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Trevor Forster It's still an ongoing conversation with Pearson! I don't know why no other College seems to be having an issue with this.
We did end up starting our HND Top Ups in August to be on the safe side, which was a right pain due to staffing, and students being on holiday. Fortunately, we didn't have that many. That doesn't solve the problem of the students who started a part time HNC in Oct 2023, who will want to top up to the 2017 spec HND in Oct 2025. I spoke to someone at Pearson, and as long as they were registered for the HNC before 31/08/24, there won't be a Pearson problem with starting the HND in Oct 2025.
I did, however, find this excellent document published by Pearson from when they switched from the 2010 QCF spec to the 2017 RQF spec 😊 It's them basically explaining why the ESFA end date was 2020, to allow for top ups! It's precisely what we've been asking Pearson to do this time, but they haven't been able to understand. They think we're making a fuss because no other college has raised it, but I think maybe other colleges just haven't noticed as they haven't submitted a 24/25 ILR yet with their Sep/Oct start HND top ups in. I did show someone at Pearson this document on Wednesday, and showed them the FALA record for the 2010 spec (expired for new registrations in 2017, but had an LDNS of 2020) and the 2017 spec (expired for new registrations in 2024 but also had an LDNS in 2024). It's so crystal clear to me, I'm not sure what they're struggling to understand.
If you didn't already start them, it's too late now 😕 If you get OfS audited, they'll want delivery evidence on your start date. We wouldn't have had anything post them completing the HNC and before 31st August if we hadn't especially arranged some delivery in August.
I'm getting more hopeful after finding that document, that the penny might drop with Pearson and they'll resolve this before R04.
I'd be really grateful if other providers would raise this with Pearson, so they don't think we're being daft! Please send them that document and the FALA evidence.
Trevor Forster Latest development: Pearson said we should have known about this and enrolled everyone on the HND from day one (not the HNC first). Nobody I know even knew the old aim was expiring for new starts until after April 2024 (we knew all new starts would be HTQ ages ago), and Pearson repeatedly reassured our curriculum staff that top ups would be fine (they didn't think about the ILR bit). Seven years ago there was an overlap so it was fine. Apparently, Pearson's hands are tied and they are physically not allowed to have the 2017 and the 2024 spec open at the same time, even by one day. I don't know who is imposing that on them, and it wasn't the case with the switch from 2010 to 2017. We could have transferred all our full time HNC students to the HND back in June when I spotted this, but we assumed there was a mistake. We also have a load of part timers, who are currently only half way through their 2017 spec HNC. We have no idea yet which ones will want to top up in a year's time. If we had transferred them all to the HND in 23/24, we'd probably end up with a 75%-90% withdrawal rate! That would be awful for TEF stats. We can't top up to the HTQ HND as it requires a lot of extra units.
There is a new 2024 RQF spec that's not supposed to be delivered in England, it's for Wales, Scotland and International (610/3636/5), and we're applying to run that for just the Oct 2025 HND top ups. It maps exactly with the 2017 spec I believe. Our justification is that we couldn't know who would top up a year in advance, and we couldn't enrol everyone on the HND without getting huge withdrawal rates. It's also small numbers, and we would never run it again. It appears to be Student Finance England available.
It took us so long to get Pearson to understand what we were talking about, but they do now see what we mean. It's not their fault by the sounds of it, but I did raise that it would have been good if they'd published advice on what to do. We're used to this in FE when aims expire, and we have to enrol everyone on a two year Extended Diploma rather than do the one year Foundation then top them up, but we usually have an almost 100% conversion rate on those, and they're all full time so we can transfer quite late if needs be. Also, there's usually a period of overlap, and it's our own choice to continue to run the older spec up to the wire. That wasn't an option with this HN Engineering change.
Ruth Canham-James
2017 Spec HND Engineering
Created
Does anyone else deliver the HNC/HND Engineering? The 2017 spec isn't available for new registrations from 24/25, which is fine (we're moving to the HTQ versions), but Pearson have categorically said that it's still fine for students to "top up" to the old spec HND from the HNC, as long as they were registered before 31/08/24 (last registration date). We have students who've just finished the HNC (or are part time and finishing next summer), but whilst they are already registered, we physically can't record them in the ILR as an HND start in 24/25 as it stands, because they've set the "Other" Last Date for New Starts in the LARS to 31/08/2024. I can transfer all the current HNC students to the HND now, but that's really messy and not actually true. Also, for the HNC students not due to finish until June 2025, we don't yet know which will want to top up. If we transfer them all to the HND now, that's a lot of withdrawals later on.
I'm very confident the LDNS in the LARS just shouldn't be 31/08/2024. We've had similar before, where they just matched the Last Registration Date, but those two dates don't fulfil the same function. I think it should be at least 31/12/2025, if not 31/07/2026. Who do I tell? I doubt the ESFA helpdesk will know or even understand. We're going to ask Pearson to raise it themselves through their channels, but in my experience, awarding bodies don't understand LDNS and think it's not a problem because it doesn't impact on them.
I'm frustrated I didn't spot this sooner! I was told it would all be fine.
Cross posted with the CMIS Jiscmail for a wider audience.