Agenda item

Grant Davis (Schools Strategic Financial Support Manager) will give verbal updates to Schools Forum on Covid funding and the consultation on support for small rural schools.

Grant Davis (Schools Strategic Financial Support Manager) gave the following update on Covid funding:

·         There would soon be an announcement for Schools via Rightchoice regarding the Covid workforce funding which covers the period following October half term up to Christmas and this would give details of how schools could make claims;

·         The DfE had offered funding for exceptional costs relating to Covid between March and July 2020 and all these payments had now been made;

·         The payment of the second tranche of the Covid Catch Up Premium payments of £80 per primary pupil and £240 for secondary pupils had just been released;

·         There had been announcement of £302 million as a Covid Recovery premium grant for schools.  Although the full details  were not yet available it was thought that they would be £6k for an average primary and £22k for an average secondary school using disadvantaged pupils as a driver for that.  A sum of £200m would also be available for tutoring and £200m for running summer sessions in secondary schools; and

·         The f40 group would continue to raise requests for additional Covid costs.

·         Schools were reminded that on their website they should refer to the Covid Catch Up Premium and state what the school was using it for.

Grant Davis referred to the report (circulated as Agenda Supplement 2) which gave details of the consultation for changes to the Sparsity Factor for 2022-23.  Grant highlighted the following:

·         The consultation focused on the proposed changes to begin measuring sparsity distances – which determine whether schools are remote enough to attract sparsity funding – by road journeys, not as the ‘crow flies’, to better reflect the actual distance between schools and to increase the maximum sparsity factor values by £10,000 across all phases in the 2022-23 schools national funding formula (NFF);

·         During the DfE’s research, their evidence had suggested that the group of schools which were experiencing the most significant financial challenges are small, remote schools. The DfE recognise the vital role that such schools play in the rural communities they serve and that without them pupils could face long travel distances to school;

·         Obviously, Wiltshire is a rural county with many small and rural schools eligible for sparsity funding.  The current definition of sparsity is for a primary school with 150 pupils or less and the average distance from each pupil’s home postcode to their next nearest compatible school is 2 miles or greater as the crow flies.  For secondary schools this would mean 600 pupils or less and the average distance from each pupil’s home postcode to their nearest compatible school is 3 miles or greater as the crow flies;

·         The current maximum funding payable through this factor for eligible schools is £45,000 for primary and £70,000 secondary schools;

·         Through the DfE’s analysis, there were currently around 1,200 schools eligible for sparsity funding nationally and the change in calculating sparsity distances would increase this number by around 900 schools;

·         In Wiltshire there were currently 73 primary schools and 3 secondary schools that fall into the “small schools” definition for sparsity funding.  Of the 73 currently only 29 are eligible under the “crow flies” distance whereas the road distance would mean that 52 schools would become eligible.  However, it still left 21 small primary schools ineligible;

·         There are three “small” secondary schools of which 2 are currently eligible for sparsity funding and these proposals would mean that the third secondary would also be eligible;

·         There were alternative options to sparsity as there was no one perfect solution to support small and rural schools.  If the distance threshold was reduced to 1 mile this would mean that only 5 of Wiltshire’s 73 small schools would not be eligible and these 5 were all urban small schools;

·         Another way of looking at it could be that the lump sum is graduated in favour of small schools using a sliding scale of thresholds depending on pupil numbers.  This could also be used for applying the minimum per pupil funding level on a graduated scale. For small schools, spreading the lump sum over a small number of pupils results in a disproportionate impact upon their overall ‘per pupil’ funding; and

·         The Local Authority would share a proposed response for Schools via Rightchoice and all schools would be asked to respond to the consultation.

The Salisbury Diocesan representative thanked Grant for the quick response to the consultation and urged Forum members to complete the consultation which is important for Wiltshire.  He welcomed the use of road distance as a measure which would include a further 52 schools for sparsity funding which was a step in the right direction, but this would still leave 21 ineligible.  A reduction to a distance of 1 mile would mean that only 5 Wiltshire Schools and 2 Dorset schools would miss out.  He also welcomed the suggestion of the graduation of the lump sum .

A Councillor representative who was also a small primary school Governor welcomed the opportunity to respond to the consultation on this issue and would raise this with the Headteacher to ensure a response was submitted.

The Chair asked if the road distance was reduced to one mile meaning more schools were eligible, would the quantum amount received be the same and that more schools would get a share, so the amount reduces? Grant Davis reported that if this proposal was carried forward for 2022-23 the amount received for Wiltshire would be based on this new methodology so the LA would be fully funded and it would be up to Schools Forum to determine how to distribute that funding in the best way.

The Chair reported that the deadline for the consultation was 9 April 2021 and although this was in the Easter holidays, all schools would be urged to submit a response to the consultation to share Wiltshire’s views on this issue.

Resolved:

1. That Schools Forum note the Covid funding update.

2. That Schools Forum note the content of the report relating to the consultation for small rural schools and encourage school colleagues to participate in and respond to the consultation by 9 April 2021.