Monthly Archives: October 2022

Catch Up a good idea, but where to find the staff?

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The DfE has released a research report into Year 2 of the National Tutoring Programme. National Tutoring Programme year 2: implementation and process evaluation – GOV.UK (www.gov.uk) What struck me about the report by NfER was the issue of where tutors came from and the impact of the programme on the overall workforce available to teach our children.

The Report comments that:

“The availability and quality of external tutors and mentors is fundamental – not all schools have the capacity to use internal staff as tutors Evidently, some schools want and need to rely on external tutors. It is encouraging that two-thirds of senior leaders were confident that their school could access high-quality tutoring when needed. However, a fifth were uncertain and a notable minority were unconfident. Only two-fifths were more confident than before the pandemic, which is disappointing given the Government’s focus on tutoring as a response to Covid-19 recovery.”

The Report also concludes that:

“The clear message from the research summarised earlier in the report is that tutors should be knowledgeable in their subject area and trained in pedagogy for tutoring to be effective. The findings emphasise the importance of the roles of the NTP contractors in 2022-23, who will be responsible for recruitment of tutors and mentors, providing them with training, and quality assurance.”

Both of these factors will no doubt contribute to the finding that the programme added to the workload of senior staff in schools, as would any new programme, and that those extra burdens need to be financed to prevent staff having to cope with extra pressures. The Report comments that “It will be important to monitor and review whether this increase in workload continues as the NTP becomes more embedded and as schools are given more autonomy over the delivery of tutoring.”

From my perspective, it is also important to know more about where the staff involved in the programme came from, and if tutoring is going to become a long-term feature of the school scene what will be the effects on the ability of schools to staff their core offering of teaching and learning. How will the programme interface with any actions on the levelling up agenda the new Ministerial Team at the DfE might pursue.

Does the return of Mr Gibb to a ministerial role in the DfE mean more phonics and the EBacc and less concern with vocational subjects? Faced with the prospect of cuts to departmental spending, will the programme be judged sufficiently successful to survive or just allowed to be something schools might wish to pay for from their own budgets?

The National Tutoring Programme should fill an important gap in the provision by providing schools with the ability to help pupils that miss elements of schools catch-up with their peers and help put their own learning back on track. However, the relationship between the programme, and particularly the secondary school sector, where staffing issues are more critical, may need further investigation and may perceived regional issues in supply. In the primary sector, the impact on senior staff workload may be an important consideration for the future.

Why do children in London want to go to school?

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Last week, the DfE published some interesting data on attendance during the autumn and spring terms s of the past few years. The figures, as the DfE acknowledges, are affected by the progress of the covid pandemic. Nevertheless, it is interesting to look at the 2021/22 autumn and spring term data for overall absence as measured by local authority. The data are for upper-tier authorities, so in the remaining ‘shire counties’ it isn’t possible to drill down to district council level. Such data would be especially interesting as it would allow better comparisons between district and unitary councils and the urban borough of London and the Metropolitan areas. Pupil absence in schools in England: autumn and spring terms, Autumn and Spring Term 2021/22 – Explore education statistics – GOV.UK (explore-education-statistics.service.gov.uk)

Even with out this data, the dominance of the London boroughs in the table as ranked by lowest levels of absence is very plain to see.  Only Trafford and Bracknell Forest break in to the list of the top 25 local authorities with the lowest overall absence rates for autumn 2021 and spring 2022 terms, a fact demonstrated by the regional data in the table below. Camden seems to be something of an outlier in the London data with rates for overall absence well about the average for its companion boroughs.

Absence rates by region, autumn and spring terms 2021/22
 Overall absence rateRate of sessions recorded as not attending due to COVID circumstancesPercentage of persistent absentees – 10% or more sessions missed
North East7.90%1.10%24.30%
North West7.30%1.20%22.30%
Yorkshire and The Humber7.60%1.20%23.00%
East Midlands7.40%1.30%22.10%
West Midlands7.60%1.40%23.30%
East of England7.50%1.50%23.00%
South East7.40%1.60%22.20%
South West8.00%1.40%24.70%
Inner London6.30%1.30%18.70%
Outer London6.40%1.20%18.80%
Source: DfE

Inner London, has the lowest overall absence rate for the period, followed by the Outer London boroughs. The South West, a region with no real urban outside of the Bristol Region, had the worst overall absence rate, ahead of even the North East that featured in my recent post about unauthorised absences this September. Absent without leave | John Howson (wordpress.com)

The DfE’s data on overall absence covers primary, secondary and special schools and it would be interesting to see the data by sector for each local authority. Are the areas where the DfE has pupped in extra funds performing better than those with just the National Funding Formula and high Needs block to rely upon? Although above the regional average, the percentage figure for Blackpool is by no means the worst in the North West, so hopefully, the funding is making a difference.

As might be expected, the overall absence rate for the secondary sector at 9.2% in Spring Term 2021/22 was higher than in the primary sector, where it was 6.7%. Both included a 1% figure for covid related absences. In 2018/19, before the pandemic, the secondary sector recorded an overall absence rate of 5.6% and the primary sector a rate of 4.1%. Not surprisingly, it seemed easier to encourage primary school pupils back into school after the pandemic.

Ensuring pupils are back in school must be the first step on the recovery in learning, and there must be thoughts about the missing adolescents and how they can be encouraged to start learning again. Might that affect judgements about future funding, or will the government write off these young people and their learning?

Can state services save money for schools?

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When I first started writing this blog, back in early 2013, now nearly a decade ago, one of my mistakes was not to create an index. With more than 1,300 posts later, to do so now would be a labour of love that at present I don’t have the time for. The lack of an index means I am largely dependent upon visitors throwing up links to former posts to supplement my own memory of issues such as Jacob’s Law – discussed in the previous post.

Today, I have been reminded of a post from January 2018 about costs and savings in the education system that is relevant to the present economic situation. You can read the full post at Not Full Circle? | John Howson (wordpress.com) but one key paragraph was this:

“…. I wonder whether another stage in the cycle of government contracting is starting to emerge. In the immediate post-war period of central planning, public bodies often ran most services. There was no profit element to consider, but cost controls were of variable quality. The Thatcher era saw a mass transfer of services to private companies, with an expectation that costs would fall. Maybe some did, but others didn’t and some benefitted from the proceeds of technological change that drove down costs, but didn’t create competition and didn’t always drive down prices.”

This 2018 post had built upon an even earlier one from July 2014 Private or public | John Howson (wordpress.com) that dealt with the issue, concerning even then, of the cost of outsourcing children’s services to the private sector with no control over rising costs.

At that time, I was establishing TeachVac www.teachvac. To demonstrate how costs of recruitment advertising could be reduced. I concluded the post with the comment that;

“In a time of cutbacks on government expenditure, as we have witnessed during the past six years, it is inevitable that staffing costs will come under pressure, and the debate between cutting wages or cutting services will rage. Sometimes there is a third way, and a new technology or a different approach, can achieve the same service level for lower costs. Is that what we ought to be striving for in education? The only other alternative to preserve service levels is higher taxes.”

This debate about the profit element, and where the most cost-effective system can be found, is once again a live one as the country faces a new round of coping with living beyond its means and the consequences of a foolish attempt to ‘dash for growth’ when other global factors were pointing towards the need for sound government.

How to make savings in a devolved system such as schooling in England is an interesting question. Perhaps we should start with the role of the DfE. Is it there to provide services on a ‘take it or leave it’ basis, such as their vacancy site or is it there to bring together the different players to work out the best value approach for schools. If the latter, how does it enforce such a best value approach? Perhaps the annual audit report should make a comment to governors about where a school spending exceeds a benchmark?

TeachVac is currently in the process of creating an index on recruitment showing the position that a school sits both locally and nationally. Such an index would provide evidence to show the degree high spending on recruitment was necessary and justified.  

Marking time between PMs

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The current political turmoil at Westminster has led commentators and journalists to suggest that the Schools Bill is now effectively dead in the water. The Bill had been struggling ever since it was introduced into the House of Lords and then received a right mauling, such as Upper House can sometimes deliver. Even Tory members of the ‘revising chamber’ seemed unimpressed by their own government’s attempts at reform. The strongest support at that point in time seemed to come from the bench of the Lords Spiritual in the form of the Church of England Bishop with the speaking rights for their schools.  

So, while the DfE also waits to see whether kit Malthouse joins the ranks of those passing through Sanctuary buildings or will be allowed to stay on in post as Secretary of State by the next prime minster, what might civil servants do with their time if the Bill has effectively been dropped?

Personally, I would like to see the regulations for in-year admissions updated to provide more power provided for local authorities, especially with regard to children in care and those with an EHCP that move into a new area. These are some of our most vulnerable children, and the present system of opt-out by academies for in-year admissions sometimes doesn’t help their education.

I have called this a need for a Jacob’s Law to change this situation, but in reality, it doesn’t need a law, just a change in regulations and secondary legislation.

For those that want to read the history behind the need for a Jacob’s Law, see  Time for Jacob’s Law | John Howson (wordpress.com) It is now 5 years since Jacob returned to Oxfordshire and started his period of 22 months without a school accepting him on roll. We must not let this happen again.

The last two White Papers have both contained references to returning control of in-year admissions to local authorities and the government has confirmed that to do so doesn’t need primary legislation.

The loss of the Schools Bill also puts at risk the idea of a register of young people of school age. Such a list would allow movement of young people to be tracked and make it harder for children to disappear off the radar. Not impossible, because parents can take drastic action such as disappearing overseas, but at least it might help policymaker understand the extent of home schooling and encourage debate about the rights of children and their parents to education and what that term actually means in the modern age?

The 25-49 age group that contains most parents of school-age children was one of the groups least supportive of the Conservatives in the latest polling of the public, even putting the Party behind the Lib Dems nationally among this age-group! PeoplePolling / GB News Survey Results

Celebrating the success of young people

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On Monday evening, I watched an audience give a standing ovation to a young man in a wheelchair. The event was the Oxfordshire Youth Awards, and this was the first time that they had been held in public for several years.

The awards celebrated the great range of activities undertaken by young people across the county, many from those you don’t always associate with success in conventional academic terms.

The awards are a celebration of young people and the hard-working and talented children and young people living in the county. Even more impressive is that the decisions about who receives an award is made by a committee of young people aged between 13-25. This in itself provide a great work experience. I was proud to have been invited to attend the event.

In between the presentation of the awards, introduced by two young people, there was music and dancing from a variety of different groups and solo performers, all held on the big stage of the New Theatre in Oxford, more often the home to big budget musicals and other similar events.

There were seven different categories of awards including;

Community Champion that attracted 38 nominations including both a whole year group at one secondary school and many for individuals.

The Inspiration Entrepreneur award attracted six nominations and included those creating social businesses as well as for-profit enterprises.

The other awards included; Youth Project of the Year; Sports Personality; Arts Superstar; STEM Innovator; Youth Activist and the Pride of Oxfordshire Award that the citation said was for the young person that had shown courage and inspirational resilience in the face of challenging circumstances. There were 18 nominations.

The evening was a noisy and celebratory event; perhaps too noisy for an old-foggy such as myself, but I am sure that it inspired the audience to think of how they can become involved next year.

All too often we hear the horror stories of the day, so it is good to be able to write a positive story of the celebration of our young people. My thanks goes out to both the young people themselves and also to everyone that has mentored, motivate and supported their achievements. Long may these awards continue.

Here is what the awards team said of the evening:

“he Youth Awards is over for another two years, but it proves that every single hour of every single day, the young people of Oxfordshire are training, learning, reaching out, making, inspiring and creating ever better versions of themselves and the world around them. On Monday night, Oxfordshire seized its chance to show its appreciation and share the love in style.

The audience whooped, cheered and got to its feet for a standing ovation during an emotional evening celebrating our county’s talented 8-21-year-olds in every possible field. In between the award presentations: rappers rapped, actors performed, songbirds sang, dancers wowed and acrobats back flipped their way across the stage. We would like to thank every single one of our nominees and winners for being the stars they are.”

To find details of the winners visit You are all stars! – Oxfordshire Youth

Cuts are painful*

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The new Chancellor of the Exchequer seems likely to impose fiscal restraint on the public sector. A century after the famous Geddes Axe helped finish off The Liberal Party in the 1920s, will we see the biggest split in the Conservative Party since the days of Sir Robert Peel and the repeal of the Corn Laws that we all learnt about in school? Could the present turmoil mark the start of the endgame for the present regime at Westminster.

Should the Chancellor reactivate the famous Star Chamber of Mrs Thatcher’s time and quiz Kit Malthouse and other department heads about savings? If so, what might the DfE offer up in education?

First, The Secretary of State for Education might state that he needs more cash for the High Needs Black and the growing problems with special education funding. This blog dealt with possible solutions to that issue in a previous post When are deficits called reserves? | John Howson (wordpress.com) earlier this week.

Then he will need to answer the Chancellor’s call for fiscal prudence. So, where might Mr Malthouse look for spending cuts in mainstream schooling?

Axe the assistant Head Grade in secondary schools?

Annually more than 1,500 teachers move onto the leadership scale at the lowest rung as Assistant Headteachers. Axing the grade could save upwards of £75,000,000 a year if those promotion opportunities disappeared. This would blight the careers of many middle leaders looking for promotion, and might hasten their departure to other jobs, possibly in some cases schools overseas.

Manage non-contact time for teachers

With devolved budgets, it is difficult for the Secretary of State to actually identify where cuts will fall if funding is reduced because either government spending doesn’t keep up with inflation or because the actual size of the funding package is reduced. The DfE could indicate what they thought indicative non-contact time limits for schools should be in a way that would mean teachers spending more time in front of classes and less time for other activities. This would be deeply unpopular, but might ease the staffing crisis some schools are facing.

Reduce the increase in the National Funding Formula below the rate of inflation

This seems the most likely outcome as it puts the decision-making about how to deal with the problem of less cash in the hands of school leaders and governors. How might they react? Looking back to the early 1980s, when I first became interested in education finance during a period of economic turbulence, my notes tell me that most local authorities that still controlled school budgets at that time did everything to save teaching posts. Equipment and maintenance upgrades were postponed. Non-teaching posts, and there were far fewer of those in the 1970s and 1980s, were either not replaced when someone left or axed, and school visits and contributions to services such as music services were dropped.

If inflation persists at above the Bank of England’s desired level, it seems likely that class sizes will eventually increase and be reflected in a worsening of the Pupil Teacher Ratios. The government could interfere here, by looking at the size of some post-16 groups and encourage or mandate minimum sizes and cross-school working involving greater use of shared lessons.

With the Oak Academy now up and running, the Oak Academy can remain holding the line that their output isn’t mandatory for schools to use, while the DfE took a look at the management of the post-16 curriculum and its delivery with a view to cutting costs.

In the end, how schools will deal with financial pressure will either be decided locally or imposed from the centre. A Conservative Party Government wedded to free market economics is more likely to opt for a free market approach, putting the decision in the hands of schools and MATs.

*This article is based upon speculation,and does not reflect the views of the author as to possible ways forward if there are cuts to the funding of schools over the near-term.

Can something be seen as ‘too cheap’?

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Someone told me this morning that TeachVac www.teachvac.co.uk was too cheap to work. Schools would not think that offering matches of their vacancies at £1 a throw would work because schools did not believe it could ever be delivered for such a low price. The suggestion was a price point of £5 per match.

It is an interesting matter to debate. TeachVac was established to demonstrate that matching candidates to teaching vacancies where the job matched the aspirations of teachers seeking a job need not be an expensive undertaking with modern technology. That was eight years ago.

The owners of TeachVac would be delighted to take £5 per match, but it would not be true to the original philosophy of demonstrating that modern technology can drive down prices. What such efficiency gains do for the notion of ‘growth’ is another matter entirely.

Anyway, the current £250 offer of 12 months of unlimited matches for secondary schools is proving attractive, especially now that the free service is restricted. Why should some schools pay, and other schools receive the service for free?

TeachVac are also now offering a health check on a school’s vacancy profile, identifying those vacancies that should cost relatively little to fill, and those where schools could struggle.

Here is a suggested framework for schools to consider.

RECRUITING A TEACHER – are you receiving value for money?

The no worry about the cost approach:

Take out an annual subscription to a service such as the tes; hire a recruitment agency; join several job boards

The make effective use of your expenditure:

  1. Calculate how many vacancies you have in a typical year
  2. Divide these into classroom teacher; promoted post; leadership vacancies
  3. Profile the months that the jobs have appeared throughout the year
  4. Review the subject areas
  5. Check against the ‘difficult to fill index’ by TeachVac for each vacancy and local competition
  6. Review the current strategy for value for money

For mainly easy to fill classroom teacher vacancies, especially early in the year:

Use School web site and review interested after 48 hours

If little response, consider move to a paid search procedure

For more challenging vacancies:

Use most cost-effective search procedure

For most challenging vacancies

Consider using agencies on a no-find no fee basis. May be expensive, but might cost-effective.

Calculate the overall cost of different approaches in terms of ability to fill each vacancy against current expenditure.

Absent without leave

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The DfE has an experimental dashboard recording weekly pupil absence data for overall absence and authorized and unauthorized absences at the local authority level. https://department-for-education.shinyapps.io/pupil-attendance-in-schools/ So far, the dashboard has data from 14,580 schools for the 30th of September data.

I have just extracted one list from the dashboard. This is the25 local authority areas with the highest percentages of unauthorized absences in the secondary school sector.

YearWeek beginningLocal authorityAbsenceAuthorisedUnauthorised
202226/09/2022Middlesbrough11.60%4.60%7.10%
202226/09/2022Knowsley11.00%4.50%6.50%
202226/09/2022Isle of Wight11.50%5.90%5.70%
202226/09/2022Sunderland10.20%4.70%5.50%
202226/09/2022Salford9.60%4.10%5.50%
202226/09/2022Hartlepool9.40%3.90%5.40%
202226/09/2022Stoke-on-Trent9.90%4.60%5.40%
202226/09/2022Newcastle upon Tyne10.20%4.90%5.30%
202226/09/2022Gateshead10.70%5.70%5.10%
202226/09/2022Bradford9.80%4.90%4.90%
202226/09/2022Doncaster10.10%5.40%4.70%
202226/09/2022Newham7.80%3.00%4.70%
202226/09/2022Sheffield8.20%3.50%4.70%
202226/09/2022Liverpool9.80%5.30%4.50%
202226/09/2022Kingston upon Hull, City of9.50%5.10%4.30%
202226/09/2022Stockton-on-Tees8.70%4.40%4.30%
202226/09/2022Rochdale8.90%4.70%4.10%
202226/09/2022Blackpool8.70%4.60%4.10%
202226/09/2022Leeds8.40%4.30%4.10%
202226/09/2022Rotherham8.90%4.80%4.10%
202226/09/2022Calderdale9.30%5.40%3.80%
202226/09/2022Barnsley9.30%5.50%3.80%
202226/09/2022Coventry8.70%5.00%3.70%
202226/09/2022County Durham9.70%6.00%3.70%
202226/09/2022Sandwell7.30%3.60%3.60%
Absence rates by geographical area -worst 25 for the end of September 2022

What is striking is the geographical spread of authorities. None in the South West, East of England and East Midlands and only one each in London and the South East. So, from five of the nine regions of England there are just two local authority areas in the list. Whereas the North East contributes more than five authorities to the list, although only two of the five local authority areas heading up the list.

Now, it may be that schools in some areas take different views about what constitutes authorized or unauthorized absences even though there are well-defined categories. Some may also be better at recording data. However, there is another similarity with the areas in the list. Most are areas with either significant pockets or in some cases even larger areas of deprivation within the geographical area.

Some, such as Blackpool, have been Opportunity Areas under previous government schemes to support education. Seven areas had more than 10% of secondary school pupils not in school at the end of September. Such a level of absence might be understandable either later in the year or during the depth of winter, but so early in the school year it is troubling.

Many of these areas have high unemployment levels and would seem to be targets for areas of growth. However, the skills base won’t be there to develop if the education of a proportion of pupils is so disrupted.

Might the current curriculum have something to do with the decision by these pupils to stay away? Government still looks more favorably on training teachers for EBacc subjects than for more directly vocational areas such as business studies.

Interestingly, most of these areas are not ones with significant teacher recruitment issues.

When are deficits called reserves?

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Local authorities are currently starting to put together their budgets for 2023/24. Upper Tier Authorities with responsibility for the High Needs block of the Direct School Gant that deals with expenditure on pupils with special needs will be looking at a year-end overspend in many cases that will need to be added to the amount already sitting off-balance sheet in a temporary solution to the problem of how to pay for this expenditure. The money has been spent by the local authority, but not paid for by central government, so it sits awkwardly in an account waiting for a solution.

At some point, if the DfE or The Treasury deems that the local authority should no longer carry the deficit, but fund it from reserves, this would be a major headache for, I suspect, many local authorities, regardless of their political control. In the present financial climate, the solution is more challenging than it might have been a year ago. As a result, I expect the government to ‘kick the can’ further down the road extending the current arrangement until March 2024, and leaving local authorities with even bigger numbers to worry about.

How might the issue be solved? Before devolved budgets came into being for schools in the 1990s, authorities might just have top sliced their education budget. I cannot see Schools Forum, the body that discusses education funding at a local authority level, agreeing to such a move these days, although the DfE could no doubt mandate it somehow.

An alternative would be to use the precept method, as has been used for social care funding, by allowing local authorities to increase Council Tax by an amount to cover the deficit they have incurred that is not on their balance sheet, but in ‘reserves’. This passes the problem to local taxpayers, despite schooling now being a centrally financed activity.

The government at Westminster could just pay off the figure authorities have in their reserves, either in one lump sum or more likely over a period of several years. But, with their demands for cuts in public expenditure to finance tax cuts, this seems an unlikely option.

Increasing pupil numbers, better healthcare and the acceptance of new medical conditions was always going to put increased demand upon a school system and its funding for pupils with special needs, and especially one that both had not always planned for the changes and was required to do more after the switch to EHCPs from Statements of Need following the 2014 Education Act. A good example of worthy legislation that doesn’t seem to have been fully costed as to its on-gong effects.

Meanwhile, parents probably see declines in service locally, as officers struggle to keep the costs of running the service within bounds. These parents often carry a heavy burden caring for their offspring and fighting a local government system is not something they want to do, but sometimes are forced to undertake. There must be a solution that puts the needs of these young people first.

The effect of the pandemic on early learning

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The DfE today published the results of the 2022 phonics screening check and key stage 1 attainment statistics. Phonics screening check and key stage 1 assessments: England 2022 – GOV.UK (www.gov.uk)

These are the first phonics screening check and key stage 1 attainment statistics since 2019, after assessments were cancelled in 2020 and 2021 due to the pandemic. Regardless of views on the usefulness of these tests they do provide some comparative data from before and after the pandemic.

These statistics cover the attainment of year 1 and year 2 pupils who took these assessments in summer 2022. As the DfE notes, these pupils experienced disruption to their learning during the pandemic. The headline outcome from the data is that attainment in the phonics screening check has decreased compared to 2019

According to the DfE, 75% of pupils met the expected standard in the phonics screening check in year 1, down from 82% in 2019.

87% of pupils met the expected standard in the phonics screening check by the end of year 2, down from 91% in 2019. Suggesting that schools can have an effect on outcomes.

In addition, according to the DfE, attainment at key stage 1 has decreased in all subjects in 2022 compared to 2019.

67% of pupils met the expected standard in reading, down from 75% in 2019.

68% of pupils met the expected standard in maths, down from 76% in 2019.

58% of pupils met the expected standard in writing, down from 69% in 2019.

77% of pupils met the expected standard in science, down from 82% in 2019.

I suppose these results are not a surprise given the turbulence of the past few years. Also, not much of a surprise is that some groups fared worse than others. Although the headline tables only consider single variables, such as gender, ethnicity, geographical region and SEN support, it is clear that while virtually all groups have seen declines in performance across the board, some have seen more than others.  

One striking change is performance on the phonics check for pupils eligible for Free School Meals. Those not meeting the criteria for Free School Meals as opposed to receiving free infant school meals saw the percentage meeting the expected standard fall between 2019 and 2022 from 84% to 80%, while for those eligible for Free School Meals the decrease was from 71% to 62%; down nine percentage points compared with a drop of just four per cent for those not meeting the criteria for Free School Meals.

In the Key State 1 results for the teacher assessment in mathematics, boys overtook girls, with 60% of boys compared with 67% of girls reaching the expected standard. In 2019, 75% of boys, but 77% of girls reached the expected standard.

Writing continues to lag behind reading and mathematics in the outcomes for the Key Stage 1 teacher assessments, with just 52% of boys reaching the expected standard.

These results show that there is much ground to be recovered following the effects of the covid pandemic, even if schools have an uninterrupted autumn and winter this year. Cutting funding for the education of this group may well be to produce life-long disadvantages for many of this group of children.