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By 1911 a range of vocational qualifications validated by 40 different bodies had
developed. Although it was established to consider the many examinations that had
developed, the Dyke-Acland Report of that year made no mention of these vocational
awards; its focus was purely on the academic side. Despite this multiplicity of
providers and their lesser status in relation to academic qualifications, by 1992 around
2 million vocational awards were being made annually. (Mathieson 1992: 195)
In the 1960s, an attempt was made to sort out this multiplicity of qualifications by
establishing Industrial Training Boards to oversee apprenticeship schemes in the
major trades. This system involved structured apprenticeships which included some
general education through day release to local further education colleges. These
training boards proved reasonably effective until in the late 1980s the Thatcher
Government abolished all but that of the construction industry, which was deemed to
have particular needs. Firms did not immediately experience a shortage of skilled
workers because they were able to recruit trained staff from among those made
redundant through the same Government’s policy of winding down manufacturing
industries. It was only as those workers neared retirement that the dearth of skilled
artisans became apparent. (Cole 2002) Growing concern over the nation’s skills levels
then began to replicate that occasioned by the Great Exhibition of 1850.
Following the loss of their day-release courses, further education colleges turned
increasingly to what were to become the most successful English vocational courses.
They resulted from a 1970s development when, under the aegis of City & Guilds, the