Agenda item

Coral Miller reported that the consultation had gone out and she had had a 35% response rate thus far with comments. The deadline had been extended to 18^th December 2015. A report would come to the January Schools Forum for final consultation.

She explained that the consultation proposed three options and had arisen from the Tribal report which had been circulated, with option 3 favoured by the Council.

George Grant apologised for the way the consultation went out and stated that the LA wanted to get to a consensus position that all can agree despite differences in views.

Schools Forum had submitted a formal joint response to the consultation to the LA. This did not comment on the specific proposed options but focused on the consultation process and the wider national context which had changed significantly since the consultation was drafted and sent to schools. In particular, Schools Forum asked that:

Ø  any decision made by the Council about 2016/17 changes should be made in the context of the pace and size of imminent change through the national funding formula across all blocks and all phases; it should not ignore the potential turbulence in funding 

Ø  any such decision should be communicated to all schools with an explanation about how this will fit in with the national changes ahead

Ø  future consultations are more timely and done in genuine partnership with both the Task Groups and Schools Forum itself

Individual members of Schools Forum raised a number of points, voicing individual opinions, including:

Ø  There was a change to the formula two years ago; what evaluation of the impact of the resulting funding transfer on educational standards has been carried out?

Ø  The research in the Tribal report was, of its own volition, flawed; it was asked if the raw data could be circulated.

Ø  The methodology used to apply the findings of the Tribal report to the local formula was flawed.

Ø  How does the proposed change improve the quality and standards of service to young people in Slough with local turbulence and short lead in times?  There must be a genuine understanding of the impact across all schools of any proposed change and proper lead in time.

Ø  Limited modelling had been done on this occasion compared to previous big changes and further evidence based models from the Tribal report were requested and refused.

Ø  There are known pressure on the High Needs Block over the next few years.

Ø  There are already academies and maintained schools in Slough ruining deficit budgets.

Ø  In the proposed options not all school are losers.

Ø  Whilst accepting the pace of change and the CSR, this is an opportunity to look across the board at the formula and it is right to take notice of the Tribal report.

Ø  Changes to the 5-16 formula need to be holistic and take account of all the imminent changes in funding that may affect schools - for early years, post 16, high needs block and Education Support Grant – all vulnerable currently.

George Grant said that the CSR was a ‘pause for thought’ for SBC and there had not yet been discussion about what would happen now. He mentioned that the Schools Forum response and that of individual schools was timely and would be fed back to members and the decision made by January hopefully. He confirmed that the formula changes will require member approval at Cabinet.