Full-Time and Part-Time Adult & HE Learners – Destinations (2024-25 Year-End)

The destination data included in this report relates to leavers in academic year 2023/24. The college employs a permanent Destinations Officer to enable us to more proactively pursue learners who have left us to improve the tracking of our outcomes.

The destinations of adult learners studying level 4 programmes demonstrate 92.2% moving on to positive destinations. At level 3 this remains strong at 90.5%. At level 2 this drops slightly to 85.9% and at entry and level 1 sits at 86.9%.

Our Into Employment provision has been particularly strong moving 64.2% of unemployed learners into sustainable jobs. As a result, we continue to reduce the number of adults who are unemployed with us when they start to being employed when they leave us.

Impact on Regional Skills and the Regional Economy

Breakdown of Learner Type

Our adult education provision can be broadly categorised into four strands:

• Strand 1: Young Adults Completing Full Time Programmes. This provision is for a small group of learners aged between 19 and 21 years old who complete their full-time technical education programme alongside full-time learners aged 16-18 years.
• Strand 2: Professional and Technical Updating Programmes for Adults. These programmes will help 43% of our adults develop skills for progression in their careers or for entry into higher education.
• Strand 3: Essential Skills Programmes for Adults. These are programmes aimed at developing essential skills for adults to support them to progress in work and life.
• Strand 4: Higher Skills Programmes for Adults. These are programmes aimed at supporting adults in our region to gain qualifications and skills at Level 4 and above.

Adult learners by strand

The chart shows how our adult learners are split between these four strands. The figures demonstrate a three-year trend in increasing the numbers of adult studying technical and professional programmes from 38% in 2023/24 to 43% in 2024/25 demonstrating our continued work to meet local and regional skills needs of adults in the West Midlands Combined Authority.

Having an Impact Locally

The chart below shows the proportion of our adult learners that reside in the Dudley Local Authority, in the neighbouring authorities (Wolverhampton, Birmingham, Sandwell & Walsall) and outside of the region. More than half of our adult learners live in the Dudley borough (51%.) 98% of our adults are from Dudley or the neighbouring boroughs demonstrating the impact we are having locally.

Adult learners based within region

Adult Classroom % STEM

The local economy relies on a workforce with high level skills and skills in STEM subjects (science, technology, engineering, and mathematics).

The chart above shows the percentage of qualifications completed by adult learners that were in STEM related subjects. In 2024/25, 46% of our adults followed STEM programmes of study, an increase of 1% compared to the previous year.