EFA e-bulletin for schools, colleges, local authorities and other 16 to 19 providers: 30 March 2017
Published 30 March 2017
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This publication is available at https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/efa-e-bulletin-30-march-2017-issue-168/efa-e-bulletin-for-schools-colleges-local-authorities-and-other-16-to-19-providers-30-march-2017
1. Information: announcement of the Education and Skills Funding Agency from 1 April 2017
The Secretary of State has announced that Education Funding Agency (EFA) and Skills Funding Agency (SFA) will be brought together to create one funding agency from 1 April 2017.
The new agency will be called the Education and Skills Funding Agency (ESFA). ESFA’s first working day will be Monday 3 April 2017.
There will be no impact on existing contracts and funding agreements with education and skills providers and other contractors.
For any further queries, please use the EFA enquiry form.
2. Information: 16 to 19 Bursary Fund audit guide for local authorities
We’ve updated the 16 to 19 Bursary Fund audit guide for local authorities for the 2017 to 2018 academic year. This is a non-mandatory guide. The guide is designed to help local authorities with any assurance work they carry out on institutions’ use of 16 to 19 Bursary Funds.
3. Information: local authority summaries of sixth-form allocations for 2017 to 2018
We’ve uploaded local authority summaries to EFA Information Exchange. They show allocations for maintained schools and special schools in their area.
The summaries present the total funding for:
- programme and student support funding and high needs funding for maintained mainstream school sixth-forms
- student support funding and high needs funding for maintained special schools
All files are located in EFA Information Exchange in the Document Exchange ‘Revenue funding’ folder, under ‘AY 2017-18’.
To access Document Exchange log into EFA Information Exchange. Choose the Document Exchange tab at the top of the page.
For support and guidance about EFA Information Exchange please visit our support page.
In mid-April we’ll upload a further summary. It will cover student numbers for all types of institutions.
If you have any queries please contact us using our online enquiry form.
4. Action: local authorities to submit 16 to 19 grant return by 30 April 2017
Local authorities (LAs) are required to submit their 16 to 19 stage 1 grant return for 2016 to 2017 by 30 April 2017. The return must be signed by your chief financial officer and uploaded to EFA Information Exchange.
To access Document Exchange, log into EFA Information Exchange and choose the Document Exchange tab at the top of the page. We’ve published detailed guidance on the 16 to 19 stage 1 grant return on GOV.UK.
LAs are no longer required to submit an EFA LA grant return for the annual stage 1 return in April.
5. Information: consistent financial reporting (CFR) 2017 to 2018 and schools financial value standards (SFVS) 2017 to 2018
We’ve published the CFR 2017 to 2018 guidance and SFVS 2017 to 2018 guidance on GOV.UK. This is for local authority maintained schools and local authorities.
Local authorities should inform their schools that the guidance is available.
This framework provides guidance to schools for collecting information about their income and expenditure by financial year.
This helps governing bodies of maintained schools provide local authorities with a financial statement each year.