Could better financial planning turn a failing school around?
Every school has budgeting challenges to navigate, although the problem can be far more pronounced in ones that are failing. Head teachers and governors in these schools often find themselves in an impossible situation, unable to drive up standards because they cannot invest in quality teachers, buildings and equipment.
While emergency government funding can support struggling schools required to make urgent improvements, it is certainly not a long-term solution – it is far more important to establish good financial planning practices, even with limited resources.
Successful schools, like their failing counterparts, tend to share common characteristics. Along with strong leadership, they have clear processes in place to support positive pupil outcomes while preventing over-spend. As an example, we only have to look at the Catholic High School in Chester, which credits effective planning and decision-making with helping it achieve its best set of GCSE results.
Curriculum-led budget planning, advocated by academies minister Lord Agnew, is widely seen as a way for schools to get the most value from their funding to improve attainment. Education resource planning tools help make schools’ finances more agile, so they can model different curriculum options and how these would impact the budget, taking unexpected challenges and new opportunities into account. They are, for instance, able to allocate staffing resources so that pupils receive the right level of contact time, in line with budget constraints.
The financial data your software provides is vital in highlighting areas of over or under-spending that could be hampering performance. You might find that the school is over-reliant on supply teachers – which eats into already-tight budgets and makes it difficult to provide continuity for pupils and parents.
Where recruitment and retention are an issue, as they often are in failing schools, headteachers need to implement good HR practices that make it quicker and easier to take on permanent teachers and bring their supply staff bill down.
This might be easier said than done given the time pressures school leaders face; a school HR software and payroll system can streamline the process to ensure they can review applications, shortlist candidates, invite them for interview and make an offer, as well as automate reference and background checks. Importantly, it allows you to build a pipeline of candidates for future roles. Not every teacher wants to work in a struggling school – but by widening the pool of applicants, you stand a better chance of finding those who are ready to take on the challenge.
As well as implementing better budgeting and HR systems, failing schools can also benefit from joining forces with top-performing independent schools, those within their multi-academy trust (MAT) can easily share best practice and resources. Particularly within MATs, there are opportunities to manage highly-complex budgets via a central system to control costs and deliver maximum value.
Regardless of whether or not it is failing, all schools must continually review their processes and be ready to make changes where appropriate. Teaching excellence, driven by strong leadership, is always going to be key to better pupil attainment and behavior – but it needs to be well-supported with careful financial planning.
