To question school spending £20000 on event space in school car park…

The SEN issue is a different matter.

You say the SENCO said the school could not meet his needs before started. Those needs must have been written down by someone who already knew him, e.g. his nursery, and presumably the SENCO thought the school couldn’t provide whatever it was said he needed. Are the school meeting those needs now he is there?

If he is not getting the provision the school has said in writing he is getting, you certainly have a valid cause for complaint.

Safeguarding governors don’t normally see risk assessments.

Presumably the school will be hiring it out in evenings and weekends when the school car park will be empty.

I can’t quite figure out the car park layout, though - @OrangeCrushing are you saying that the school car park isn’t gated off at all, so anyone could access the school during the day? That seems shocking given how schools usually have very tight security. Or is there a barrier/ gate between the school car park and the rest of the school buildings?

Ah, thank you. I missed that 😬

Do they have a business plan for this event space?

An "event space" only large enough for 10-15 primary sized children, located next to an already-full carpark on a main road, so no additional nearby parking, is unlikely to be the big financial win they seem to think it is.

You really can't.
And no Ofsted wont unless there are very serious, evidenced issues, mainly safeguarding.

Ofsted will only consider a complaint unless the school complaints procedure has been fully followed first.

In practice, OFSTED sometimes contact the LA and ask the questions. The LA will investigate on their behalf and send a report back.

It feels like the priorities are wrong?
I would have focused on securing the car park with gates first, ensuring reading resources are adequate

But they don’t have the funds for adequate reading resources, hence the revenue from the event space.

Was the same when my kids were at school. Schools (both public and private) would rent out facilities such as school halls. With public schools, it was so they could fund basic things such as reading resources. With private schools it’s maximising revenue which is expected under sound economic management. I recall school halls being rented outside school hours by local churches, dancing schools etc. School ovals/green space being rented out of hours for football clinics, youth athletics organisations etc.

I’m sure and they wouldn’t.

Well that’s a weird thing to say!

The reading scheme has changed this year so would need a one off injection of money to replace the existing books which is almost certainly less than the redundancy payment which would be due to the senior manager. So from a cash flow perspective, making the manager redundant doesn’t mean they can buy the books this year anyway.

And then there is the issue of who will actually do the work the senior manager is going once they are made redundant?

Lots of assumptions being made by you about how the school is managing its finances based on very little information provided by a parent who has an axe to grind because she thinks one of the managers has not handled her SEN responsibilities to that poster’s child correctly - a personality issue which is completely unrelated to how the headteacher, finance committee of the governing body and the PTA manage the budget.

People do have a variety of interesting ideas don't they. My favourite experience, years ago as mine are adults now, was the school PTA having a big boost in fund raising. One of the dads went to college with a comedian who was very popular at the time, prime Saturday night show on BBC. He was doing a panto that year in our city and the dad asked him to come and open the Christmas Fayre. Well the school was packed, the queue outside was long and everyone paid to come in. That night we made more than double what was normally raised in a year.

How to spend all that money? Big meeting, school hall full of parents and the arguing started, computers, carpets so classrooms were quieter, books, play equipment and the one I loved was the mum who had calculated how many paper towels the school could afford, I think it worked out as one and a half towels per day per child and she wanted the money spent on paper towels.

Well the arguing went on and the meeting went on. Eventually I put my hand up to speak, there was a big disaster somewhere, famine children dying and I suggested as the money was causing so much upset we should donate it to the disaster fund. Stunned silence and then Head said yes if we couldn't agree soon that would be the best idea.

Eventually it was agreed to buy books and some play equipment and leave some for any emergency.

Money can cause problems, lack of it and spending it, and I don't think some parents ever forgave me for my suggestion but it did focus minds.

I hope the new "shed" does generate some money for years to come.

If the event space was paid for by the PTA, it's irrelevant to the issue of books, which should be funded by the school. If it is able to pay for non-teacher managers but not for books, it sounds like something is badly wrong with the management of its finances.

This won't help with the shed but you can look at your school finances on the financial benchmarking website and see how they compare to other schools.

https://financial-benchmarking-and-insights-tool.education.gov.uk/find-organisation

The shed project doesn't sound the best thought out from what you say. Unless they get a long term high paying let.

I think many people have a huge misunderstanding of the powers/influence that Ofsted have. So many times on threads about schools there is always someone who shouts out complain to Ofsted. The majority of times Ofsted will bat it back and check you have followed the school’s complaints procedures first

A school governor? With a dismissive attitude like that?

@Lurkingandlearning OP says they got planning permission. Did people ask the school about the project when the planning notice went up?

Not for one parental complaint they won't! Unless it's a huge safeguarding concern.

Complaint about a school needs to go to chair of governors first.

This is a separate issue which may be clouding your perspective on the shed issue.

How big is the school? Having two non teaching members of SLT is absolutely standard, especially as one is the head and one is the SENDCO. I work with lots of schools and would be surprised that this was all they had unless it was a tiny school. The sendco will either be part time or will be PT sendco/pt teaching even if that's PPA cover or running interventions, unless it's a massive school.

If you have concerns over how the school are using the EHCP funding or how they are meeting the outcomes for your child you need to call the case work officer and talk to them for advice. You also need to challenge this in an EHCP review where it is written on the form how they are spending the funding.

@Alwaysinamood not sure OFSTED would

I think a teacher’s job can be summed up, in part, as explaining difficult concepts/facts to those who don’t understand them. That is a skill in itself.

If they cannot explain something to a parent in terms that make sense to the parent , then there is a good chance they are not good at explaining rather than that parent being stupid.

But to be fair, in the scenario you have described, they probably don’t understand the situation themselves because it seems they are hoping to use the shed as a business if they intend to hire it out to Slimmer’s World or similar. Do any of them have any business qualifications? Perhaps more importantly do they have planning permission to erect a shed for business purposes? Given the health and safety issues you have raised, I suspect not.

Unfortunately, this kind of thing will occur as long as people who are not trained as educators are expected to also be equipped to run businesses. The real puzzle is why they believe they can.

No problem. I work in finance with schools and my Heads would prioritise the reading scheme or other investments that DIRECTLY benefit the children. If any of them suggested something like this it would be closely scrutinised and unless it is is an exceptional area this shed won’t raise much in rental income. Unless there is something significant missing in terms of information I think this is a very poor investment. I am very conscious working in the public sector that we are spending public money raised through taxes and it is incumbent on us to spend these funds wisely and for the purposes for which they were given.

Also if you e any concerns you can make an anonymous complaint to Ofsted who will investigate and turn up unannounced

My god definitely some very defensive school governors here!!
I agree with OP! £22k for a shed?!! And no books, it all sounds very dodgy to me. I’d even say sounds like someone is pocketing from it somewhere.

Lots of academies and bigger schools have several non teaching SLT members-is one the SENCo? You've said this is an infant school but that doesn't necessarily mean it's small. We have. 5-form intake infant school near us!

That might be the topic for another thread?