The latest figures make uncomfortable reading. 946,000 young people aged 16 to 24 are Not in Education, Employment or Training (NEET). That’s 12.7% of an entire generation.
This week marks the Power of Specialist FE campaign, a national initiative celebrating the transformative role that specialist further education plays for young people with SEND. It’s an opportunity to shine a light on what works, but also to ask some harder questions about what doesn’t.
Too often, alternative provision becomes a safety net for systemic failure rather than a genuine solution. We find ourselves managing problems rather than preventing them. Young people end up in holding patterns when what they actually need are clear pathways forward.
The reality is that preventing young people from becoming NEET requires investment in the right structures from the start. It means the whole system takes responsibility, not just the providers who pick up the pieces at the end. We can’t keep asking how to keep NEET numbers down without asking the bigger question: how do we build a system where NEET isn’t an inevitability in the first place?
There’s a persistent narrative that SEND provision is expensive and lacks evidence. This needs to change. We demand data, research and measurable impact in every other area of education. SEND deserves the same rigour.
Families need interventions that actually work, not just well-meaning attempts. Practitioners need clarity and robust frameworks, not guesswork. And young people deserve the very best we can offer, based on the evidence before us.
If we want to build trust with families and young people, we must be transparent about what works and what doesn’t. SEND provision isn’t a peripheral concern. It’s the ultimate test of whether our education system truly values every learner.
Our EB8 employability bridge programme shows what’s possible when you combine evidence, commitment and innovation. It’s demanding work, and while limited resources have certainly driven creativity, proven programmes like EB8 deserve proper governmental funding and support to grow and reach more young people.
Real leadership means stepping into uncomfortable territory. It means asking difficult questions about provision, practice, priorities and yes, funding. It means working in spaces where solutions aren’t straightforward, and success can’t always be measured in neat metrics.
The temptation is always to protect what we already have. The responsibility is to make it better.
Specialist further education transforms lives and creates genuine opportunities for young people outside of the mainstream system. On specialist further education, one learner at our college said, just last week:
This week’s campaign celebrates that impact, but it’s also a call to action. We need policymakers and decision makers to recognise the essential value of specialist FE and give it the place it deserves within an inclusive education system.
Because every young person deserves more than to become a statistic.