Lifelong Learning UK (LLUK), one of 25 Sector Skills Councils (SSCs), commissioned CFE to help deliver its Sector Skills Agreement for all four UK nations. This agreement shows how the sector will meet the skill needs of the employers who provide:

• Community learning and development
• Further education
• Higher education
• Libraries, archives and information services
• Work based learning

SSCs are employer-led organisations with a remit to reduce skills gaps and shortages and improve productivity within their sector.

Part of their statutory requirements is the production of a Sector Skills Agreement (SSA) - a three-way agreement between employers, education and training providers and organisations that plan, fund or support education and training.  SSAs are developed through a formal five-stage process and CFE was commissioned between September - November 2007 to deliver the final stage reports.

For this project, CFE provided specific support around:

• providing an agreed format for the report for each nation;
• facilitating the development of action plans  for each of the four nations;
• identifying the key findings and messages for the sector;
• providing current policy updates for the final reports; and
• writing all four nation reports, and a UK overview utilising desk-based and fieldwork data from employers and stakeholders, and ensuring the report met the SSDA submission criteria.