GNVQs and the Postschool Curriculum

Abstract

Some 90 percent of higher education institutions have now apparently agreed to accept general national vocational qualifications (GNVQs) as entry qualifications, and there are currently some 82,000 students registered for the new qualifications in 1,400 centers [Nash, 1994]. There can be no doubt about the interest in and enthusiasm for GNVQs in the further education sector. Our own research at Warwick [Hyland & Weller, 1994] funded by the Universities Funding Council found (on a questionnaire survey of all 465 post-16 institutions registered with the Further Education Funding Council in England in January 1994, with 316 completed, a response rate of 67.9 percent) that 78.8 percent of colleges had implemented GNVQs. The most popular programs were in business, health and social care, and leisure and tourism at intermediate and advanced levels (levels 2 and 3), with only 10 percent of institutions taking up foundation-level courses.