This is the twenty-ninth of a series of bulletins produced by ISE to update members on key data and policy on Covid-19. This covers the period 08/10/2020-14/10/2020.
You can access all of the Covid-19 bulletins on ISE insights.
Latest Covid-19 data
Data taken from Wikipedia and from the government’s Covid-19 dashboard.
The UK has now had a total of 654,644 identified Covid-19 cases and 57,690 deaths.
- New data from ONS looks at how Covid-19 is changing our behaviour.
Lockdown policy
- The government has moved to a simplified three tier lockdown system. Economist Renaud Foucart sets out how this new system can be made to work.
- The Labour Party and the SAGE advisory committee are arguing that the government needs to go further and move to a ‘circuit breaker’ lockdown.
Education
- Teachers continue to be worried about Covid transmission in schools. Meanwhile, GCSE and A level examinations have been postponed by three weeks to give students more time to prepare for them.
- Challenges continue for universities in delivering learning safely during the pandemic. Some students have been sent home following lockdown breaches. JISC have released guidance for safe online working for staff and students.
- The Union Learning Fund which provides learning advice and training opportunities for working people is to be scrapped from March 2021.
The labour market
- The labour market position has worsened as the existing furlough scheme comes to an end. Redundancies are rising at a record rate.
- The government announces a new furlough scheme for those forced to close their businesses.
- The government’s career assessment, which is designed to help people rethink their careers, has been receiving a lot of criticism on social media. Russell George discusses the controversy on the FE Careers IAG blog.
Student recruitment
- ISE Insights continues to provide advice on student recruitment, exploring IBM’s virtual internship, setting out 8 tricks to better student recruitment and exploring how to choose the right recruitment technology.
- During the pandemic it is more important than ever to focus on equality, diversity and inclusivity in recruitment. ISE Insights has been discussing this issue setting out 4 steps to unbiased assessment and arguing that inclusive recruitment means focusing on the nuances.
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