Schools facing catastrophic winter

[noblegiraffe]

Schools are starting their Autumn term facing an unprecedented funding crisis. Headteachers are becoming increasingly frantic in their disbelief that the government has done fuck all about it, and appears to be planning to continue to do fuck all about it.

There are few issues contributing -

The energy crisis - school energy bills are not capped, unlike household ones. To give an idea of the scale of the issue, Ormiston Academies Trust which sponsors 43 schools will see its energy bills rise from £5.1 million to £14.3 million. Grant Shapps, transport minister, says that schools could consider switching to LED lightbulbs.

Teacher and support staff payrises - the government have recommended payrises for teachers and support staff, but crucially will not be giving schools extra money to fund them. If schools give staff the recommended pay rise, they will have to cut services to fund this (even before you consider the energy bills)

The cost of living crisis - schools are facing increased prices just as households are. Food for the canteen, stationery orders, everything is more expensive. Sam Freedman tweets "Very rough calculation is that energy bills plus teacher pay increase plus higher food costs are going to add around £5bn to school budgets nationally. Just under 10% of the total budget. And none of it was built into the funding model."

On top of that, covid still needs to be considered. Last Jan/Feb schools were in chaos due to staff absences (the government widely trumpeted their call for an army of volunteers to step in, which didn't appear). At the end of the summer term, all the education unions wrote to James Cleverly, temp Ed Sec asking for a covid plan that included increased funding to schools for supply teachers to cover staff absence. Given that we haven't actually got a functioning government at the moment, I'm pretty sure he hasn't replied. Signs are that we're facing a bad flu season too, vaccinating school staff should be a consideration. Some schools already pay for the flu jab for staff, most won't be eligible for a covid booster, no idea what the impact of that will be. Obviously there will be pressure to close windows to keep any heat in, which goes against covid guidance for ventilation.

Some academy trusts appear to have large reserves which will help them weather the storm, most very much don't. twitter.com/ajjolley/status/1564562763443277825?s=21&t=nmM2Q_vFCmo5GzILNNKhfg

School leaders are reporting that they will have to make support staff and/or teachers redundant or pause recruitment, restrict heating, cancel school trips and extra curricular activities. This will inevitably have an impact on children, and on the quality of education on offer.

I'm not sure what either Truss or Sunak have said about the crisis facing education, all I've heard is wittering about grammar schools. An intervention is needed urgently.

www.tes.com/magazine/news/general/energy-bills-cost-of-living-crisis-schools-face-catastrophic-winter

It maybe why he apparently runs a free school.

No way would this happen in state or grammar or independent.

And I very much doubt it would happen in an adjacent although I wouldn't put it past them trying

Academy even!

Isn't it just?

I do a break duty in the lunch queue and see kids find out how much money is on their account before buying, and you often see them ask 'what can I get for that?'. It hadn't occurred to me that it's quite tough for the dinner lady to tell the child that they can't afford much/anything when they are hungry.

That's so sad, @noblegiraffe . Easier in primary, I think, where kids will always get something to eat, even if it's paid for by a staff member. But we have fewer of them.

I don't envy any school leadership trying to balance the books. And anyone who thinks we can just "cut our cloth" and magic money out of nowhere is delusional. And clearly don't understand that schools are already strapped for cash. What will happen is there'll be fewer qualified teachers in front of classes, no extras like extracurricular activities/trips/visitors, no investment in technology so if things break or get old they won't be replaced. Many parents won't necessarily realise what's going on because school staff get very good at staying upbeat and making something educational and fun out of not much (in my primary experience!) so as long as the kids come home saying all is normal at the end of the day parents won't notice anything awry.

I often post links to satirical stories in the Daily Mash as they’re very pertinent and very funny, but this is as good as. Thanks for the laugh.

Several of our students have a single white bread roll for lunch, because that's all they can afford.
And with the cost of everything going up, schools dinners will get more expensive too.

My understanding is that Academies are funded by central gov as opposed to local authorities .And they are not allowed to make a profit .So if someone like Nash at Pimlico Academy has millions worth of reserves I guess these come from other investments ?
I can't believe that money made in other parts of these capitalist's empires will be moved across to pay heating bills in a school .
Apologies if I'm barking up the wrong tree!

This is not a new thing! This has been happening for years sadly. It will become a more common occurrence and in more schools though x

I'll tell you all a story that shows how the other kids also get this which gives me hope for the future voters of this country.

My ds just did a 2 yr college course. 15 in the class. Mixture of backgrounds but 1 student came from poverty.

One day he finally admitted he didn't game online with them because he didn't have a console. Not even a laptop. He was doing a computing course with them.

These 16/17 yo all scrambled together bits of old PCs and old laptops they had because they all had gaming consoles as gamers so upgraded over the years.

They all donated a tenner each to buy a windows licence.

And together they built him his own computer and gave it to him on his 18th (he's an early sept birthday.)

I was so proud of them for not having the "I'm alright Jack" attitude but rather one of helping because they could and realising his life's situation didn't mean judgement or scorn or tough shit you don't have.

It's these attitudes we need to see so much more of as a society.

Because of their simple act of kindness he pulled his grade up and is now able to continue studying post college (he has an amazing apprenticeship) what he loves and he will be able to improve his and his families life financially.

Why the government can't see feeding and keeping warm the future generation is an investment in this countries future - and treating teachers well is the same investment - escapes me daily.

Not gonna lie.. this made me cry! Thats so lovely. X

I cried too when they did it!

It was honestly so lovely to see such attitudes in the young.

And it's probably no surprise to you if I tell you their main topics of conversation are computers and slagging off Johnson and trump

I agree. Much poorer countries than ours have state-funded education. If this happened we are basically saying we either do not care about ordinary people, or that we are no longer a G7 country and instead a fairly poor country.

I mean we have provided free secondary education since 1944 and longer for primary. The only time it has not been full-time was in some places during the war because they could not get teachers as they were all fighting on the front. But NEVER has part-time state education been introduced because of money.

And how is this school going to attract any teachers? Unless they employ only unqualified staff?

Are schools still required to keep there windows open for covid? Sorry if its been asked already.

I agree with you OP and on top of lack of adequate funding for schools pre the pandemic when in my LA two thirds of schools already had a deficit budget that they were having to plan and agree to address.

My last visit to a school, the administrator happened to open the gas bill beside me. In April 22, the gas bill was £1800 for the month of March. She checked back and for the same period the year before the bill was £690. March isn't even the coldest month!
Schools are going to have to lose staff ( their biggest expense). Academy trusts are often much more ‘flexible’ 😳about staff ratios, staff qualifications and are quick to rid themselves of experienced, expensive staff. The quality of education will suffer.
Parents, come on! This is your children and their education. I'm always amazed at how little we protest to the government about the quality of education we settle for.

Our electricity bill in April was £18000.

Oh my!!! That's shocking. Its not as if a fundraiser bu the parents would even touch the sides of them bills😟

They all sound like they have been raised extremely well

No, we're talking schools needing to find hundreds of thousands of pounds.

Not something the PTA could whip up, or that could easily be saved with minor cuts to, I dunno, photocopying budgets.

We are already asked to photocopy on A5 rather than A4 - which is crap for those of us with poor eyesight. Reducing that further will make practically no difference to the school budget.

I think LochAqua is the same billy bullshitter that used to post about her dh being a head and everything was better than it ever had been in lockdown/ during covid. Either that or her dh is a completely awful person.

I really hope something happens to support these rises. These children have been through enough.

LockAqua is on another thread about school uniform saying how strict her DC’s school is about it. Doesn’t ring true

I'm currently watching the documentary about Michela school - the strictest HT.

She is going on about lefties and conservatives.

She's not converting me 🙄

When I was a child, Viz used to have a handy tips section. Things such as "Put jam on your face this summer to annoy the wasps!"

You're wasted on MN. Comic talent like that should be more widely known.

Oh come off it, @LockAqua . We didn't believe any of this pile of old horseshit two years ago and we sure as hell won't fall for it now either.