Welcome to the Berry Education Newsletter!
Stay up to date with all Trust governance related news and events every 6 weeks.
Children’s Wellbeing Week – The King’s Speech
The Children’s wellbeing bill was recently announced today through the King’s speech.
Here is what the government say it will do:
Strengthen multi-agency child protection and safeguarding arrangement
Require free breakfast clubs in every primary school
Limit the number of branded items of uniform and PE kits that a school can require
Create a duty on councils to have and maintain children not in school registers and provide support to home-educating parents
Provide Ofsted with stronger powers to investigate the offence of operating an unregistered independent school
Enable serious teacher misconduct to be investigated, regardless of when the misconduct occurred, the setting the teacher is employed in, and how the misconduct is uncovered
Ensure any new teacher entering the classroom has, or is working towards, Qualified Teacher Status (QTS). This will be accompanied by recognising the essential role of support staff in schools by giving them a national voice in the setting of their pay and conditions
Bring multi-academy trusts into the inspection system and enable direct intervention when schools and trusts are not performing to the highest standards
Click the button to learn more.
FSM Funding Decision Delayed Due To General Election
The DfE has confirmed that schools will receive their first payments for Universal Infant Free School Meals (UIFSM) in the 2024/2025 academic year based on this year’s funding after a decision on the new rate was delayed by the election.
This means the first payments due to councils on June 28th and academies on July 8th – will be made based on the funding rate for 2023-24 of £2.53 per meal. The allocations were published on Monday, June 24th.
Even with extra labour, energy, and food expenses included, the true cost of delivering free school meals—which is estimated to be roughly £3.30 per meal—is already significantly underfunded.
Budget Shortfalls Cause For SEND Pupil Concern
According to a BBC enquiry, 113 of the 153 councils contacted forecast a collective shortfall of £926 million.
Parents say they are concerned children could suffer in a push to cut deficits as demand rises. Since 2019, the accumulated deficit in England for SEND has reached 3.2bn, according to the county council network.
DfE To Research Risks Posed By Older School Buildings
The DfE will be researching to improve their understanding of future building safety risks and condition issues in the education estate, particularly in post-war buildings (constructed between 1945 and 1990).
A contract notice released this week estimates that 2.1 million will be spent on research to improve the department’s understanding of building safety risks and condition issues.
The DfE said it will support with minor works for the project at an estimated £2.7 million.
Berry Education SNE Event Success!
We recently exhibited at the Schools North East (SNE) event on the 13th of June at St James’ Park, Newcastle. We had a great day, there were so many informative sessions throughout the day on a variety of different topics.
At the event, we showcased TrustGov (our governance MIS platform) and its compliance capabilities, meeting automation, top-down reporting and potential ROI for MATs around the UK.
We also discussed the other services we provide here at Berry Education such as:
- Governance Advice, Guidance and Meeting Support
- Governance Development & Leadership Support
- Specialist support for Panel Hearings – Exclusions, Admissions & Complaints
Due to the success and amazing conversations at the SNE event we have signed up for the next event!
You can find us exhibiting at the Schools North East Annual Summit 2024 – 17th October.