I'm going to get on my high horse here. School funding, as we all know, is not in a great place. The sound bites about highest funding in place ever is a joke. I cannot fathom how this is allowed to go unchallenged.
I have to admit, as a head of a small village school, in a rural "shire" county, I was happy to read the NFF plans for the 2018-2019 year. It wasn't perfect, but the sentiment behind it was right. "Shire" counties have been historically underfunded in comparison to others counties and rural schools had often been a forgotten partner in the education landscape. When the NFF was first released, there was quite rightly some push back from the schools whose funding would reduce because of the formula changes. They had planned for their original budget and they could not realistically change their plans that quickly. However, what is frustrating for me is the continued push back of schools moving to the "Hard" funding formula.
The current system is farcical. There are so many aspects of the NFF that remain optional and under Local Authority formula. Surely, if the NFF was correct, all funding streams should now be available to schools. Still, to this day, so many areas are not implementing the full NFF. Therefore, even though the ESFA are allocating schools money, the LA do not have to give all of the funding. Over the past four years my school has lost thousands of pounds due to this unfair formula and I am going to outline these "losses" below.
Year | NFF budget | Actual | Loss |
2019 - 2020 | £359,000 | £328,000 | -£21,000 |
2020 - 2021 | £408,000 | £373,000 | -£35,000 |
2021 - 2022 | £471,000 | £469,000 | -£2,000 |
2022 - 2023 | £492,000 | £472,000 | -£20,000 |
The first thing people will point at is the increase of around £150,000 in the last four years. Yes this is appreciated, but this goes to show how unfair the original formula was and that there has been an increase in school funding. However, because the NFF wasn't implemented in full we have still be negatively impacted. As you can see, my school has lost out on £68,000 over the past four years. This is completely unfair and unsustainable. How is it fair that my school can lose this money from our budget? This money has been lost due to the LA funding options. If we received the full NFF my school would be in a much better position.
It is so frustrating, I have moved from a position of finally being able to post a strong surplus and pay for some much needed capital projects, but now those plans have been ruined. My budget for next year goes from a having money available to potential redundancies, just because the NFF has not been implemented. This is then compounded by the fact that we know there is a lower Reception intake next year, so our 2023 - 2024 budget will be reduced even further due to a drop in AWPU.
The additional funding that is going to be provided through the spending review does next to nothing for my school. We will receive an additional £12,500 in this financial year. When you take into account the NI increase will cost us £3,000, gas will cost us £3,000 more and electricity £6,000 more. As you can see, this leaves us with a grand total of £500.
What now happens to us when the expected teacher pay rises are implemented?; The support staff finally get the pay increase they deserve (if the unions will be realistic and the NJC are willing to move!)?; Future energy rises?
What now needs to happen is the DfE need to stop messing about with the NFF. They need to remove the optional funding streams and move to the "hard" formula. They need to commit to it and not keep pushing it back. My school needs the full funding formula and cannot continue to function with the reduced income!
I am not sure what the purpose of this blog is. I needed to get these thoughts out of my head!