Tag Archives: schools

Funding and equality

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In the good old days Cabinet office guidelines recommended 13 weeks for a public consultation by a government department. The stage one consultation on the ‘Schools national funding formula’ was published on the 7th March and closes on the 17th April. This is but five weeks including Easter. The closing day is a Sunday. (There might have been an exclamation mark here, but I am trying to conform to the new DfE guidelines).

The interesting feature for me of the proposals centres on the attempt by the government to marry together two different notions of equality. The first of these is the notion that everyone should have the same funding. In essence it is the argument of the F40 Group of authorities that felt they were short-changed when the current rules were introduced. The second notion is that of equal outcomes. If every child is to achieve the maximum possible from their education some will need more resources than others. This principle has long been accepted in relation to SEN and with the Pupil Premium the issue of the need for other forms of additional support was formalised at a national rate. The Pupil Premium will remain for the lifetime of this parliament, but no guarantee has been given for after 2020. The consultation identifies three categories of additional needs.

Without fully worked examples, it is difficult to do more than comment on the building blocks of the new formula. I suspect the one that will worry schools that might be potential losers under a new formula is the area cost adjustment. The level this is set at will need to be able to compensate for areas where salaries are higher because of high cost of living and working in the area. However, if it doesn’t recognise the high cost of housing in some areas outside London, it won’t help schools in those areas attract and retain staff. This is important because, as the consultation recognises, staffing costs are the major part of any school’s budget. Ever since the introduction of Local Management of Schools in the early 1990s, the decision to fund on ‘average salaries’ rather than actual salary bills has benefitted schools with a relatively young staff profile and eaten up more of the budget of those schools with a high proportion of staff at the top of the Upper Pay Band. The new formula won’t change that. Indeed, it might see the end of scales and move towards a single point or a first year starting salary and then the same basic salary for all with additions for responsibilities and other reasons depending on what the school could afford.

The notion of support for exceptional circumstance such as split sites, sparsity and business rates, not to mention the PfI payments from the Building Schools for the Future programme, is welcome news, assuming the funding is enough to cover all current needs.

And here lies the issue. With more pupils to educate, how much more cash will there be in real terms? Personally, I would also want to see modelling of outcomes when the current pupil numbers currently going through primary schools move into the secondary sector. What will be the effects on primary schools, especially small primary schools, when secondary numbers are rising and primary numbers are static or again falling? The nature of the formula will especially affect small rural primary schools. Does a Conservative government want to design a formula that might lead to their wholesale closure or will the sparsity factor balance off against the area cost adjustment? This will, I am sure, worry some of the more rural areas of England, not least Northumberland where, according to the DfE website, Holy Island Church of England First School currently has a per pupil expenditure or more than £27,000. I am not sure whether the statutory walking distance to the nearest schools works in cases like that but it might be another factor to add to the list of exceptions that can be covered through additional funding.

This just goes to show how much work DfE officials have done on trying to create a fair formula, but how complex the issue remains until there is agreement on what a fair formula is. What it isn’t is just allocating the same amount to every pupil.

 

Talk up teaching

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According to the Mail on Sunday, not a newspaper I usually read, but whose reporting of the Secretary of State’s remarks to the ASCL Conference have been brought to my attention, we need to be positive about what a great career teaching is. Apparently, according to the Mail on Sunday, Mrs Morgan told ASCL delegates:

That a number of schools are struggling to recruit good teachers but that talk of a “crisis” in recruitment may deter people from the sector. She said that, “While the headline data shows a sustained low, national vacancy rate, the reality on the ground for many heads is that they are struggling to attract the brightest and the best.” She acknowledged the cost of recruiting can be a burden when schools have “other, better things to be spending money on,” On fears that highlighting recruitment issues may put people off of becoming a teacher, the Education Secretary said: “Let’s focus on commenting to the outside world on what a great profession teaching is, how rewarding it can be and what good teachers have the power to do.”

In questions there was apparently talk of the need for a national database of vacancies: TeachVac your time has surely come.

In case the Secretary of State has been shielded from TeachVac by her officials I am sending her a letter outlining the advantages of the free service we have been providing for more than a year now. I agree with the heads asking why spend millions of pounds on advertising when it can be done for free?

Heads, teachers, local politicians, governors and others responsible for recruitment might ask why they haven’t tried TeachVac if it is free. Wasting money through inertia is not acceptable when everyone is complaining about the effects of austerity.

Let me re-iterate, TeachVac is free for everyone, to schools to post vacancies and to teachers, trainees and returners to post requests to be told when a vacancy meeting requirements is posted.

If you know someone involved in recruiting teachers and leadership staff in schools, do please tell them to visit www.teachvac.co.uk and watch the demonstration videos. Signing up takes no time at all, but a school does need to know its URN – available via Edubase – as a security check.

As to the Secretary of State’s thesis about talking up teaching, I agree it is a great job, but surely she could have offered something on the workload front that would have allowed an even more positive message to have emerged from her speech. I hope by Easter, she will have something more eye catching to say to the other teacher conferences. She could even announce that the DfE is investigating free initiatives on recruitment advertising and job matching such as TeachVac. Such a move wouldn’t cost a penny, but would show the government is keen that the cash she has for schools isn’t being spend on private sector profits.

If anyone wants to know more about TeachVac, please do contact me and I will be happy to answer your queries.

 

 

TeachVac is ahead of the game

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Should schools be allowed to appoint staff as a result of vacancies advertised only internally; should MATs or diocese as employers be allowed to appoint staff to a new post anywhere in their organisation without an external advert? The BiS Department in Whitehall is currently carrying out a consultation on this topic entitled. CLOSED RECRUITMENT PRACTICES IN THE PUBLIC SECTOR.

The consultation poses a number of questions about the process that might affect schools, but one that interested me the most was:

Under this option, the Government would ensure that all public sector employers published information on the levels of internal-only recruitment used within their organisation. This might include the number of staff brought in under internal recruitment, and the proportion of all recruitment that took place as a result of internal-only recruitment. This information would be publicly available, and would allow scrutiny and debate over the extent of internal recruitment.

If accepted, this idea would require schools to publish details of the number and percentage of internal appointments. Now TeachVac is ahead of the game here because it provides schools with a list of vacancies advertised and we could easily extend that to include whether it was an internal or external advertisement.

As with other TeachVac recruitment services, this would be free to registered schools and would require only one extra keystroke at time of entry. Posts marked internal only would not be matched with candidates in the TeachVac database but we could provide data on their numbers to help schools justify internal advertising as the best way forward.

An extreme outcome of the consultation would be for the government to require all schools to advertise all vacancies. This might prove interesting in relation to say, the School Direct salaried route if those trainees had to compete with others on alternative routes.

The cost of advertising if schools do not use TeachVac’s free service is another issue. Does the government really want to divert resources into advertising and away from teaching and learning when the school has a perfectly good candidate or must we always be seen to being open with public money? TeachVac allows both options, at no cost to schools

I well recall in an earlier age a vacancy being advertised in a Saturday newspaper because nobody other than the internal candidate would be likely to read it. Such measures are within the rule but not the spirit of open advertising.

Any rule change would apply not only to teaching posts but also to all other vacancies. Schools that hired contractors would not be affected, and the contractors could do what they wished unless their contract specified the schools would only accept staff appointed after an open recruitment competition.

It would certainly make unlikely those cases that crop up from time to time of senior staff employing their relatives. That was something, I seem to recall, worried MPs at one time about who was employed in their own offices.

Should politicians lead by example?

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This blog starts with not one but two ethical issues. Firstly, should we discuss politician’s children and specifically their education and secondly, should politicians send their children to state funded schools? These questions arise after media speculation that the Prime Minister is to send his son to a private school, thus saving the State several thousands of pounds a year on his education.

I would normally regard this as a private matter and fully support the right of parents to educate their children as they see fit. However, the Prime Minister has form in this regard since the discussions as to where his daughter would go to secondary school were all over the media in 2014. Indeed, according to the Daily Mail on line, in October 2014 he was in favour of the state sector. http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2796964/cameron-set-tory-pm-send-children-state-secondary-viewing-three-four-schools-wife-samantha.html Part of the headline read: No one should need to go to a private school, says Eton-educated PM.

The article went on to say

In an interview with Good Housekeeping magazine, the Prime Minister suggested the Government’s education reforms were designed to make private education redundant.

‘If you pay your taxes you shouldn’t have to pay all over again. There is no reason why our state schools can’t be among the best in the world, and some of them are,’ he said.

‘What is exciting is there this change not only in practice but also in culture which is all about excellence and wanting to be the best and wanting to get the best out of every child, and you are now seeing that in more and more schools.
Well that seemed pretty clear. So perhaps he can tell us why he has changed his mind? It cannot be as a result of the social mobility index the government published yesterday, as that rates London very highly for social mobility compared with say many seaside resorts. https://www.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/496103/Social_Mobility_Index.pdf

If the Prime Minister does opt out of state education for his son, what does this say about the government’s own academy programme?

Is it a slap in the face for hardworking teachers and other staff in our state schools that the person leading our public services doesn’t want to use them for his own family? Of course, London state schools might lose out under the funding review coming up shortly and their performance, which has improved dramatically over the last few years, might deteriorate over the next few years, especially if they have difficulty recruiting staff due to the pay cap in the public sector. We these the factors that help change Mr Cameron’s mind from eighteen months ago? We don’t know and, as I said, at the beginning, all parents have the right to decide how to educate their children. The State is the default position if you don’t, won’t or cannot take a decision yourself. But one cannot help but feel that leading by example is good for the morale of those that work in the public sector.

A matter of trust

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The school system in England, and presumably across the rest of the United Kingdom, is essentially based upon trust. Parents trust schools to educate their offspring and schools trust parents to make sure those attending school know the difference between the basics of right and wrong. Is this trust in danger of breaking down?

The Report today from ATL, the Association of Teachers and Lecturers, about violence towards teachers and others working in schools makes for uncomfortable reading, at least at the headline level. I wasn’t able to find the details of the report on ATL’s website when I came to write this blog, so cannot comment further on say, the proportions kicked against those shoved around by their pupils.

The implications are that many of the pupils come from homes where parents have not set appropriate boundaries. Are these clustered in specific areas or spread widely across the country; were they primary and secondary pupils or mostly just antagonistic adolescents?

The concerns over metal health are especially worrying. I think it is clear that a high proportion of long-term mental health issues develop during the time a young person should be in education. The cuts to CAMS (Children and Adolescent Mental Health Services) must be reversed and such services must be adequately resourced for an increasing number of young people in the at risk age-groups. Many readers know that I write this having personally experienced violence in a classroom, albeit many years ago now.

The need for schools to have good working behaviour policies is vital if we are to aid retention of teachers in our classrooms. It isn’t about metal detectors at the doors, but about sensible timetabling, vigilant staff from the senior leadership to the contract cleaners and a policy that is enforced.

At the same time, parents and society in general must trust schools are able to find ways of educating everyone in society. Before the ATL Report appeared I was going to write of my concern that some schools seem to be exploiting the fact that schooling is a voluntary activity by asking parents of disruptive Year 11 pupils to withdraw them from school and, as is their right, state that they are educating them at home or otherwise than at school. With a Year 11 student, it is highly likely that nobody is going to investigate what is actually happening and there is a risk that they can fall into anti-social behaviour and even sexual exploitation.

If I tie all this back to the report earlier this week on Regional School Commissioners it is only to make the point that without coherent planning across the whole sector issues such as the development of special education and support services risk becoming fractured and like CAMS unable to deal with the problems thrown at them despite the very high quality of staff working to tackle everything thrown at them.

In the 1990s the Lib Dems recognised that tax cutting had gone too far under the Conservatives and called for a penny on income tax for education. Perhaps we are reaching that point again. Putting up the regressive Council Tax isn’t an answer: putting up the fairest of the taxes we have may be; the trouble is it is also the most visible.

Don’t Panic?

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This has been a good week for TeachVac (www.teachvac.com) the free to use recruitment site that I helped establish. Not only did it receive a mention in The Guardian on Tuesday – in Fiona Millar’s piece about recruitment challenges – but it also featured on BBC Breakfast TV on Wednesday morning. As a result, I have been on a number of local radio stations at various times this week following their picking up on one or other of the pieces in the national media.

So, what is the situation for September 2016? A trend we at TeachVac noted in December and have seen continuing in January is a larger than expected number of advertisements in the three key EBacc subjects; English, mathematics and the sciences. One of the problems of pre-recording media interviews several days in advance is that percentages change and it is important not to over-estimate. Thus the 40% increase that is being used in some quarters was actually an under-representation of the change between this year and last during the first two weeks of January. Of course what we will not know for several months is whether the increase is a genuine increase in demand or just a change in behaviour on the part of some schools that have brought forward recruitment, perhaps on the basis of anticipated need rather than an actual vacancy in order to start the process early. Now that some academy chains have changed their dates for resignation to the start of term that may also be an influencing factor.

Whatever the reason, or reasons, we are still seeing more advertisements than in 2015. This makes the fact that TeachVac is free to schools, teachers and trainees ever more important. After all, TeachVac was established to help reduce the cost of recruitment. If the free to use model works for Twitter, why not for teacher recruitment?

The team at Teachvac regularly has schools phoning us and asking, ‘can the process of advertising a vacancy really be that simple and free as well?’ The answer, of course is yes. If you don’t believe it and haven’t  yetseen the demonstration video on the site, then I urge you to have a look and tell the remaining schools, teachers and trainees that still haven’t signed up to do so.

Schools that enter vacancies into TeachVac for secondary main scale teachers are told the current state of the ‘free pool’ of possible applicants. TeachVac issued its first alert of 2016 this week when the ‘free pool’ in English slipped below the two thirds level. If advertisements continue at this rate there won’t be enough new entrants to ensure all vacancies can be easily filled throughout the year. Not a problem yet, but it could become the autumn for schools looking at vacancies in January 2017.

At TeachVac, we believe this early warning can help when timetables are constructed as it provides early warning of potential challenges. The changing position is updated regularly in the TeachVac monthly newsletters and other Reviews we publish. Schools, local authorities and other interested parties, such as subject associations and teaching schools, can access more detailed information for a small fee.

My assessment of the 2016 recruitment round, at least for secondary main scale teachers, where the data is richest, is that the increasing school population is starting to affect demand and the under-recruitment into preparation last September will cause issues for some schools in some subjects. Perhaps that’s why the train to be a teacher advert made an appearance on Channel 4 last evening. But, more about recruitment for 2016 at the end of the month when new figures will appear from UCAS.

Geopolitics and macroeconomics

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Whether the world is a more dangerous place this January isn’t for me to say. However, to balance my short-term views about teacher supply problems I thought it worth thinking about what the combined effects of a downturn in China; tensions in the Middle East; falling oil prices and the possibility of rising interest rates might do to the longer-term teacher supply position.

An analysis of data over the past fifty years suggests teacher supply problems ease when the economy is subdued or in recession. Whether there is a direct link between these two facts may be arguable, but while there is a need to educate children there will be a need for teachers. Again, over the past fifty years, there have been massive strides in technology since the famous BBC programme of the late 1970s ‘The chips are down’ about the microprocessor revolution. Classrooms have adapted to make use of the new technology, but there has been no seismic shift away from traditional patterns of pupil teacher numbers. Indeed, in secondary schools over the past decade, pupil-teacher ratios have even improved, according to DfE data.

The recently reported growth in home schooling may be the first signs of a coming revolution, driven by parents no longer satisfied with the current model of schooling. Tablets, TVs and computers can provide more learning power than any school library of a couple of decades ago. What is needed is the means of instruction and the method of motivation to keep youngsters on task. How much more likely is that in a home environment than when youngsters are faced with the distractions caused by 25 or 30 other children: could learning me more focused and take less time in the home than the classroom?

No doubt, parents would still want children to socialise in order to learn team games, sing together and undertake risky science experiments under the control of a qualified person. However, that might mean only sending your child to school for a couple of days a week. Such a shift might also boost the market for tutors as parents just buy in specific skills where their offspring are facing issues with learning.

As the BBC recently highlighted, the spirit of enterprise is abroad in Britain at the present time. I am sure that there are many developers in both large companies and small start-ups eying what could be a lucrative market that has world-wide potential; some of which will be on display at BETT.

Such a shift in technology from a labour intensive to a technology driven learning process could have a profound effect on both the need for teachers and the spending by the State on education. However, in the short-term, the geopolitical and macroeconomic signals might suggest that if a downturn is coming then teaching might benefit from renewed interest as a career choice.

As I have said at several conferences recently, I am one of the only people that might see benefits from a slowdown in China, even if it only reduces the inflow to that country of UK teachers to work in the growing international school market.

However, with the allocations for 2016 entry into teacher preparation courses set and fewer places available on non-EBacc subjects than in 2015, none of this will matter before 2017 unless, as in 2009, any downturn in the world’s economy bring back greater numbers of returners into teaching: such an effect could dramatically alter the picture of teacher supply, even for 2016, were it to come about.

Fig leaf looks a bit threadbare

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It didn’t take long for the national press to take up the issue of teacher supply in 2016. The Observer, a paper that has carried several stories about teacher supply over the past few months, including covering my evidence to the Select Committee in last Sunday’s edition, has highlighted the concerns of Sir Michael Wilshaw about recruitment in coastal and deprived areas expressed in his annual report. The reporters also highlight Labour’s issues with the DfE statistics, including both the inclusion of Teach First numbers being included in the annual census of trainees and the presentation of vacancy numbers based on data collected in November. http://www.theguardian.com/education/2016/jan/02/ofsted-row-ministers-extent-teacher-shortages-michael-wilshaw

As Sir Michael Wilshaw demonstrated in his last annual report, even the DfE figures, collected at the most favourable time of the year, have been going in the wrong direction over the past few years. It is not the fault of civil servants that the only data they collect comes from a census taken in November, but the fig leaf that this provides Ministers with now looks ever more threadbare.

How can you operate a National Teaching Service if you do not know the annual demand from schools for teachers? I am interested to know if anyone has yet seen the parameters for the working of this service. As schools are already recruiting for September 2016, if the government doesn’t enable the service soon it will have an even more challenging first year of operation than might be necessary.

Who does the government have that is capable of running such a service anyway? How much will they pay the teachers; will they only recruit existing teachers, perhaps from Teach First; will it just be secondary schools offered such teachers or will primary and special schools be included; will such teachers be offered only to academies or will all schools be able to bid for such teachers? Who knows, if you do please let me know where I can find out the details.

If the Observer didn’t actually talk to Sir Michael before writing their story, but just based it on comments in his annual report, they might want to ask him about progress at GCSE in areas where recruitment is challenging. TeachVac’s preliminary investigation of 2015 GCSE 5A*-Cs results including English and mathematics, compared with 2014, suggest that in London more schools performed less well in 2015 than 2014 than did better. Now, nationally, there was an overall decline of half a per cent in this figures, so some schools doing worse than last year was to be expected. The fact that overall more schools in London did worse raises questions about whether teacher supply problems might have contributed to the outcomes, even if schools have tried to protect examination classes.

Of course, since the DfE don’t believe there is a crisis in teacher supply anywhere in the country they will have to come up with a different explanation if it is true school performance in London has faltered compared with some other parts of England.

Teacher recruitment in 2016

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How will schools looking for teachers in 2016 fare? Teacher supply was a common theme of discussions in the autumn term of 2016, so I thought I would share some preliminary analysis regarding the start of the 2016 recruitment round. Schools signed up to TeachVac, our free recruitment site that costs schools nothing to post vacancies, receive more detailed information thorough our monthly newsletter. To find out more visit http://www.teachvac.co.uk

In addition, secondary schools receive the unique update on the size of the remaining ‘free pool’ of trainees every time they upload details of a main scale vacancy. At present, this is the national picture since the NCTL seem reluctant to reveal regional data in any meaningful form, despite in 2014 telling me that they had hoped to do so in 2015. The data on regional provision in the priority subjects that they have produced is challenging to map against the actual census numbers in some subjects. As the key census table also has gaps that appear to be filled in another table, I have a word of caution about the data in the public domain. No doubt some enterprising MP will ask questions or the Select Committee will elicit the actual data from the DfE as part of their inquiry. If so, we will update the information in TeachVac.

Anyway, using the data that is available we can assume that Teach First trainees will be in classrooms and unavailable to fill vacancies, other than as qualified teachers at the end of their programme, and that School Direct Salaried trainees are also likely to be hired either by the school where they are training or another local school without an advert appearing.  As a result, these trainees can be discarded from the pool of trainees available to schools unable to access these programmes. In addition, it is worth reducing the remaining number by five per cent to allow for those that don’t complete their training programme on the higher education, SCITT and School direct fee routes.

Taking all these variables into account, the picture is broadly similar to this point in 2015. There are unlikely to be enough trainees in the ‘free pool’ to satisfy demand in business studies; design and technology – despite slightly better recruitment than last year; English – where we have concerns that the distortion produced by both Teach First and the School Direct Salaried numbers may make it difficult for schools in some parts of the country to recruit a teacher –this is a subject where the regional breakdown of recruitment into training would be especially helpful. Although the mix of science teachers may not be what schools need, the total of trainees may be sufficient across the country, even if not regionally. The same is true in mathematics.

In PE, art and probably languages, there should be sufficient trainees to meet demand. In other subjects, we need to see how schools will schools respond to curriculum changes and funding pressures before making a judgement. However, geography, music, IT and RE schools seeking teachers may struggle towards the end of the year, if 2016 follows the pattern of 2016.

Regionally, despite the presence of Teach First together with the School Direct Salaried places, we expect schools outside these programmes to struggle in London and the Home Counties when it comes to recruitment of main scale teachers. As these are the parts of the country with the greatest concentration of independent schools, the demand for teachers from these schools is an additional pressure in the marketplace.

Teachvac has a new service this year that allows us to provide advice on salary levels offered in the marketplace. This is not yet a free service, but the team are happy to discuss details with anyone interested. 2016 looks like being another interesting and challenging year for teacher recruitment.

 

The Select Committee and teacher supply

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Yesterday morning was an interesting experience. I spend forty minutes alongside three other leading authorities on teacher preparation and supply appearing in front of the House of Commons Education Select Committee. This august body was taking evidence about the current state of recruitment into the profession and employment opportunities for teachers.

As might be expected, the general tone from everyone, except the Minister in the final session, was gloomy with the emphasis on targets not met and the challenges schools face when looking for new teaching staff. The Minister was right to emphasise the increased number of teachers in the profession, but along with the data on entrants to training he must ensure civil servants provide clarity on the basis for the figures. Did his comparison with last year exclude or include Teach First numbers in both sets of numbers he quoted. It would be unhelpful if 2014 data didn’t include Teach First but 2015 did, since the comparison wouldn’t have been based on a similar measure. This can be checked when the transcript appears.

What is also interesting is the data revealed in an answer Lord Nash gave on the 7th December to a written question in the House of Lords. From that information it is possible to identify success against target for the four key routes into teaching; higher education; SCITTs; School Direct fee and School Direct salaried. The rates are important because some of the routes into teaching provide more trainees for the free pool of job hunters that aren’t necessarily going to be snapped up by those responsible for preparing them for the profession than do other routes.

There is an interesting debate to be had around any route that is especially selective in its entry standards and then offers employment to all those on that route into teaching. This would leave others schools not so fortunate with a much more limited access to the trainee market. One solution would be for all schools to become involved in training. However, it only matters if some routes are better at filling the places allocated.

The table shows the percentage of allocated places filled in 2015 as reported in the answer to the PQ

  HEI SCITT SD – Fee SD – Salaried
Total 88 65 54 70
Primary 104 77 71 89
Secondary 77 57 45 56
English 142 57 60 82
Mathematics 72 51 34 47
D&T 42 47 31 77
History 108 82 85 79
Geography 93 40 38 45

On the basis of the figures in the table, there is a risk that recruitment controls in history and English might create a shortfall in 2016 with knock-on effects on the teacher labour market in 2017 if the same pattern were to develop as last year.

The effects of the controls will need to be watched very carefully in case school recruitment doesn’t take over from higher education courses once they have been capped. Recruitment controls rely upon applicants wanting to enter teaching by any route and not being wedded to a university course. Should that not prove the case, and there was a discussion about how far trainees were now prepared to travel to study to enter the profession during the Select Committee session, further action might need to be taken quickly.

Of course, allocations aren’t the TSM number and are set high in some subjects, but why did schools only manage to fill a third of their allocations in design & technology. In mathematics, might the bursary provide a better return to some candidates than the salaried route in terms of effort and cash on offer?

Hopefully, as the recruitment round for 2016 unfolds there will be room for dialogue between the DfE and other partners, even if it might have to be managed through the Select Committee.

My evidence to the Select Committee can be read on their page devoted to the inquiry at: http://data.parliament.uk/writtenevidence/committeeevidence.svc/evidencedocument/education-committee/supply-of-teache rs/written/24299.html