(From telegraph.co.uk) Tens of thousands of pupils will be sent to colleges and a new breed of technical schools from the age of 14, where they will work "business hours" and attend classes for an extra two weeks a year.

More professionals and business figures should be brought into mainstream comprehensives to help teach vocational courses, while companies could be paid to let their trainee staff attend lessons.

The proposals are contained in a blueprint for vocational studies intended to put an end to the "scandalous" failure of state education to ensure school-leavers are competent at reading, writing and mathematics. More than half of 16 year-olds complete compulsory education in England without achieving a basic C grade in both English and maths, and most then follow what ministers have called "dead end" vocational courses.

Michael Gove, the Education Secretary, published plans which would see many work-related qualifications scrapped in favour of a new system in which employers play a much greater role.

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