Local Government Association says black hole in school places and finances

LGA warning on funding and school places (press release) the TES said: 'More than three-quarters of authorities in England say they have not received enough money from the government to create the extra school places needed in their area in a five-year period to 2016/17, according to a poll by the Local Government Association (LGA).' -

72% of SBMs say they don't get a fair wage

The NAHT's survey of school business managers had 560 respondents, 20% of them from academies and free schools - page 7 has a chart showing the many roles in which they either lead or have some responsibility, including marketing and educational visits.

DfE survey: finance is source of greatest change and great stress for academies

A government survey published this month found that the freedoms associated with academy status have been put to the greatest use in finance. However they also found that higher financial reporting requirements caused some stress.

NASBM: how much time academy heads spend on finance depends on context

There were no figures for academy heads in DfE survey about how teachers and heads split their time. The survey found that 12% of headteacher workload is spent dealing with 'school policy and financial planning'.

12% of headteacher workload is 'school policy and financial planning' says DfE survey

The DfE's report:'Teachers’ workload diary survey 2013' showed that 'school policy and financial planning' was among highest of the categories in a chart showing: 'Average hours spent on individual activities by full-time teacher - Weighted' - it was the biggest single time consumer for headteachers in primary schools (12%) but for secondary schools, where it was also 12% - it came below 'General staff/management meeting' which took up 15% of a head's time.

Experience, understanding and independence

This week the EFA launched a survey on how academies are taking up their new freedoms: 'We’re particularly interested in whether academies are using the freedoms and flexibilities available to them and what difference this has made to schools.

Poll shows 62% of free school parents believe local authority has a role

http://www.localgov.co.uk/index.cfm?method=news.detail&id=111559


http://www.londoncouncils.gov.uk/news/current/pressdetail.htm?pk=1697

According to the survey, which was carried out by YouGov and commissioned by London Councils, 62% of parents with children at a free school support the idea of councils having a role to improve standards. And 77% of parents with children at local authority maintained schools think councils should be able to intervene at their schools.

From the Yorkshire Post: http://www.yorkshirepost.co.uk/news/main-topics/education/councils-seek-academy-powers-1-6058094

Councils want powers to close down free schools and academies without needing the support of Education Secretary, according to a survey by the LGiU (local government information unit) think-tank and the National Union of Teachers (NUT).

It found that 91 per cent agreed or strongly agreed that local government needs the power to open a new school without “reference to the Secretary of State.”

The majority of those questioned believed councils need to be able to close down, merge or reduce the size an academy or a free school without the approval of Government.

It found that a “middle tier” was required to provide strategic oversight of all schools, including academies and free schools, and that local government was best placed to perform this role.

LGiU think tank chief executive of the think tank Dr Jonathan Carr-West said: “Local authorities have a duty to ensure that there are sufficient and sufficiently diverse school places available to meet the needs of their communities. Too few places and the community is ill served, too many and public resource is wasted. “Failures in school place planning have many and complex causes, but research for this report suggests a correlation with the number of academies: schools in which the local authority has no direct power to increase or decrease the number of places available,” he added.