Education Marketing

While the Lib Dems have announced a £2bn growth in the education budget if they come to power, and the Conservatives have promised to cut services more than Labour, Labour have just found another £300 million savings in DCSF and agency budgets announced -Linked to this finding, primary schools will have access to up to a thousand extra school business managers under a scheme launched to help schools make their money go further.

And the Schools Secretary, also confirmed details on how the Government will reduce spending by the DCSF and its partners.

According to the DCSF School Business Managers have been shown to save schools up £30,000 in a year.  The National College for Leadership of Schools and Children Services is to invest £5 million to fund 250 school business managers next year, each working with four or five schools, with a further 250 more in each of the following three years.

This means that schools in England now have access to:

·        school business managers working to save money in clusters of primary schools

·        Free consultancy support on how to save money

·        Advice and guidance from the DCSF and National College on partnership working, procurement and delivering value for money

The DCSF has said it will take the lead on saving money by:

- Reducing spending on Government agencies by £135M
- Cutting start-up costs for extended services by £100M
- Reducing bursaries for initial teacher training, saving £50M
- £21M savings on DCSF back office and communications spending, including moving Teachers TV online.

Together all these savings add up to over £300 million over 2 years, with work underway to identify a further £200 million worth of savings, as agreed with the Treasury at the Pre-Budget Report.

The new school business managers will work across for four or five primary schools, helping them save significant money off their budgets, so that the schools’ front line service is maintained and improved.

Currently only a third of all primary schools have business managers. Those that do report that on average, they are generating an additional £30,000 a year for the schools, through managing budgets effectively, maximising resources and securing additional income streams.

This announcement is in addition to the free consultancy advice that all schools can access on how best to save money. 96 per cent of schools who have received this consultancy have said they would recommend it to other schools.

In November DCSF published a discussion document to help schools hare best practice on making the best use of resources and NCSL have organised a series of conferences where schools have shared best practice.

Areas on which schools believe they can save money include on procurement and back office functions and through federations and collaboration.

The Government believes that savings can be made centrally, and through its partner Non-Departmental Public Bodies (NDPBs).

All NDPBs are expected to make efficiency savings, but in particular the Government plans to save around 40 per cent of Becta’s budget (£45M over the two years 2011-13) and 30 per cent (£55M over the two years 2011-13) of theTraining and Development Agency (TDA) non-teacher training budget.

Other savings will be found through cutting start-up funding for extended services (£100m), and reducing golden hellos for teachers (£50m) in subjects that already have large numbers of new applications.

In addition, the DCSF will reduce is communications budget by £5 million. This will include moving Teachers TV, which is now used by a quarter of the schools workforce, so that it will only be available online, saving £1 million a year.

Background…

1. Pilots run by the National College show that head teachers with access to school business managers report reduced workloads, with higher-level school business manager role having a potential to free up to 30 per cent of their time.

There was also evidence that the new roles are allowing schools to release funds by maximising existing resources and engaging clusters of schools to work together strategically.

2. In addition, the groups of schools will also receive:

- targeted support from existing SBMs and groups of schools which are already realising the benefits;
- continuous professional development from the National College for the appointed School Business Directors; and,
- a range of appropriate advice covering achieving better value for money, and changing models of school organisation and leadership.

3. Last November The Government launched a website – marketed at schools offering a huge range of financial advice and support for schools:

http://www.teachernet.gov.uk/management/schoolfunding/schoolfinance/letstalkresources/

The support package for schools includes:

- Free national consultancy programme for every maintained school in England – giving tailored, timely advice to schools that request help and guidance on how they can make the best use of their resources:
- Wider school workforce – how schools plan and manage their staffing;
- Leadership – how much time and experience school leaders have to focus on delivering value for money;
- Strategic management – how schools approach financial and resource management, including linking the two with school improvement;
- Collaboration and partnership – how schools work together – and with other organisations – to improve outcomes together;
- Challenge and Governance – the role of the Governing Body in supporting delivery of value for money; and
- Procurement performance – how schools approach procurement.

5. NDPB savings

Building on the 21st Century Schools White Paper, which set out the strategy to devolve more responsibility and power to schools, the government says it is possible to cut back the level of support TDA and Becta provide to schools, while retaining their strategic expertise and ability to concentrate at a system level on the improvements that are needed.

6. Extended services start up funding

Over 95 per cent of schools are now offering access to extended services – and all should be doing so later this year. Start up funding was designed to be used to support schools to develop sustainable extended services and to overcome barriers that might have prevented them from developing extended services.

Over time extended services should become sustainable either through charging, for childcare for example, or through reconfiguring funding strands at local level through children’s trusts, or by pooling budgets to support extended services through schools. Funding to support schools in offering extended services, and to subsidise those on low incomes to participate, is protected through the PBR settlement for schools.

7. Reductions in bursaries for initial teacher training

The Government will continue to protect the initial training and recruitment of teachers to secure the best in the future. However, given the very buoyant recruitment market in many areas, it is possible to make reductions to the level of bursaries for recruitment to Initial Teacher Training which will generate savings of the order of £50m in the 2011-13 period.

There are now enough quality candidates coming forward in subjects such as Music, RE, modern languages and biology so the to offer bursaries at their previous level (£6,000-£9,000) for some subjects is less.

This announcement was made in October 2009 and it will come into for postgraduate students starting in September 2010. A base level of £4,000 will still apply to all postgraduate course with some subjects eligible for bursaries of £6,000 and £9,000 as before.

8. Communications

The £5 million savings from communications and marketing expenditure is achievable through making more information available digitally, and reducing money spent on printing and publication of documents that the public would rather see online only.

Teachers TV has been running for four and a half years and now has 230,000 people using the service every month – a quarter of schools workforce. Viewers are increasingly accessing Teachers TV online with demand for the more traditional TV route falling – and on current projections by next year more people will be accessing online and on demand rather than through broadcast anyway.

From August this year the Government will turn off the broadcast channel, saving £1M a year.

9. Reductions in central administration costs of DCSF

DCSF staff numbers have been reduced by 1465. 1130 jobs have been moved out of London and the South East. Premises costs have been cut by £12 million a year and significant reductions of £36.3 million made on back office costs, with £8 million per year in efficiencies going forward from HR, procurement and finance costs.