Tom Belger | Schools Week

School funding: ‘Serious questions’ for government over £100m bailouts

Ministers have “serious questions to answer” over school funding bailouts for five councils, Labour has said, with calls for transparency over funding deals and other authorities demanding cash. Last week the Department for Education revealed that deals totalling almost £100 million had been struck with Bury, Hammersmith and Fulham, Kingston upon Thames, Richmond upon Thames […]

Headteacher vacancies fall despite Covid exodus fears

Fears of a Covid-fuelled mass exodus of headteachers this summer may be wide of the mark, although new figures suggest more leaders left their jobs earlier in the pandemic. The government was warned about a “post-Covid exodus” of headteachers after a poll last year found nearly half were less than likely to remain in the […]

Schools in minister’s own constituency £130k worse-off under pupil premium change

Schools in Nick Gibb’s own constituency face being £130,000 worse off under his department’s controversial change to how it calculates pupil premium funding. Rising deprivation amid the pandemic has fuelled a 6.2 per cent jump in pupils who would typically receive top-up funding in Gibb’s Bognor Regis and Littlehampton seat. But controversial reforms to use […]

School trip funding plummets under government’s Turing scheme

School leaders say pupils will miss life-changing experiences with funding set aside for overseas trips slashed by two thirds under the government’s Turing scheme. The flagship £110 million scheme, named after scientist Alan Turing, opened to applications last week. It replaces the EU’s Erasmus+ programme. If it’s not ringfenced it’ll all go into higher education […]

DfE to spend £7m on hundreds more school cost-cutting consultants

The Department for Education will spend £7 million expanding its army of cost-cutting consultants by up to 600 – with a similar “mentor” scheme now to be rolled out for chief finance officers. Tender documents show the government will soon invite bids from organisations to train 200 school resource management advisers (SRMA) a year until […]

Councils in deficit told to find SEND savings in exchange for £100m bailouts

Five councils have been told to cut special needs and disabilities (SEND) spending and reform services in exchange for government bailouts totalling almost £100 million to fill black holes in their budgets. The Department for Education has reached deals with five local authorities which have some of the largest dedicated school grants deficits in England. […]

RSC says no: Fairview academy conversion blocked over local concerns

A school’s bid to become an academy has been turned down because it was “at odds with the community” as parents, staff and the local council opposed the plans. The proposal by Fairview Community Primary School, in Kent, to join the Westbrook Trust was rejected by Claire Burton, regional schools commissioner for the south-east and […]

School claimed furlough cash then gave £64k payout to head

A junior school that claimed nearly £100,000 of furlough cash because of the “dramatic and potentially catastrophic” financial impact of Covid made a £64,000 redundancy payment to its executive headteacher. Accounts for St Stephen’s Junior School, a single-academy trust in Canterbury, Kent, show that executive headteacher Stuart Pywell was made redundant in August, and sent […]