For far too long, young adult carers have been overlooked. It's estimated that they provide around £5.5 billion of unpaid care each year. Despite the contribution they make, young adult carers are three times more likely to be NEET (not in education, employment or training) compared with other young people, and if they get to college, almost a third drop out. But these outcomes aren’t inevitable – young adult carers have great talent and skills.

A year ago, the Learning and Work Institute, in partnership with the Carers Federation, launched a new three-year project – Driving Change: supporting young adult carers in FE. The aim of Driving Change is to enable colleges, in all parts of the UK, to put tailored and high-quality support in place so that young adult carers can achieve their potential.

The first year of the project hasn’t been entirely plain sailing – we certainly didn’t anticipate a global pandemic. Colleges across the UK are fantastic hubs, at the heart of their communities. They’re used to being creative and flexible in responding to local needs and challenges – whether that’s working with employers to address skills gaps, addressing the root causes of gang violence and knife crime or bringing together different communities to promote social cohesion.

Supporting young adult carers in college

However, the coronavirus pandemic caused huge disruption and forced colleges to transform their ways of working, almost overnight. Colleges couldn’t simply adapt or tweak the delivery of learning and support; they had to find entirely new mechanisms for keeping their learners engaged and motivated, and on track with their learning.

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Around 22 colleges across England and Wales were participating in the Driving Change project when the pandemic hit. At the Learning and Work Institute, we understood the scale of the challenge that these colleges faced. But we also knew that young adult carers would be particularly hard hit by the crisis and that effective support would be crucial to their wellbeing and progression. 

In the early days of lockdown I spoke to 17-year-old Katie studying at Solihull College. Katie cares for her mum and younger brother. She explained how the day-to-day practical and emotional demands of being a carer had increased due to the pandemic. Like Katie, thousands of young adult carers across the country took on additional responsibilities – homeschooling younger siblings and filling the gaps in support usually provided by local services. Alongside this, they had additional worries about the potential impact of the coronavirus on the people they care for, and concerns about shopping for basics and rising living costs.

In the pre-Covid world, going to college provided many young adult carers with much-needed respite from their responsibilities. There was a real risk that the physical closure of colleges, combined with the added pressures brought about by the pandemic, would lead to even greater numbers of young adult carers dropping out and effectively becoming "trapped" in a life of caring.

The impact of the coronavirus

Despite the unprecedented challenges colleges were facing, after a short pause, all 22 continued to actively participate in Driving Change. The feedback we received was that their initial work on the project had enabled them to develop a clear understanding of the needs of their learners with caring responsibilities. This meant that they were well placed to respond during the crisis. The ongoing support provided by the Learning and Work Institute and the Carers Federation team, in the context of a clear framework for improvement, provided the focus that colleges needed to ensure that they were doing all they could to respond to young adult carers’ unique situations and keep them on track with their learning.

In August, Bridgend College was the first college to successfully achieve the Driving Change QSCS quality standard. Sunderland College and South Devon College have also since done so. These colleges have demonstrated an unwavering commitment to improving the experiences and outcomes that their young adult carers achieve. Some of the changes and actions that they have implemented include:

• Convening young adult carer advisory groups, to advise and guide college activities and support.
• Developing new processes and policies, in consultation with young adult carers.
• Introducing new surveys to improve identification of carers throughout their college journey.
• Producing films, aimed at both staff and students, to raise awareness of the wide and varied experiences and challenges faced by young adult carers.
• Securing governor and senior leadership team approval to run mandatory training for all staff, to be refreshed each year.
• Identifying and appointing young adult carer "champions" across all curriculum areas.
• Developing new partnerships with local schools and carers services, to support young carers’ preparation for transition to college, at an early stage.
• Introducing targeted data collection and monitoring, which provides clear evidence of need and progress towards targets/outcomes.
• Targeted use of 16-19 bursary to support young adult carers.

Making a tangible difference

These changes are making a tangible difference to young adult carers - helping to prevent them from dropping through gaps at the key transition point from school to college; providing empathetic, tailored and flexible support; raising aspirations and expectations; providing clear opportunities to progress and achieve.

During the past six months policymakers and the public alike have recognised the value of the UK’s army of paid and unpaid carers. We are keen to ensure that the learning and outcomes from Driving Change have impact in the widest way. The government is currently preparing to update its national Carers Action Plan – we look forward to working with the Department of Health and Social Care to ensure a strong focus on enabling young adult carers to make effective transitions in education and employment. Implications for policy, from colleges that participate in Driving Change, will feed into this.

As we move into year two of Driving Change, we’re looking forward to working with many more colleges, across England, Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland, to give young adult carers inclusive access to further education and high-quality and tailored support from colleges.

Nicola Aylward is the head of learning for young people at the Learning and Work Institute

To find out more about how your college can get involved in Driving Change, contact Nicola.aylward@learningandwork.org.uk