Tag Archives: 16-18 funding

Primary winners (possibly): Secondary losers (certainly)

Posted on by
Reply

The Institute for Fiscal Studies and the Nuffield Foundation have published the latest in their series of reports about education spending Annual reports | Institute for Fiscal Studies While the report covers the whole education sector, I am principally interested in the school sector. That sector now overlaps the early years sectors, at the lower age grouping, with many schools taking pupils below the age of five. At the 16-18 age grouping, there is an overlap between the school sector and the further education and skills sector.

The highlights for me from the latest report are: the obvious effect of the explosion of demand for SEND places. I am not sure whether this report fully captures the full cost of the increase, since the transport costs for pupils with SEND aren’t usually a part of the DfE’s budget, and certainly cannot be funded from the Central Services Block or even the High Needs Block of the Dedicated Schools Grant.

The second highlight is the reduced funding for secondary schools. These schools have seen the reduction in 16-18 funding, and a reduction of the gap between their funding and that of primary schools. I suspect the latter, over the long-term, may have been partly affected by the need to fund non-contact time in the primary sector, introduced under the previous Labour government.

The primary sector is now experiencing falling rolls, while the upper secondary 16-18 sector is still seeing pupil numbers growing. As the report says, there is a policy decision to make about falling rolls. Does government either recoup the cash not needed because there are fewer pupils, and put the consequences on schools, or does it keep the cash in the primary sector and hope to improve outcomes? I wouldn’t bet on the latter.

One element missing from the picture seems to me any discussion on the changes in school reserves. I think it is vital to know how much money is being saved by schools from revenue budgets, and whether the total per pupil is increasing or reducing. With many academy trusts ‘pooling’ reserves so funds can be used for a school in a local authority different from that of the school where the cash was accrued, a picture of trends in this area might reveal the extent of short-term pressures on school budgets. Recently, I came across a special school with a balance of £2.5 million. Is that a good use of public money?

In a graph – sadly the IFS don’t number their graphs or tables in the report: an oversight in my opinion – it sees that early years’ spending has doubled between 2010-11 and 2025-26, and primary school spending has increased by 12% over the same period. All school spending was the same per pupil in each year. This means that secondary school spending per pupil declined by three per cent over the period, and 16-18 spending by 8% – this despite the fact that schools often use their most expensive teachers with this age grouping.

Finally, I note that central spending on academies is now £510 per pupil, double the level in 2016-17. I am not convinced that this is due to a shift towards larger MATs as the report states, as this would imply there were no economies of scale possible.

 I will review this issue further when I look in detail at the 202425 accounts of a selection of MATs once all their accounts are published.

Pay your bus fare to learn

Posted on by
Reply

The government has responded to the House of Commons Select Committee report of earlier this year about bus services in England. I am sad to see that not only will free transport not be available nationally for those under the age of 22, but the government doesn’t even seem prepared to concede that there is an anomaly regarding free transport to school or college for those aged between 16-18.Buses connecting communities: Government Response

Recommendation 15

The Department’s review of the English National Concessionary Travel Scheme should consider piloting a free bus pass for under-22s, valid for travel at any time of day. This would support access to work and skills opportunities for younger people and help embed long-term public transport use.

Response from the government 

The Government recognises the benefits that free travel for under-22s could bring. However, we are operating in a challenging fiscal environment and the future funding for bus services has already been allocated through the Spending Review, with no funding available for such a scheme. Expanding concessionary travel would therefore be unaffordable within this SR period without diverting funding away from maintaining current bus service levels.

I read the dead hand of HM Treasury here. Perhaps the Select Committee could also have sent the recommendation to the Department for Education for their views, although I suspect the answer would be the same. Local authorities serving rural areas cannot afford to subsidise 16-18 travel as might be the case in the large urban areas.

My previous post showed how out of line education in Oxfordshire is compared with other key indicators for the districts within the county. Should the NHS pay more to support children with SEND? | John Howson This is a missed opportunity by the government to improve education for those in rural areas living in poverty. Sadly, it seems like a missed chance. Both a lack of ambition and a lack of resources seem to be the reasons.

Could everyone study mathematics to 18?

Posted on by
2

Are there enough teachers of mathematics to allow all 16-18 year olds to be taught the courses required by the Prime Minister? Not surprisingly, the teacher associations state that in the middle of a teacher recruitment crisis then there certainly are not enough teachers. Are they correct?

Well, as a famous radio personality of the 1950s once said, ‘it depends upon what you mean by’. In this case it depends upon what you mean by a teacher of mathematics? The first problem is that those in the 16-18 year old age-group divide into four: those in the school sector; those in further education; those in apprenticeships or other work environments and finally the NEET group, not in employment, education or training for one reason or another. Some of these, such as the small group in custody could receive some maths education, but most, by the nature of the category, would be outside any scheme.

However, let’s concentrate on the school sector. Could adding perhaps two hours a week to the curriculum of those in Years 12 and 13 be staffed? The obvious answer is that yes it could be. After all, any teacher can be required to teach any subject to any year group while QTS (Qualified Teacher Status) remains just that, a certification to teach, not a curriculum limited certification as I have long advocated. Additionally, academies don’t even need to employ staff with QTS, so they could hire retired engineers or undergraduates from a local university interested in earning a bit of cash to support their studies.

With the Oak Academy, schools might just sit the students in a room and show them pre-recorded learning modules, especially if no assessment was required at the end of the course. After all, discipline shouldn’t be an issue with this age group that are still in schools.

Of course, schools would expect some more funding from the government for putting on more courses, even if they reduced other teaching hours so as to keep programme levels at the same overall package length for students.

The government has been developing strategies to improve the teaching of mathematics in schools with more maths hubs and CPD available, that will have made a difference to the skill set of the teaching force, but probably only a small impact.

More importantly is the number of new teachers, where there are far fewer in training than in recent years.

2013/142014/152015/162016/172017/182018/192019/202020/212021/222022/23
2125217024502545245021742145279226711834

The ITT Census number of 1,834 is by far the lowest for over a decade. With STEM subject trainee numbers also being lower, there is support for the position being taken by the teacher associations.

Even if the mathematics was in fact statistics and problem-solving father than pure mathematics, it seems likely that there would not be sufficient teachers to staff any normal method of delivery. Might this be a time to consider the use of technology in delivery of the curriculum?

FE: too often forgotten

Posted on by
2

This blog is as guilty as many in education of too often overlooking the further education sector. Despite its status of something of a poor relation to both higher education and the school sector, further education has an important part to play in developing the economic activity of our nation. One of my regrets about the Coalition government was that it allowed the further education sector to be excluded from the funding deal for schools. That deal may not have been perfect, but it has left schools, and especially those secondary schools without 16-18 provision, relatively much better off than the further education sector. The oft quoted number is that a lecturer in the FE sector earns around £7,000 less than a school teacher when teaching the same age group.

One has to ask, is it rational to be thinking of cutting fees for higher education without also considering the funding of further education, where a portion of higher education work also takes place. I suspect that a significant amount of the work on FE funding assumed that further education could subsidise expensive practical subjects from the assumed cheaper to deliver classroom based education. Such a view is both short-sighted and not, I suspect, based on much in the way of evidence. I guess that when general studies was taught to classes 100 or more day release students, such subsidies were possible: but mostly, I suspect, that was a long time ago.

Teaching English and Mathematics, both classroom based subjects, to those that failed to reach a satisfactory level at school cannot be done in large classes. It also cannot be done properly by those without sufficient knowledge and skills of teaching.  Practical subjects whether construction or hairdressing need both small groups and often expensive equipment. The Treasury doesn’t seem to realise this fact. Government also doesn’t seem to realise that students often have to travel significant distances to attend colleges offering subjects they are interested in learning.

We have already seen a couple of universities flirt with financial issues and there must be a risk as the number of 16-18 year olds reduces for the next couple of years that further education as a sector will experience the same sorts of serious financial problems.

Once the agony of the Brexit saga is finally resolved, one way or another, then British industry and commerce must step in to support the development of the further education sector as a means of creating talent for our wealth generating industries, whether old manufacturing skills or modern IT related skills or those that have yet to be fully understood around the applications of AI across the workplace.

Now is the time to review the economics of the whole 16-18 sector. Schools are able to support small sixth forms, especially where pupil numbers are growing at Key Stage 3. Colleges don’t have this luxury and it is a false economy to under-fund them when we need a more productive and skilled workforce at all levels. Those that don’t go to university are as important in our economy as those that do and much less of a burden on the public purse.  They deserve a better deal.