Of the 84 colleges it inspected in 2010/11, education watchdog Ofsted has confirmed that not one was rated outstanding for its teaching and learning.

In addition to this, the inspectorate reported that 16 colleges were given a lowly satisfactory as their overall grade for the third inspection in a row.

Indeed, 44 per cent of schools that were previously rated as good saw their grade fall - nearly double the 25 per cent decrease seen in 2010.

"There is far too little outstanding teaching in colleges," the Ofsted report said. "No colleges achieved an overall outstanding grade for teaching and learning, and only 11 per cent of the lessons observed were judged outstanding."

Further to this, Ofsted noted that there was too much variation between the quality of teachers within individual colleges.

The news comes ahead of the official appointment of the new head of Ofsted Sir Michael Wilshaw, who has already pledged to make top grades more difficult to come by.