ABSTRACT
If Lord David Eccles was right when he described the education curriculum as a ‘secret garden’ then Further Education (FE) would probably be best described as the ‘kitchen plot’ in its most hidden corner. Very few legislators will have had first-hand experience of its culture and purpose and seem to view it as only marginally changed from its forebears, the trade schools and Mechanics Institutes of the last century. The fact that over two million people in 1990 enrolled in FE classes might come as a surprise to some.
