Call for equal education funding up to 18 years old

The former education minister has suggested raising the education participation age to 18 in Jersey

Students should be able to stay in education or professional training until the age of 18, a former education minister has proposed.

Deputy Inna Gardiner has lodged a proposition requesting equality in funding for 16 to 18 year olds "regardless of the path" they choose and to raise the education participation age to 18.

The legally presumed age for leaving education or training in Jersey is 16 compared to the age of 18 in the UK.

The government said Deputy Rob Ward, Minister for Education and Lifelong Learning, only had sight of the proposition the day it was lodged and he would "consider the proposition and respond accordingly in due course".

Ms Gardiner said students who stayed within government-paid education were funded between £7,000 and £8,000 per year, whereas students who attended Highlands for apprenticeship training received "only £1,600 from the government’s tracker programme".

"The tracker programme has a total budget of £650,000 per year for an average of 400 plus apprentices, with a maximum funding of £1,600 for each student, whilst the annual average cost per year for an apprenticeship is £5,400," she said.

"Once the funding runs out, remaining students and employers are required to self-fund."

'Future investment'

Ms Gardiner said a UK law requiring students to stay in education up to the age of 18 was introduced to "improve the career and life prospects for young people and the UK Government committed to fund these provisions".

"Education is our investment in the future," she said.

"If this proposition is adopted our government will, in the first instance, be required to establish the cost of the required provision and to bring all funding streams into coherent routes."

Ms Gardiner said her proposition was "purposefully simple and non-prescriptive".