ESFA Update academies: 17 July 2019
Published 17 July 2019
Applies to England
© Crown copyright 2019
This publication is licensed under the terms of the Open Government Licence v3.0 except where otherwise stated. To view this licence, visit nationalarchives.gov.uk/doc/open-government-licence/version/3 or write to the Information Policy Team, The National Archives, Kew, London TW9 4DU, or email: psi@nationalarchives.gov.uk.
Where we have identified any third party copyright information you will need to obtain permission from the copyright holders concerned.
This publication is available at https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/esfa-update-17-july-2019/esfa-update-academies-17-july-2019
1. Action: add your member and trustee email addresses to get information about schools
From September 2019, academy trusts must provide a direct email address for each of their members and trustees using get information about schools (GIAS). We have published a guide to help academy trusts provide or update their governance contact information.
The 2019 edition of the Academies Financial Handbook sets out the new requirement. Having direct emails addresses will allow us to contact members and trustees with useful information to support them in their governance roles.
Acting now will ensure you are compliant with the handbook when the new requirements come into effect in September. Please ensure that members and trustees provide an email address personal to them and not a generic school mailbox address.
We have produced a template privacy notice to help you comply with the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR). We recommend you provide each member and trustee with a copy of the privacy notice when requesting any contact information.
If you have any questions, please contact us using our online enquiry form.
2. Reminder: budget forecast return 3 year
Academy trusts have until Tuesday 30 July 2019 to submit their budget forecast return 3 year (BFR3Y). Thank you to all the trusts who have already submitted return.
We recognise that you may be working on the return offline using the Excel workbook, but we recommend you start using the online form as soon as possible so that you’re able to meet the deadline.
A reminder that the BFR3Y is now in scope of the ESFA’s policy on publishing the names of academy trusts who are late, or do not submit, two or more financial returns in each academic year. We strongly advise all users to allow enough time for all checks to be completed and approved by the deadline.
3. Information: update to guidance on the teachers’ pension employer contribution grant
The Department for Education (DfE) has updated the teachers’ pension employer contribution grant methodology, published in April this year, to provide further detail on the supplementary fund.
As announced in April, schools will be able to apply to the fund if their grant allocation falls short of their actual pension cost increase by more than 0.05% of their overall budget. We have now confirmed which funding streams we are using to define ‘overall budget’.
In October, we will publish school-level grant allocations and announce details of the supplementary fund, including how schools can apply.
4. Information: local authority financial transparency consultation
There is evidence from financial data for 2016 to 2017 and 2017 to 2018 that a higher percentage of local authority maintained schools have been getting into financial difficulty compared with academy trusts. The situation does however vary between local authority areas.
DfE has been looking at ways of improving transparency in the financial health of local authority maintained schools, and believe that a number of accountability measures currently used in the academy trust sector could be adapted for local authority maintained schools.
Today, DfE published a consultation containing proposals that we suggest implementing across the local authority maintained school sector. These proposals aim to improve transparency whilst also providing insight into the ways in which DfE could help local authorities and schools.
The consultation does not just affect local authority maintained schools. It also highlights that from 2019 to 2020, the Self-Assessment Tool will be mandatory for academies. More details will be announced in due course.
We encourage you to read the consultation and respond using the online survey. The consultation period will run through the summer and will close on Monday 30 September 2019.
5. Information: publication of asbestos management assurance process (AMAP) report
DfE has published a report of the asbestos management assurance process (AMAP) on Tuesday 16 July, along with a list of participants. The AMAP was established to improve our understanding of how state-funded schools in England manage asbestos, and to promote good practice.
Whilst the responses suggest there are no systemic failures in the management of asbestos, DfE is contacting schools and responsible bodies that have not yet responded to ask them to participate. We will also be contacting schools whose responses suggest they may not be meeting regulatory requirements, or where practice could be improved to seek reassurance, sharing information with the Health and Safety Executive (HSE) where appropriate.
The AMAP portal remains open. If you have not yet completed the AMAP or wish to check or update your return, please read the user guidance and use the AMAP portal to submit your information.
6. Information: 2020 T Level providers who are planning to deliver the T Level Transition Programme from the 2020 to 2021 academic year
We have now published the list of 2020 T Level providers who are planning to deliver the T Level Transition Programme from the 2020 to 2021 academic year.
7. Information: industry placements – capacity and delivery fund (CDF) for 2020 to 2021 for 16 to 19 providers
7.1 For providers in receipt of CDF in 2019 to 2020
We have published information to explain the arrangement for delivering industry placements through the CDF in 2020 to 2021 academic year on GOV.UK.
It covers:
- changes between academic years 2019 to 2020 and 2020 to 2021
- submission of a mandatory monitoring form by midnight 31 November 2020
7.2 For providers not in receipt of CDF in 2019 to 2020
We have published information explaining the arrangements for 16 to 19 providers wanting to apply to deliver industry placements through the CDF in 2020 to 2021 academic year on GOV.UK.
8. Information: 2019 to 2020 funding grants and contracts
We will start issuing the 2019 to 2020 grants and contracts through manage your education and skills funding service in the week beginning 22 July for:
- adult education budget (AEB)
- 16 to 19 education
- loans bursary
- 16 to 18 traineeships
We will issue contracts for apprenticeships and procured AEB in early August.
9. Information: interactive post-16 school census tool
We have updated our post-16 interactive tool to support the return of accurate post-16 school census data. Some institutions risk not getting the funding they should because of inaccurate data.
The tool will help you understand:
- how your data is used to calculate your post-16 funding
- how common data errors affect your funding
We have updated some parts of the tool to reflect changes in the condition of funding from September 2019 and the inclusion of advanced maths into the large programme uplift. There are also updates to reflect collection of previous academic year data relating to:
- planned learning hours
- planned employability, enrichment and pastoral hours
- maths/English GCSE prior attainment
We have added two new condition of funding flowcharts, in static and Interactive formats, to help you understand the policy.
Business managers and staff responsible for preparing and submitting the autumn school census return will find it useful.
A suite of ESFA funding reports will be available in COLLECT when the autumn census opens in October. They will show you how your data looks in relation to our post-16 funding calculations. We strongly advise institutions to use these reports to help quality assure census returns.
The tool is in an Excel workbook. Please make sure that macros are enabled so that the workbook functions properly.
If you have any questions, please use our online enquiry form.
10. Information: maths and English condition of funding tool
We have published an interactive tool to present the maths and English condition of funding in a step-by-step user friendly way.
We have designed the tool to support schools and colleges to understand the policy and determine:
- which students on 16 to 18 study programmes will need to continue studying maths and/or English
- and the maths and English qualifications they can undertake
Further information on 16 to 19 maths and English funding is available.
11. Information: condition spend data collection (CSDC) reports for 2016 to 2017 and 2017 to 2018
Each year DfE conducts a data collection to understand the use made of the School Condition Allocation (SCA) funding.
We have published the findings of the CSDC for the collection that took place for the financial year 2016 to 2017 and 2017 to 2018.
If you have any queries, please contact ConditionSpend.COLLECTION@education.gov.uk.