Supply teacher spending: academy Vs maintained

Figures supplied by DfE in response to a parliamentary question.

Supply teacher spend by local authorities in maintained schools in England
Vs
Supply teacher spend by academy schools in England:

Year	10/11	11/12	12/13	13/14	14/15
Maintained	£906m	£766m	£743m	£812m	£821m
Academies	-	£99m	£211m	£354m	-

Sam Freedman - forming MATs key to dealing with era of austerity

In a blog for Faculty of Education at Canterbury Christ Church University, Sam Freedman - former Michael Gove adviser and now Director of Research, Evaluation and Impact at Teach First - said the main tools for schools in an era of austerity will be staff cuts and consolidation (or federation) through forming multi-academy trusts (MATs).

Free school pays nearly £400k rent

The Telegraph and Argus in Bradford has reported on the rents paid by free schools. The data for the report came from https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/capital-funding-for-open-free-schools and shows that 7 out of the 39 free schools included pay rent on a lease.

Employer contributions to teacher pension will rise by 2%

From Teachers' Pensions: 'HM Treasury has today published the final Directions and the expected outcome of the TPS valuation is a total contribution rate of 26%. The TPS proposed final agreement provides that scheme members will pay an average contribution rate of 9.6%, with the balance falling on employers; meaning that the new TPS employer contribution rate will be 16.4% (currently 14.1%).'

£45m Harris Westminster Academy - The Independent

The Independent: '...Michael Gove, has approved a plan to spend £45m on a free school (Harris Westminster Sixth Form), making it almost certainly the most expensive in the country even though it has just 500 students, The Independent has learnt' - The paper reports internal criticism and lists areas of underfunding.

'Off the peg' classrooms opened in Lincoln

From Premier Construction News: 'Sunesis schools are high quality buildings which are delivered on average 12 months faster and 30 per cent cheaper than traditional approaches...

School cuts energy bill by 9% with student-led energy project

From the The Local: 'Year 5 pupils... have been enthusiastically leading the project as our Lincolnshire Carbon Ambassadors... We are very proud to announce that the school have seen a 9% decrease in the energy used in comparison to last year...'

Pension changes mean big black hole in academy finances

From Public Finance:

According to accounting firm UHY Hacker Young (who released this benchmarking report today - although I'm not sure if the report mentions this issue - I couldn't see it!) a waiver on paying National Insurance contributions has been cancelled and this could add costs equivalent to three extra members of staff (about £100k) to secondary academies and two (£50k) to primaries.

Free school costs forecasts not revealed

http://www.elmbridgeguardian.co.uk/news/10786418.Cobham_Free_School_costs_kept_under_wraps/?ref=nt

Elmbridge Guardian:

Some details of funding were supplied for Cobham Free School (Surrey) but the DFE told the Elmbridge Guardian: “It is sensible that complete and reliable figures should be released as planned, rather than disclosing figures before they have been finalised, which could be misleading.” It also said “premature disclosure” could be unfair to the school as it was still in negotiations with contractors over the unfinished building work on the former police station site.