Given the Chancellor’s Budget on Wednesday and the publication of the Education White Paper yesterday, this week I am focusing on the impact these fundamental changes will have on schools and their Governing bodies.

I have no doubt in Governing body meetings over the next 12 months we will be formulating plans to ensure the best outcomes for our children and young people whilst we get to grips with the changes we will need to make.

SEISMIC CHANGE IN EDUCATION LANDSCAPE
On Wednesday the Chancellor, George Osborne, announced the 2016 budget with headlines including:

• all schools to be in the process of, or have already become academies by 2020;
• from April 2017 there would be a new national funding formula;
• £20 million a year of additional money available for schools in the North of England, as part of its Northern Powerhouse Initiative;
• from September 2017, 25% of secondary schools to be able to opt-in for a longer school day to offer an extra 5 hours of teaching or extra-curricular activities with potential funding to pay for this;
• from 2017 funding for the Primary schools’ sports premium doubled to £320 million a year, paid for through a levy (the ‘sugar tax’) on soft drinks companies.

Yesterday the Education Secretary, Nicky Morgan, laid out plans for an overhaul of the education sector with the publication of the White Paper ‘Educational Excellence Everywhere’ which will see significant changes to structure, training, support and development over the course of this Parliament.  The White Paper sets out 7 elements which the Government believes will deliver educational excellence across England and the key headlines for Governors are:

• A move to make all schools academies or in the process of conversion by 2020 as well as plans to force schools to become academies in local authority areas that are under-performing or where the LA no longer has capacity to maintain its schools. Whilst there will be a continued push to get schools joining/forming multi-academy trusts successful, sustainable schools will still be able to continue as Single Academy Trusts.
• Development of a new competency framework defining the core skills and knowledge needed for governance in different contexts and establishing a new database of everyone involved in governance.
• All governing boards are expected to focus on seeking people with the right skills for governance so academy trusts will no longer be required to reserve places for elected parents. This will be offered to all open and new academies.
• Three clearly defined core functions for LAs – (1) ensuring every child has a school place; (2) ensuring the needs of vulnerable pupils are met and (3) acting as champions for all parents and families. Shifting responsibility for school improvement from LAs with a new means to broker support and an increased focus on teaching schools, National Leaders of Education (LNEs) and other system leaders to spread expertise and best practice.
• Consulting on making the school admissions system simpler and clearer including requiring LAs to co-ordinate in-year admissions and handling the administration of an independent admission appeals function.
• Setting up a new online Parent Portal containing information about the school system and how to support their child; guidance for parents and pupils on complaints, making it simpler to escalate complaints beyond the governing board to the DfE, and up to a public service ombudsman.
• Creating ‘Achieving Excellence Areas’ with a focus on areas of chronic and persistent under-performance through building teaching and leadership capacity as well as additional school improvement funding and sponsorship.
• Meeting the needs of neglected groups of children with a focus on boosting attainment of four groups of children: ensuring schools stretch the lowest-attaining and most academically able pupils, better support children with special education needs and disability, and reforming the alternative provision (AP) system so that schools remain accountable for the education of children in AP and are responsible for commissioning provision.
• Ofsted to consult on removing separate graded judgments on the quality of teaching, learning and assessment to focus inspections on outcomes and to reduce the burdens on schools and teachers.

As you can see from the areas listed above these are fundamental changes in which schools and Governing bodies operate.

This week I highlight the new consultation on reforms to the national schools funding formula, a reminder that DBS checks for Governors become compulsory this month, a new requirement for schools to register their Governors on Edubase from September and the launch of a new website for school performance tables.

SCHOOLS NATIONAL FUNDING REFORM
Further to the Chancellor’s announcement in his Autumn statement that a new school funding formula would be introduced in 2017, the Government has now drawn up its proposals and this week launched a consultation on them.

The most immediate change is that local authorities will no longer determine how core funds are distributed, which instead will go straight to schools. Their role will be limited to distributing high needs funding, on the basis that this involves making local decisions about children with SEND.

The press release issued by the DfE to announce the consultation stated that four factors would determine how core funding was to be distributed:

• basic per pupil funding – ensuring a core allocation for the costs of teaching all pupils;
• funding for additional needs – including deprivation, low prior attainment and English as an additional language;
• school costs – including fixed costs and those related to schools serving rural communities;
• area costs – ensuring more funding goes to areas that face the highest costs.

If you would like to contribute to the consultation you can do so here.

REMINDER DBS CHECKS BECOME COMPULSORY FOR GOVERNORS THIS MONTH
Amendments to the School Governance (Constitution) (England) Regulations 2012 come into effect on the 18th of this month when it will become compulsory for all Governors in maintained schools to have Disclosure and Barring Service checks. (The amended regulations do not use the term Disclosure and Barring Service but refer to “criminal record certificates”).

From 1 April Governing bodies will have to apply for an enhanced check certificate for any new Governor within 21 days of their appointment or election. For all existing Governors Governing bodies will have to apply for certificates by 1 September of this year.

The relevant regulation, The School Governance (Constitution and Federations) (England) (Amendment) Regulations 2016 can be accessed here.

REQUIREMENT TO REGISTER GOVERNOR DETAILS ON DFE DATABASE
Schools are to be required to register details of all their Governors on Edubase, the Department for Education’s Register of educational establishments in England and Wales. The information to be given will include name, appointment date and the appointing body, which will be public information. Home addresses, nationality and the chair’s email address are also likely to be required, but will not be available to the public. The target dates are for schools to start uploading information in April if they wish, and for it to be compulsory to do so from September.

Academy trusts are to provide the same details on members of local governing bodies, in addition to the current requirement for them to publish information about their trustees.

SCHOOL PERFORMANCE TABLES MOVE
The DfE has just launched a new site for school performance tables which contains  statistics about school and college performance in England, including test results, teacher assessments, Ofsted reports and financial information for academies. The old site will close at the end of this month.

This week I’ve provided a link to Ofsted’s Lead for Governance you tube video on questions Governors might be asked by Ofsted Inspectors, information on the phonics roadshows being offered by the Department for Education and calls by doctors and academics to ban tackling in school rugby.

Thanks to Sheena Lewington for sharing this insight from Belita Scott, Ofsted’s National Lead for Governance, who provides some examples of what governors might be asked during inspection.

DFE ANNOUNCES A SERIES OF PHONICS ROADSHOWS
To mark World Book Day yesterday, Schools Minister Nick Gibb announced a series of events to help schools share best practice and help children become confident readers. The new drive has been launched in response to the latest phonics screening check results, which show that despite strong progress there are still regional variations in the proportion of children reaching the expected standard in reading by the end of year 1. The North East roadshow is taking place at Bishopton Redmarshall C of E Primary School in Stockton on Tees on 15 March and there are only 2 places left.

CALLS FOR SCHOOLS TO BAN TACKLING IN RUGBY
In an open letter to ministers more than 70 doctors and academics are calling for a ban on tackling in rugby matches played in UK and Irish schools as they say injuries from this “high-impact collision sport” can have lifelong consequences for children.

Supporters say rugby builds character and other forms are less challenging and a spokesman for the Department for Education said: “Team sports, such as rugby, play an important role in developing character… we expect schools to be aware of the risks associated with sporting activities and to provide a safe environment for pupils.”

This week I highlight the Education and Adoption Bill passing through Parliament and its impact on coasting or failing schools, the DfE’s initiatives to improve children and young people’s mental health and the launch of an initiative to encourage more reading of literature in secondary schools.

EDUCATION AND ADOPTION BILL PASSED THROUGH PARLIAMENT
The Education and Adoption Bill completed its passage through Parliament on Tuesday evening and included new measures that allow swifter intervention where a school is coasting or failing. Inevitably we will see more schools become academies and key clauses in the Bill include:

• Coasting schools, as labelled by the Regional Schools Commissioner (RSC), will be eligible for intervention. The definition of a coasting school has not yet been finalised and will be part of a second piece of legislation subject to MPs’ vote.
• New powers are given to RSCs to issue schools with a performance, standards or safety warning notice. The RSC issuing the notice will also have the power to decide how much time the school is allowed to respond and improve.
• The academy conversion for Inadequate schools must be ordered by the Education Secretary. They can also make academy orders for schools deemed to be coasting, but this is not a mandatory duty.
• Consultation is no longer required for forced academisations.
• LAs and Governors are now required to co-operated in the event of forced academisation.
• Education Secretaries will be given powers to set the actions Governors will be required to take in forced academy takeover, and impose deadlines.
• Education Secretaries can also revoke an academy order if other means of improvement or closure are deemed a better option.
• Academy trusts and chains taking over maintained schools are responsible for communicating their improvement plans to parents. This does not mean they will be consulted on the changes.
• Academy funding agreements must include a provision which allows education secretaries to end agreements for coasting academies.

In the next and final step, the Education and Adoption Bill will be taken to Her Majesty the Queen for royal assent. This will turn the bill into an act of Parliament and its measures will come into force as soon as possible.

 
IMPROVING CHILDREN AND YOUNG PEOPLE’S MENTAL HEALTH
The Department for Education (DfE) is seeking views on the most effective support methods to help improve the mental health of children and young people. The Education Secretary, Nicky Morgan, has announced a £1.5 million fund driven by young people to help them develop support networks and talk about mental health, with online advice and workshops to help set them up.

The DfE has also updated its counselling guidance, which provides practical, evidence-based advice, informed by experts on how to make sure school counselling works for children and young people.

 
LAUNCH OF 100 CLASSIC BOOKS IN SCHOOLS INITIATIVE
One hundred titles are being offered as part of a new initiative from Penguin Classics, following a call for action by Schools Minister Nick Gibb to ensure there is more classic literature being taught in schools. The 100 titles – taken from Penguin’s Black Classics series – range from the earliest writings to early 20th century works, span fiction and non-fiction, poetry and prose, and are intended to offer a springboard for children to discover the classics. All the titles are by authors who died before 1946 and are therefore out of copyright.

Penguin is offering Secondary schools classroom sets of 30 copies of each of the 100 titles for a package price of £3,000, allowing pupils to read along with their teacher and classmates. The offer will run between March and June 2016 for delivery in time for the new school term in September 2016. Schools can register for further information at: edu.penguinclassics.co.uk

This week I look at the English Baccalaureate (EBacc) and the Government’s response to the House of Commons Education Committee report ‘Life Lessons: PSHE and SRE in schools’.

INFORMATION ON THE ENGLISH BACCALAUREATE (EBACC)
Today the Department for Education published information on the Government’s policy on the English Baccalaureate (EBacc). The EBacc is a school performance measure which allows people to see how many pupils get a grade C or above in the core academic subjects at Key Stage 4.

The measure was introduced in 2010 and all pupils who started Year 7 in September 2015 (this academic year)  will take the EBacc subjects when they reach their GCSEs in 2020. The EBacc is made up of:

• English
• Mathematics
• History or Geography
• the sciences
• a language

GOVERNMENT RESPONSE: LIFE LESSONS: PSHE AND SRE IN SCHOOLS
A year ago the Education Select Committee published a report which recommended that Personal, Social and Health Education (PSHE) should be introduced as a statutory subject in primary and secondary schools.

On Tuesday the Education Secretary, Nicky Morgan, responded to the Chair of the Select Committee advising that the Government would not be making PSHE a statutory subject.   The Government’s response to the Report’s recommendations has been published and Nicky Morgan has stated that over the next few months her Department  will produce an action plan and recommendations for improving PSHE, including publishing a comprehensive PSHE toolkit for schools through the Sutton Trust/EEF.

This week I look at the changing education landscape with the academies programme and multi-academy trusts, the use of the Education Endowment Foundation (EEF) Teaching and Learning Toolkit in shaping decisions on the use of Pupil Premium funding and the next round of an international reading study of 10 year olds.

EDUCATION SECRETARY: ALL SCHOOLS TO BECOME ACADEMIES
As we are all aware the education landscape is changing with the Government’s drive for more academies and collaboration and partnerships between schools. This was evidenced yesterday when the Education Secretary, Nicky Morgan, spoke at the Leicestershire Academies Spring Conference and the transcript of her speech makes for very interesting reading.

The Education Secretary stated that the academies programme was expected to grow and expand until all schools became academies. She talked about improving the education system through school-to-school support with the most sustainable, accountable and efficient way to achieve this being through multi-academy trusts. She also highlighted the importance of school governors because of the skill, expertise and wisdom they brought to running schools.

MAKING USE OF THE SUTTON TRUST-EEF TEACHING AND LEARNING TOOLKIT
In November last year I highlighted the publication of a research report commissioned by the DfE regarding the performance gap between pupils from more and less advantaged backgrounds in England. The report highlighted the work of The Education Endowment Foundation (EEF), an independent grant-making charity dedicated to breaking the link between family income and educational achievement. As some of you might already be aware the EEF in conjunction with the Sutton Trust has developed a Teaching and Learning Toolkit which provides guidance for teachers and schools on how best to use their resources to improve the attainment of disadvantaged pupils. The Toolkit covers 34 topics, each summarised in terms of their average impact on attainment, the strength of the evidence supporting them and their cost.

When you are discussing the use of Pupil Premium funding and its impact in your Governing body meetings do you know if your school is aware of or using the Toolkit and could this be helpful?

SCHOOLS TAKING PART IN THE PROGRESS IN INTERNATIONAL READING LITERACY STUDY 2016
The Progress in International Reading Literacy Study (PIRLS) measures the reading ability of 10-year-olds, which can then be compared with other countries. The study is run by the International Association for the Evaluation of Educational Achievement (IEA) on a 5-yearly cycle. A randomised sample of 170 schools from across England have been selected to take part in the next round of the study taking place between May and June, with the results published in 2017.

This week I highlight the new website to help prevent extremism in children and young people, North Tyneside’s success with the publication of the latest GCSE performance data and the DfE’s first symposium on character education.

PREVENTING CHILDREN FROM EXTREMISM
Earlier this week saw the launch of a new website (Educate Against Hate) by the Department for Education, offering advice on preventing extremism for parents and teachers. Further measures were also announced to protect children in and out of school including:

• a significant escalation of Ofsted investigations into unregistered, illegal independent schools, following the closure of 3 unregistered schools in Birmingham before Christmas;
• a new tougher approach to prosecuting illegal unregistered schools, including publishing details of when the government will take forward prosecutions and a call to local authorities to identify any settings of concerns that Ofsted can follow through, with a commitment to strengthen closure powers;
• a consultation on registering children that go missing from school, improving information shared between schools and local authorities, to reduce the risk that children taken out of school go missing, following Ofsted inspections of schools in Tower Hamlets and Birmingham last year.

LATEST GCSE PERFORMANCE TABLES
The latest GCSE performance tables were published this week and whilst almost 65% of pupils in our region scored 5+A*-C grades at GCSE level, this was below the national average of 66.5% in the latest performance tables.

The great news is that the highest performing Local Authority area in the North East is North Tyneside, where 72% of our pupils achieved 5+ A*-C grades. We also topped the national average of 91% for 5+A*-G grades by 1.8 percentage points.

CHARACTER EDUCATION SYMPOSIUM
Yesterday the Education Secretary, Nicky Morgan hosted the Department for Education’s first character symposium, discussing what excellent character education looks like. Listing traits as “those qualities that enhance us as people: persistence, the ability to work with others, to show humility in the joy of success and resilience in the face of failure. Character is about being self-aware, playing an active role within communities. It’s about selflessness and self-discipline as well as playing a full role in society.”

The DfE is currently building the evidence base to develop the best approaches and will look to the Character Awards as a gold standard as to what works in character education. An online digital platform will be provided where teachers can share best practice about character education, evaluate new ideas and find online professional development materials – as well as sharing their own data to build a proper evidence base.

In this week’s Update I highlight the new school efficiency metric tool, updated timeline guidance and the launch of a new mentoring campaign to support struggling teenagers.

NEW SCHOOL EFFICIENCY TOOL
The DfE has introduced a new metric tool to help mainstream schools understand whether they can improve their efficiency relative to other schools and you might want to consider whether you want to use this tool at your next Finance/Resources Committee meetings.

The metric provides schools with an indication of their efficiency, based on pupil attainment and the money used to achieve it, relative to statistically similar schools. This is intended to prompt schools to think about where they can become more efficient and how they could focus their resources to support measures to increase attainment.

GUIDANCE: TIMELINES
The DfE has provided guidance for Headteachers and Governing bodies of maintained schools, academies and pupil referral units, to help understand and plan for the compulsory legal requirements schools must meet.

MENTORING CAMPAIGN TO SUPPORT STRUGGLING TEENAGERS
The Government has announced the Chair of Capgemini UK and the Careers and Enterprise Company, has agreed to lead a major campaign to encourage business people and professionals to volunteer to act as mentors to young teenagers at risk of dropping out of education or achieving less than they could.

The new campaign will be led through the Careers and Enterprise Company, which was set up to give young people better access to access to high quality careers education, advice and guidance through more effective employer engagement with schools.

Welcome back after the Christmas break. In this week’s Update I highlight the consultation on revisions to statutory guidance on keeping children safe in education, amended guidance on behaviour and discipline, best practice advice on handling complaints and issues around parental responsibility, as well as the announcement of the new National Schools Commissioner.

CONSULTATION ON PROPOSED REVISIONS TO GUIDANCE ON KEEPING CHILDREN SAFE IN EDUCATION
On 22 December last year the Government issued a consultation on proposed revisions to its statutory guidance for schools on keeping children safe. The consultation document explains the proposed changes which include:

• In the “Summary” reinforcing the importance of Part One as a starting point for all staff in schools and colleges to read and understand;
• Increasing the focus on the importance of a child centred and coordinated approach to safeguarding;
• Emphasising further the role that individual staff play in safeguarding and the fact it is everyone’s responsibility;
• Highlighting the importance of early help and how it sits in the wider safeguarding system;
• Highlighting the importance of data sharing;
• Clarification on the role of the designated safeguarding lead and cover for the role;
• A new section to cover online safety;
• Aligning and clarifying training requirements for the designated safeguarding lead and staff;
• Updating the inspection section to reflect the Ofsted framework; and
• A new section covering children with special educational needs and disabilities.

The draft guidance has also been issued and if you would like to respond to the consultation, responses should be submitted by 22 February 2016, either online or via email (safeguarding.schools@education.gsi.ogv.uk) or post (Michael Bell, Level 3, Bishopsgate House, DfE, Feethams, Darlington, DL1 5QE) using this response form.

AMENDED GUIDANCE ON BEHAVIOUR AND DISCIPLINE
The DfE has updated its advice for school leaders and school staff on developing a school behaviour policy to reflect that, from this month, schools will no longer have an obligation to use home-school agreements.

BEST PRACTICE ADVICE FOR SCHOOL COMPLAINTS PROCEDURES 2016
This new advice from the DfE provides best practice for schools in creating and revising complaints procedures and how to deal with complaints, replacing the School Complaints Toolkit 2014. Over the next couple of weeks, I will compare this with our existing Complaints Guidance and Procedures document and will bring a revised document to Governors this term if any changes need to be made.

The DfE has also produced advice on dealing with issues relating to parental responsibility which you might find helpful.

NEW NATIONAL SCHOOLS COMMISSIONER
A new National Schools Commissioner has been appointed by the Department for Education. Sir David Carter, currently the Regional Schools Commissioner (RSC) for the South West, will succeed Frank Green who completes his term as Schools Commissioner at the end of January 2016.