Correspondence

ESFA Update local authorities: 17 March 2021

Published 17 March 2021

This correspondence was withdrawn on 23 December 2022

This has been withdrawn as it’s out of date. Read the latest editions of ESFA Update for the latest news and information.

Applies to England

1. Latest information on coronavirus (COVID-19)

The Department for Education has published guidance about COVID-19 in educational settings for staff, parents and carers, pupils and students on GOV.UK.

Please check GOV.UK regularly for updates.

2. Action: the coronavirus (COVID-19) workforce fund for schools and colleges online form is now live

The coronavirus (COVID-19) workforce fund for schools and colleges online form went live on 10 March 2021. 

The deadline to submit your claim is 23:59 on 31 March 2021. 

We’ve published guidance to help you complete the form. 

3. Action: consultation on business rates

The Department for Education has launched a public consultation on a proposal to centralise the payment of national non-domestic rates (NNDR), more commonly known as business rates, for state-funded 5 to 16 schools.

We are seeking views on the payment of schools’ business rates directly to billing authorities on behalf of schools and a single reconciliation payment to billing authorities to allow for adjustments before the end of the financial year.

We welcome views from state-funded schools, including academies and local authority maintained schools, local authorities, billing authorities and any other stakeholders. The consultation closes on 5 May 2021.

4. Reminder: adult education budget (AEB) contracts for services expiring on 31 July 2021

Existing 2020 to 2021 ESFA funded adult education budget (AEB) contracts for services will expire on 31 July 2021. This expiration applies to contracts for services only and not grants, which do not expire.

In November 2019, we wrote to contract for services providers to confirm the details of these arrangements. Your contract will expire on 31 July 2021 and no further funding will be provided for any learners who have not completed their learning by this date.

For future funding opportunities you must be successful in one or both of the following two procurements opportunities:

• In October 2020, we launched a procurement opportunity so providers can access funding to deliver 19 to 24 traineeships from 1 August 2021. The outcomes of this procurement opportunity have now been communicated.
• The procurement application window for ESFA funded AEB contracts for services is now open. The procurement will provide funding for the delivery of adult education and training to learners in England that are resident outside of the devolved areas, including delivery of the National Skills Fund level 3 adult offer. Contracts will start on 1 August 2021. Full details including the specification and instructions to tender can be accessed via Jaggaer, the DfE e-Procurement Solution portal. The bidding window closes at 10:00 on 22 March 2021.

5. Information: updated 2020 to 2021 dedicated schools grant (DSG) allocations

We have updated the published DSG allocations for 2020 to 2021, to reflect changes in recoupment and high needs place numbers

More information is available on how we calculate DSG recoupment when maintained schools convert to academy status.

6. Information: Advanced Learner Loans (ALL) funding rules for 2021 to 2022

We have published version 1 of the ALL funding rules for academic year 2021 to 2022. The rules apply to all providers of education and training who hold a loans agreement with the ESFA.

This document includes changes we have made since the 2020 to 2021 version 3 which we published in January 2021. These changes are set out in the summary of changes section at the end of the document.

We expect to publish the performance management in version 2 in late spring. If you have any queries on these rules, please contact us through our enquiry form.

7. Information: maximum loan amounts for 2021 to 2022

We have published the maximum loan amounts guide for academic year 2021 to 2022. This document confirms we have maintained the same maximum loan amounts for qualifications that we designated for loans in 2020 to 2021.

If you have any queries on these rules, please contact us through our enquiry form.

8. Information: qualification achievement rates for 2019 to 2020

We will publish high level national summaries of qualification achievement rates (QARs) for the 2019 to 2020 academic year on Thursday 25 March at 09:30. These will be available in the further education and skills, and apprenticeships and traineeships statistics publications for March 2021.

We previously confirmed 2019 to 2020 data will not be used by others such as Ofsted, local authorities or devolved authorities or within ESFA and DfE, to hold institutions to account. Therefore, we will not publish any QAR data at institution level for the 2019 to 2020 academic year. We will not supply 2019 to 2020 QARs for institutions to use internally themselves.

9. Information: post-16 monitoring requests for evidence and information

We have requested further information and evidence to support some reports and inform policy development through ESFA Information Exchange. Your organisation’s nominated contact will receive a notification that there is a letter to view; the request should be forwarded to colleagues responsible for maintaining learner records and submitting data to us.

The letters will indicate what we are reviewing, and will include a template identifying 15 learner records that we would like you to complete and return to us with the requested information or evidence by COP Wednesday 24 March 2021.

Territorial leads will contact some providers separately to correct ILR data quality issues which we identified through our analysis, but are not currently on our monitoring plan. Some of these indicate potential issues in the way some information is calculated and reported, while others are causing some reports to trigger incorrectly. Your territorial lead will confirm which learners this applies to and what action you need to take.

10. Information: Advanced Maths Support Programme continues until July 2022

Mathematics Education Innovation (MEI) is pleased to announce that the Department for Education has agreed to extend funding for the Advanced Maths Support Programme for a further 15 months, until 31 July 2022.

This means that the AMSP will continue to provide support for schools and colleges, increasing opportunities for students to achieve valuable qualifications in AS/A level mathematics, AS/A level further mathematics and core maths.

There is a great deal of work to do to enable students to recover the learning they have lost due to the pandemic. The AMSP will be offering six targeted support packages, in addition to the high quality support already on offer, to help this learning recovery. The packages will focus on:

1. Motivating students’ interest and maintaining continuity of mathematical learning at Key Stage 4
2. Supporting students’ transition to level 3 study
3. AS/A level mathematics
4. AS/A level further mathematics
5. Core Maths
6. Supporting students’ transition to degree study

Charlie Stripp, MEI’s Chief Executive and Director of the National Centre for Excellence in the Teaching of Mathematics (NCETM) said:

The AMSP has been doing excellent work to support the teaching and learning of Key Stage 4 and post-16 mathematics throughout the COVID crisis. It’s great news that we can now be sure the AMSP will be in place to the end of next academic year.

The ability to understand and use maths is crucial for both individual and national success. We must do all we can to help young people whose education has been disrupted by the COVID crisis to recover the learning they have lost.