Recommendation 11

Between September 2015 and March 2017, government oversaw a programme of 37 area reviews of post-16 education and training provision across England. As part of the programme, sixth-form colleges were given the option of becoming academies and, by 2018/19, 24 sixth-form colleges had converted.18 The Department highlighted that there are a number of reasons why a college may choose to become an academy, but acknowledged that one reason may be that, while colleges pay VAT, post-16 academies and other schools do not.19