Agenda and minutes

Contact: David Gearing  Email: david.gearing@kirklees.gov.uk

Items
No. Item

1.

Apologies for absence

.

Minutes:

Apologies had been received from Hazel Danson (NEU – NUT section), Paul Davies (Kirklees Governors), Marcus Newby (Primary Heads) and Jenny Shore (Primary Heads).

2.

Minutes of the Forum meeting held on 29th June 2018 pdf icon PDF 124 KB

.

Minutes:

The minutes were agreed to be a true record of the meeting.

3.

Matters arising from the 29th June 2018 pdf icon PDF 82 KB

·         Proportionate representation / Forum membership update

·         High Needs Review update

·         Absence Insurance Scheme deficit recovery

Minutes:

3.1 Proportionate Representation 2018/19 and Forum membership update [minute 3.1 of the 29th June meeting]

 

Proportionate representation

 

The Forum has ten membership positions from the mainstream primary and secondary school sectors. The number of representatives from the maintained primary, maintained secondary and mainstream academy sectors are determined from an annual check from the May pupil census of the total number of pupils (Reception to Year 11) in each of the sectors at that point. The table below shows the relevant numbers and proportions used to inform Forum membership for the academic year ahead.

 

Maintained Primary pupils

Maintained Secondary pupils

Primary Academy pupils

Secondary Academy pupils

Totals

31,786

9,262

6,575

14,709

62,332

50.99%

14.86%

10.55%

23.60%

100.00%

5 reps

2 reps

1 rep

2 reps

10

 

The above numbers have not changed significantly enough from a year ago to alter the sectoral proportions which have applied for the last two years. It was pointed out that the maintained secondary proportion has exhibited an increase in comparison to last year.

 

 

Membership update

 

Maintained Primary – potential vacancy due to a period of secondment. The next Kirklees Primary Heads meeting takes place on 13th November when the question of representation will be considered.

 

Maintained Secondary – the last Kirklees High School Heads (KHSH) meeting effectively ran out of time to decide upon the issue of representation. There is, however, an officer meeting next Friday with the KHSH Chair and vice Chair at which it is hoped that two new Forum representatives can be confirmed.

 

There was some discussion at the KHSH meeting about the lack of a Secondary academy representative to the Forum. Clearly this situation has arisen, in the main, due to the absence of anyone from that sector putting themselves forward for the ballot that took place over the summer. However, the fact that there are more primary academies than secondary academies in Kirklees also weighs against the secondary academy sector. It would be helpful if the Schools Forum regulations included a statement about the need for academy representation to be proportionate to the two sectors as is the requirement for maintained school representation.

 

3.2 High Needs Review update [minute 3.3 of 29th June] [Mandy Cameron, Head of Service – Education Safeguarding and Inclusion, attended the meeting for this item].

 

Mandy Cameron provided a verbal update about the next steps in the High Needs action plan following the recent workshop event at the John Smith’s Stadium.

 

·       Various work-streams have been created and are in the process of being time-lined.

·       It is intended that work on funding levels be pulled together into proposals by the end of this term.

·       There will be meetings held with individual special schools over November and December to refresh the earlier Core/Core Plus work in the light of further development of the high needs continuum. Schools with the same specialism will be seen together.

·       There is also a need to map ASD and SEMH difficulties across all of our special schools.

·       The assessment of  ...  view the full minutes text for item 3.

4.

Kirklees Education & Learning Partnership Board (standing item)

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Minutes:

The minutes from the last ELPB meeting will be made available to Schools Forum members. The main focus of the meeting was upon the Learning Service’s school improvement work. Paul Brennan has conducted an external review of current practice. This has identified key areas for improvement and change, issues that are not inconsistent with national trends. A draft Learning Strategy will be considered by Cabinet in December and will be shared with the Forum in advance of that.

5.

Scoping of decisions to be made for 2019-20 School funding round pdf icon PDF 49 KB

·         Provision of growth funds in Schools Block

·         New Cash Floor factor

·         Permission to transfer up to 0.5% out of the Schools Block

·         Min Funding Guarantee to set

·         Maintained Schools de-delegation

·         Budget arrangements within the Central Schools Services Block

Additional documents:

Minutes:

In comparison to the changes to schools funding that had to be put in place for 2018-19, there are relatively few further changes that need to be considered for funding year 2019-20. Listed below are the main issues where decisions need to be reached alongside the Forum.

 

  • Provision of Growth Funds within the Schools Block

 

2019-20 will see a new formularised approach to growth funding within the DSG Schools Block. To replace the historic level of annual growth funding hitherto provided, the ESFA will compare October 2018 pupil census data with that for October 2017 to map the positive differences between the years. The 2019-20 Schools Block will include £1,370 per primary pupil growth and £2,050 per secondary pupil growth. In addition, a sum of £65,000 will also be included for each brand new school appearing on the October 2018 census.

 

It is anticipated that the new methodology will provide an increase in growth funding for Kirklees. From the sum provided we will still need to set aside money to operate a Pupil Growth Fund and a Falling Rolls Fund and also to fund year group increases for a small number of schools growing primary provision by one year group per annum. Any new growth funding provided above the level required to satisfy these commitments would be really helpful to the task of supporting schools undergoing some form of restructure given that reorganisation monies are dwindling rapidly. A proposal will be brought to Forum.

 

  • The new Cash Floor factor

 

2019-20 will see the introduction of a new formula factor, the Funding Floor. The 2019-20 Schools Block allocation will include a second 0.5% rise in funding per pupil. If this is passed on to schools there will be a need to ensure that every mainstream school gets at least a 1% increase on their 2017-18 per pupil funding baseline. This could not be done in the context of a minimum funding guarantee mechanism which continues to be capped at plus 0.5%, so a new fixed funding floor factor set at plus 1% is to be introduced to enable the minimum funding increase requirement to be delivered. We will need to bring this factor into play next year (unless the permission described below is taken up).

 

  • Permission to transfer up to 0.5% out of the Schools Block

 

(As in 2018-19) local authorities are allowed to make proposals to the Schools Forum (and through wider consultation with all schools) to transfer up to 0.5% of their total 2019-20 Schools Block funding allocation to other areas of the Dedicated Schools Grant, particularly to help with pressures within the High Needs Block. For Kirklees the 0.5% equates to the totality of any new money provided for schools within the Schools Block. This was a key factor in the decision not to propose a movement of funds for 2018-19. A formal decision now needs to be made by the Council on the approach to be taken for 2019-20.

 

  • Minimum Funding Guarantee

 

Depending upon the decision reached  ...  view the full minutes text for item 5.

6.

Teachers' pay award September 2018

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Minutes:

A decision has now been made and communicated to schools that the pay uplift percentages for the various teacher pay scales will be applied to all spinal column points and not just the minimum and maximum values of each scale (as the government were recommending). The grant allocations from the ESFA towards the cost of the September 2018 pay award for the period 1/9/18 to 31/3/19 are still awaited, possibly because the allocations are to be based upon October 2018 pupil census data(?) Modelling of a sample of schools has shown that the grant should allocate funds which approximate to the cost of the pay award in excess of the 1% uplift schools had already included in their 2018-19 budget plans.

7.

Any other business

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Minutes:

No other business was raised.

8.

Confirm minutes

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9.

Date and time of next meeting

Friday 30th November 2018, 10:00am at Tolson Museum.

Minutes:

Friday 30th November 2018                             

Venue: Tolson Museum   

Start: 10:00am