East of England

Dear colleagues,

It’s another busy time of the year for colleges! This week we are celebrating National Apprenticeship Week, from the 9 to 15 February. The official toolkit and resources can be found here. Following this, we dive straight into Colleges Week, which is running from 2 to 6 March. This year, the theme is Skills for All. We have suggested a different focus for each day and you can find all the necessary resources to help your teams develop activities at Colleges Week 2026: Skills for all. The week is a great opportunity to spotlight the impact of our sector locally, regionally and nationally – and a particularly good opportunity to engage your MPs, employers and local community. Please do get in touch with the regional team to let us know what you have planned or how we can help you to celebrate! Don’t forget to share your good news stories throughout the week on social media and let us know directly by contacting Chloe.Buchanan@aoc.co.uk. Please do also share your press releases on this or anything else on our College News page.

We have also been busy over the last few weeks with the new term’s networks and forums, and squeezing in a few early college visits for our keep-in-touch meetings. I look forward to visiting the rest of the region over the coming weeks.

Last week, I attended a roundtable on skills mismatch in Cambridge, with representation from Cambridge Regional College and ARU. We had a productive discussion on how education and employers can better support young people into the right training pathways. Sizewell C’s skills development lead also presented on their work with schools, colleges, and universities to ensure the future workforce is equipped with the skills needed for upcoming opportunities. It was also noted that Jess Asato MP (Lowestoft) visited Sizewell C with a focus on training and assessing the progress of the job pledge for Lowestoft.

If there is anything else I or the regional team can support you with, please do not hesitate to get in touch. Our contact details are available on the AoC website.

Best wishes,
Amanda Winnick
Area Director (East)

College Good News:

USP College hosted the inaugural Federation of Essex Colleges Intercollege Skills Competition, celebrating student talent and the value of FE collaboration. The week‑long, WorldSkills‑endorsed event concluded on 30 January and featured students from:
USP College
Chelmsford College
Colchester Institute
Harlow College
South Essex Colleges Group

Competitions spanned health and social care, hair and beauty, electrical installation, plumbing, bricklaying, engineering, digital, science, and hospitality.

It was encouraging to see continued commitment to sustainability across the region: Oaklands College won the Sustainability & ESG Award at the biz4Biz Hertfordshire Business Awards 2025 and Inspire College Group received the Sustainability Award at the 2025 Peterborough Telegraph Business Awards.

These achievements highlight the sector’s regional leadership in environmental responsibility. Congratulations!

Finally, warm congratulations to Gill Worgan, awarded a CBE in the King’s Birthday Honours last June and who attended her investiture last Thursday.


Calls for Action:

• Deadline for TEC applications Wave 2 is Monday 16 February 2026.
• High Needs Provision Capital Allocation 2026-27 has now been announced. If you have a specific project in mind, it is an opportune time for colleges to approach their local authority.

Regional Network dates:

Midlands and East Apprenticeship Forum
Tuesday 10 February 2026
10 – 11.30am (online)

Midlands and East College HE Forum
Tuesday 10 February 2026
1.30 – 3pm (online)

East Governance Professionals’ Network
Wednesday 4 March 2026
1.30 – 3pm (online)

East Finance Directors’ Network
Tuesday 10 March 2026
11am – 12pm (online)

East HR Professionals’ Network
Tuesday 10 March 2026
1 – 2.30pm (online)

East Curriculum and Quality Network
Thursday 19 March 2026
3 – 4.30pm (online)

East Principals and CEOs’ Network
Thursday 26 March 2026
2 – 3pm (online)

Happy New Year! I hope your break over the festive period was wonderful and restorative. Thank you to all the colleges for your warm Christmas greetings and kind messages of thanks and support. We very much appreciated them and wish you the very best for 2026. We definitely have another busy year lined up for us!
Congratulations to our East region AoC Beacon Award finalists for 2025/26:

• Cambridge Regional College, finalist for The Careers & Enterprise Company Award for Excellence in Careers and Enterprise
•  Harlow College, finalist for The Edge Award for Excellence in Real World Learning

Assessor visits are taking place this month, with winners being announced on the 3 March 2026 at the House of Commons. We wish you the very best of luck!

It was great to see FE leaders recognised in the New Years Honours list including: Nikos Savvas, Chief Executive of Eastern Education Group who received an OBE for Services to Further Education and Andrew Barnes, former Chair of Governors at City College Norwich who received an MBE for services to further education.

These awards are all a fantastic recognition of the impactful contributions colleges make in their communities and the education sector as a whole – well done to our East Region Colleges!

Continuing with the theme of celebrating, Colleges Week 2026 will take place from Monday 2 March to Friday 6 March 2026. Our theme this year is “Skills For All” and we are already looking forward to hearing what exciting activities you have planned for the week. Further information and resources can be found here and if there is anything we can do to support you with this celebratory week, please do get in touch.

We are keen to use these regional monthly newsletters to celebrate success in the region, therefore if you have anything you’d like us to share in future editions, please email pal.sohi@aoc.co.uk.

Network Meetings

As always, we have another round of regional events planned for this term that I look forward to seeing you at.

East Chairs’ Network
Tuesday 13 January 2026
8.30 – 9.30am (online)

East Finance Directors’ Network
Tuesday 13 January 2026
11am – 12pm (online)

East HR Professionals’ Network
Tuesday 13 January 2026
1 – 2pm (online)

East Governance Professionals’ Network
Wednesday 21 January 2026
1.30 – 3pm (online)

Best wishes,
Amanda Winnick
Area Director (East)