Correspondence

ESFA Update academies: 16 October 2019

Published 16 October 2019

This correspondence was withdrawn on 21 December 2020

This has been withdrawn as it’s out of date. Find the latest information from ESFA in the latest ESFA Update.

Applies to England

1. Action: add your member and trustee email addresses to ‘Get Information About Schools’

The Academies Financial Handbook sets out the requirement for all academy trusts to provide a direct email address for their members and trustees using the governance section of Get Information About Schools using your DfE sign-in account.

If you have not done so already, please make sure you provide this information as soon as possible to ensure you are compliant with the handbook. You should provide a direct email address for your members and trustees - 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.

2. Action: submit your school resource management self-assessment tool checklist

The school resource management self-assessment tool is now open for academy trusts to complete and return their checklist by Thursday 14 November 2019.

All academy trusts with open academies as at 31 August 2019 must submit the checklist return.

3. Action: academy trust accounts submission coversheet guide

We have published our guide to submitting your audited financial statements for 2018 to 2019. You should read the guide before completing the online form and uploading your documents.

This year, we have reduced the data collected in the coversheet to eliminate duplication with other returns. Please upload your audited financial statements, auditor’s management letter and findings from your internal scrutiny programme of work within the accounts submission coversheet.

All academy trusts that had a signed funding agreement and an open academy at any point during the accounting period to 31 August 2019, should submit audited accounts (annual report, financial statements, auditor’s management letter and findings from your internal scrutiny programme of work) to ESFA. This includes free schools, studio schools and university technical colleges (UTCs). The deadline for submitting accounts is Tuesday 31 December 2019.

4. Action: land and building collection tool is open for completion by 4 November 2019

We are now over halfway through the collection period.Thank you to all the trusts who have already submitted their land and buildings collection tool (LBCT). For those who are currently working through the return, the deadline to submit your return is Monday 4 November 2019.

This week’s top tip is to remember if you have church owned land, please allow plenty of time for diocesan checks as these must be completed before the deadline.We recommend you contact your local diocese as soon as possible to agree deadlines.

If you are having difficulties completing your return, we will be hosting weekly skype calls with users as well as hosting web-chat sessions. Our next skype call is tomorrow, Thursday 17 October, 14:00 to 14:30.

5. Action: Condition Data Collection - accessing your school condition report

The Condition Data Collection (CDC) programme collects condition, contextual and building management data for every state-maintained school and college in England. We are now in the final phase of the programme and wanted to thank you for your support.

Over the past three years we have:

• visited 22,000 schools
• shared over 19,500 school condition reports and will share the remainder in October and November
• gathered a robust evidence base to inform how we target future capital investment to where it is needed most

If you have not already accessed your school condition report, providing it has been released, you can download it from the CDC portal. You should have already been given access to the CDC portal and received instruction on how to access your school report. If you require further information on how to access your report, please submit your enquiry using our enquiry form, including the name and URN of your school.

6. Reminder: complete your autumn school census return by 30 October 2019

It is vital that school census returns are accurate as this is the basis for much of your revenue funding calculation.

To help schools and academies quality assure their census data prior to final submission, we have made a range of reports available in COLLECT. These will allow you to check the accuracy of the data that we will use to calculate your pre-16, and 16 to 19 funding.

Full information on the reports’ content and some of the common data issues is available on GOV.UK.

The school census post-16 interactive tool is available online. It is designed to help schools and academies with sixth forms understand how to ensure an accurate 16 to 19 census return. We have also published an interactive flowchart to help you understand whether a student meets the condition of funding, and what they can study.

7. Information: national funding formulae provisional allocations

On Friday 11 October, we published the national funding formulae (NFF) provisional allocations for schools, high needs and central school services for 2020 to 2021.

The changes this year are set out in the national funding formulae policy paper.

We will upload tables to COLLECT, which show the NFF calculations for the schools block. This allows each school to view the calculation of the notional allocation for their institution. Local authorities can view the calculation for all schools in their area.

We will also publish the 2020 to 2021 technical notes for the:

• high needs NFF
• schools NFF
• central school services NFF

For early years (EY) funding, we will increase the hourly funding rates for all local authorities for the two year old entitlement and the vast majority of areas for the 3 and 4 year old entitlement. The small number of councils that have been protected from large drops to their EY funding rate as a result of the ‘loss cap’, will have their 2019 to 2020 hourly funding rates for 3 and 4 year olds maintained in 2020 to 2021. We will publish further details in due course.

8. Information: list of academy trusts late with two or more financial returns in the 2018 to 2019 academic year

We have published a list of 43 academy trusts that were late with two or more financial returns in the 2018 to 2019 academic year.

Most academy trusts submitted their financial returns on time, but in order to improve compliance with the submission deadlines, and in fairness to the trusts who do submit their returns on time, we have a policy of naming those academy trusts who are late with two or more deadlines in an academic year.

9. Information: applications now open for two new education technology programmes

The Department for Education has launched two new education technology programmes for schools and colleges.

The EdTech Demonstrator Schools and Colleges Programme is an exciting opportunity for schools and colleges who are using technology effectively to apply to share their experience and help support other providers. Successful applicants will receive between £75,000 and £150,000 in grant funding to support the delivery of this programme.

A selection exercise will run until Friday 22 November 2019 with final interviews in January 2020.

The department is also seeking participants for the EdTech Innovation Testbed, in partnership with Nesta. This programme will help schools and colleges trial promising technology suited to their needs for free, with CPD for participants and hands-on support from evaluation experts to understand what works across:

• formative assessment and essay marking
• timetabling
• parental engagement

The closing date for applications is Monday 25 November 2019.

10. Information: School Places and Spaces Conference – Tuesday 12 November, Birmingham

The Department for Education and Educational Building and Development Officers Group (EBDOG) invite representatives from local authorities, large multi-academy trusts and dioceses to the School Places and Spaces conference. Hear from Lord Agnew (Parliamentary Under Secretary of State for the School System), Rory Kennedy (Director of Capital Directorate), and Andrew Warren, RSC for West Midlands.

There will also be a range of workshops available throughout the day on topics such as:

• good estate management for schools
• spending well on school places
• energy efficiency and school maintenance

Book your place now.

11. Information: International Charity Fraud Awareness Week: 21 to 25 October 2019

Week commencing 21 October is International Charity Fraud Awareness Week. This campaign is supported by the Fraud Advisory Panel, which is a coalition of charities, regulators and other stakeholders. ESFA is promoting the campaign to further raise awareness of fraud in the education sector.

A free fraud awareness hub has been established, which will host a number of webinars throughout the week alongside providing practical helpsheets and case studies. Further details can be found on the Fraud Advisory Panel website.

Not all of the information may be relevant to your trust, but the campaign will focus on a different topic each day. Topics include: a general overview of charity fraud, internal fraud and understanding data risks.

On Wednesday 23 October the campaign focuses on cybercrime. Cyber crime is an increasing risk to all business, including the education sector. ESFA has published a guide on cyber crime and cyber securitys to help raise education provider’s awareness of cyber crime and cyber security.

12. Information: updated provider data self-assessment toolkit (PDSAT)

We have released an updated version of the provider data self-assessment toolkit (PDSAT) on the PDSAT section of GOV.UK.

This update enables both XML and funding information system (FIS) import and report output for the 2019 to 2020 funding year.

PDSAT is available to colleges and independent training providers to assist with their routine ILR data-checking procedures for their ILR data returns.

For further information, please email pdsat.ESFA@education.gov.uk.