Agenda item

2016-17 Pre 16 School Funding Formula

To consider the report.

Minutes:

The Chairman informed the Forum that the report due for consideration provided details of the 2016-17 School funding formula for pupils aged between 4 to 16.  The main funding formula remained largely unchanged from 2015-16 with the exception of an increase in the IDACI band and FSM6 funding rates, and the low prior attainment rates.

 

The Forum were asked to note the final funding formula set out in appendix A and the indicative individual school budget shares as set out in appendix B. Edmund Bradley informed the Forum that for calculating schools’ budget shares LAs were required to use the October 2015 school census data provided by the EFA. One of the most significant changes in the dataset had been the use of the recently published 2015 IDACI values, instead of the 2010 IDACI values used previously. This had resulted in a significant degree of movement of pupils between bands at an individual school level.  

 

This change had resulted in 953 fewer primary pupils and 935 fewer secondary pupils in IDACI bands who attract funding for deprivation than last year.  There were also now no pupils at all in the highest three IDACI bands compared with 179 such pupils previously. This would have resulted in a significant loss of funding to schools. Deprivation rates had therefore been increased for 2016-17 to compensate for this.

It was noted that 17 schools would be protected through Minimum Funding Guarantee at a cost of £309k, this was an increase of 9 schools compared to last year.  The Forum questioned if it was known out of the 17 schools using MFG how many had sizeable underspends carried forward and if so what they were being used for. 

 

The maintained sector representatives were asked to vote by sector on each de-delegated service shown in table 3a and 3b of the report. Stuart Muir raised concern that under the new de-delegation arrangements, middle schools, deemed secondary, would have funding deducted for their primary pupils even though this was against their collective wish. The Chairman mentioned that Annex C did show that they would be paying more.

 

It has subsequently been clarified with the Education Funding Agency that an adjustment can be made to middle schools budgets to ensure no deduction is made for behaviour support or school contingency.

It was decided that for the vote on the de-delegated services the middle schools’ vote would be taken and recorded separately. The following table shows how each sector voted on each de-delegated option for 2016-17:

 

De-delegated service

First, junior, and primary schools

Middle and secondary schools

Contingencies including schools in financial difficulties and deficits of closing schools

Approved

Not approved

Behaviour support services

Approved

Not approved

Licences/subscriptions

Approved

Approved

Staff costs supply cover (e.g. maternity, trade union duties, suspended staff reimbursement)

Approved

Approved

 

Members were reminded that where approval for ‘de-delegated’ services had been given, these will be provided to maintained schools at no extra charge in 2016-17. Academies and maintained schools which have not approved the de-delegation will receive the funding for these services will be expected to purchase services from their delegated budget.

Supporting documents: