Mr. Andrew Brownlee:

On behalf of SOLAS, I thank the Chair and members for the opportunity to speak with the committee today and discuss issues around the future of science, technology, engineering and maths in Irish education.

SOLAS has responsibility for funding, planning and co-ordinating further education and training, FET, in Ireland.

Through the 16 education and training boards, ETBs, and other providers, the FET system offers access to a wide range of learning opportunities and supports in every corner of the country, regardless of background or formal education level, and it offers a learning pathway to take you as far as you want to go. It currently serves a base of around 200,000 unique learners every year. SOLAS also serves as the co-ordinating provider for craft apprenticeships and works with the Higher Education Authority, HEA, to jointly manage the National Apprenticeship Office to oversee the national apprenticeship system.

Much of FET is technical, vocational and practice-based by nature, and as such, STEM education is a core part of the offering. We estimate that almost 20,000 learners go through specific STEM courses in FET each year. More than 9,000 of these undertake programmes related to manufacturing, engineering or construction. Some 8,000 undertake programmes related to ICT and around 2,000 undertake programmes related to science or maths. Annual STEM provision in FET has grown by 8% since 2018, despite the significant disruption caused by the pandemic. This does not include basic numeracy training offered to thousands as part of the ETBs’ adult literacy service, which is critical to building maths competency across the adult population. On this theme, SOLAS co-ordinates the delivery of the cross-Government adult literacy for life strategy, which places a strong focus on growing maths and numeracy competency for adults over the next decade. As I noted above, SOLAS also co-ordinates craft apprenticeship provision, all of which is focused around STEM-related training, with a current craft apprentice population of 22,470. There are also exciting new STEM apprenticeships emerging in areas like cybersecurity, software development and engineering. On green skills, SOLAS and the ETBs have made an ambitious pledge that every FET course and learner will have access to a module on sustainability and green skills awareness, with level 4 and 5 micro qualifications developed and an online and open access e-college course rolled out to facilitate this.

Growing STEM education will be critical: to meeting the needs of the future world of work; to ensuring we can respond to a digitally transformed society and economy; and to delivering the green skills which can enable effective climate action. FET and apprenticeships already play a key role in this regard, with significant capacity and ambition to grow this offering further. However, we are conscious that key to success will be generating more interest and demand for STEM-related tertiary education and careers. At present, there is insufficient exposure to the types of vocational and technical options and pathways needed to encourage more post-primary students to pursue this route, and the guidance tends to steer them towards more traditional academic directions. This also has implications for gender diversity, with these options typically more sparse in female single-sex schools. SOLAS and the ETBs have worked to provide more access to taster modules during transition year to encourage interest and skills development in STEM-related areas and to signpost future potential pathways. Areas of focus have included mechanics, aviation, electrical, plumbing, green skills and healthcare. As part of their strategic performance agreements with SOLAS, all ETBs are required to develop the transition year offerings further in the next two years. We have also been working closely with the NCCA to further embed this approach.

Our future FET strategy, transforming learning, sets out a clear roadmap for development which centres on the three core pillars of building skills, fostering inclusion and creating pathways. Under the pathways pillar we are committed to significantly expanding pathways between school and FET, with one idea to use FET capability to deliver credited vocational and technical options as part of a reformed senior cycle. On this, we are exploring the potential development of school-focused offerings in areas like construction, hospitality, technology, nursing and healthcare that might encourage interest and pathways to STEM-focused careers.

FET has a significant role to play in supporting the growth of STEM education, both in offering options and pathways at school level, and in delivering the technical and practice-based courses that can take people into exciting STEM-linked careers or onto STEM higher education degrees. I thank the committee for its time and I look forward to further discussion on this matter.