunities)-related activity – led by two enterprise development managers seconded from the School of Business and Professional Studies – continued to gain momentum, with no less than 221 learners becoming involved in a variety of enterprise endeavours. The College – along with the Blackpool Sixth Form College and Beacon Hill High School – is a key stakeholder in the HERO project, which aims to develop enterprise education across Blackpool’s 14-19 sector.

Collaboration with employers ensued and learners now have access to a dynamic curriculum that marries business function theory with a clear insight into the underpinning processes. CPD is also embedded to provide learners with a clear progression route. This might lead to our own highly popular range of professional postgraduate programmes, made more accessible by the creation of a new BA top-up degree with several specialist pathways.

Further education too has seen major growth, particularly in the area of Business Administration, which bears the enviable accolade of having a 100% student-to-employment rate. In Teacher Education, curriculum innovations such as the Preparing to Teach in the Lifelong Learning Sector (PTLLS) were implemented in direct response to the professionalisation of this sector.