Nicky Phillips | Schools Week

Changes in the Financial Handbook for Academies

The focus this year is on transparency, with the 2015 handbook seeking to bring in new rules to ensure academies spend public money wisely and fairly The annual Financial Handbook for Academies is rapidly becoming a rule book for the industry – and the 2015 edition contains several stand-out changes that need careful consideration. Here […]

AET saves £1m by moving school computer system into cloud

The country’s largest academy chain will save almost £1 million from moving its ICT services to a “cloud-based” service. The Academies Enterprise Trust (AET) began the transfer of email, websites and all documents over to Google’s cloud service in 2012 in a bid to reduce costs and co-ordinate computer systems across all its schools. It now estimates that […]

How to switch to a cloud-based ICT system

The academies programme has shaken up schools’ traditional support systems, particularly in ICT. However, this reorganisation has created opportunities for the most innovative tick chains to cultivate new infrastructure models. Switching to a cloud-based system has revolutionised AET, the largest multi-academy trust With more than 45,000 staff and student users, our organisation has many challenges […]

Jeremy Corbyn: What does his Labour leadership mean for teachers?

There are those that cheer and those that look on stonily. But Jeremy Corbyn could provide the strong opposition to education policies that teachers need I was in a meeting of the Socialist Education Association when the news came that Jeremy Corbyn had been elected as Labour leader. The reaction was mixed. Those next to […]

More than 30 academies ask permission to employ unqualified teachers

More than 30 academies have been given approval to employ unqualified teachers, despite opening before restrictions were lifted. Free schools and academies have been able to employ teachers without academic or professional qualifications since 2012. However the 2,320 academies that opened before 2012 have funding agreements requiring them to employ only those with qualified teacher status (QTS) […]

Examiners are more generous during re-marks, study finds

Examiners are more generous when they re-mark GCSE and A-level papers immediately after the summer results, a talk by the chair of Ofqual has revealed. A study described by the exam regulator’s chair, Amanda Spielman (pictured), suggests that papers re-marked immediately after exams as part of an appeal later failed to get higher grades when […]

Schools stretch rules by pressuring parents into making donations

A leading secondary school that asked parents for cash earlier this year appears to have again stretched the rules around parental donations. The Grey Coat Hospital, in Westminster, central London, sent a letter to parents whose children were returning to school this academic year asking them for a £96 voluntary donation. While this is not […]

Eye tests in special schools are a must, says sight loss charity

Special educational needs teachers have welcomed calls from a national disability charity for the introduction of free eye tests in every special school. Sight loss charity SeeAbility wants the government to fund specialists to carry out the tests in classrooms after new research found nearly four in ten pupils in special schools have never had […]

School food plan campaign group urged heads to sign infant free meals letter

A letter published in a national newspaper calling for the government to continue funding free school meals for infants was co-ordinated by an organisation that has received half a million pounds to oversee the programme. The Sunday Times published the letter – signed by heads from nearly 500 schools – praising the introduction of the […]