GDST Trustees

[Common]

How has the GDST Board of Trustees managed to create the first strike by staff in 149 years?

Cheryl Giovannoni and her board have treated a unique educational institution in the UK based on values, ideals and morals like a business because they fundamentally fail to comprehend the ethos of service that powers the GDST.

Oh and better facilities.

2000 was also before the huge NI hike of the early 00s - it added a huge amount to staff costs and might account for increase in SLT costs (and all otherbstaff costs)

Parents will still go to GDST schools if they want single sex and fees that are usually a bit lower than other schools in their area (used to be quite a bit lower, but seems to have narrowed)

The question is whether they'll be able to get the staff they want. If TPS remains available in the private sector, then it is likely to be problematic. I do not know how likely it is that keeping state sector benefits for state sector employees only will everbecome policy. If it does, the whole private sector will be tackling the issue

The question of whether schools (state or independent) will be able to get the staff they want in future is indeed key and it's not looking good.

They are competing for a diminishing pool. If foreign travel eases up again it'll get worse.

A school that treats its teachers well will always have an advantage in retention but speaking as a teacher, it's tricky to discover before accepting a job if a school management does treat teachers well (unless you stay in the same small local area and are well plugged into the grapevine).

Hence the importance of specifics such as what the salary is and what the pension arrangements are, any fee remissions etc - these are discoverable from outside with a bit of effort. Although I have been offered a job before now without any of that info being shared -- I said no as I reasoned if the package was that good, they'd have said.

This thread has certainly put me off ever working for GDST!

It is fascinating seeing the vested interests coming to the fore on this thread.

And as for Michael Oakley’s letter, talk about playing the man rather than the ball! ‘Too old’, ‘pensions are different now’. ‘Times have changed’….

How about addressing his substantive points, that the schools could still afford to stay in the pension fund, how SMT have chosen to reward themselves (generally with the connivance of take governors that they have had a role in appointing), increase in office costs (including a large marketing budget) and ‘office costs’.

Ultimately, you cannot look at pensions in isolation and say how lucky teachers are. In the unlikely event a teacher works for 40 years until 67, they might get a nice pension of £20-30k per annum. This would equate to a pot of £400-600k roughly, or an extra 5k per annum over 40 years, accounting for inflation etc.

This is hardly a banker’s pension, where they could shove this amount in over a couple of good bonus years.

Teachers are (absurdly) committed and loyal. They tend to buy into going the extra miles for their pupils, even when the pupils are already starting with every privilege possible (yes, I know this is not every private school pupil, but a substantive majority).

Mostly, what teachers want is gratitude and appreciation , not being thrown a big bonus. But, they are being massively taken for granted, and the profession is already struggling with many leaving and few joining (especially in scarcity subjects).

It is a strange outcome of Covid, that when education has never seemed more necessary, teachers have had a real pay cut and bankers record bonuses.

Can’t go on forever…,

@TheReluctantPhoenix I haven’t read the letter but you need to know first-hand from me that marketing has changed enormously since 2000! Having gone through 11+ this year, plus about to with DS next year, I hand on heart tell you that marketing makes a massive difference between schools. Profile is key and this is a massive change from 20 years ago. No wonder costs have gone up - the sector is shrinking and competition is fierce - especially where we are in london where the choice is massive and market is saturated. The marketing has become vital, just as it has in the charity sector. 20 years ago you wouldn’t have seen many adverts for charities. Now it’s the only way to raise money. Consumers have changed drastically and the target market for private schools has shrunk as people are priced out of the market.

You honestly sound like you resent private school pupils - my children are not ‘privileged’ - we make enormous sacrifices to send them to private school, including a remortgage on our (modest) home. We simply could not afford the fee increases - and we are not alone.

I hate to say it but the salaries of top execs, especially within the charity sector, have grown exponentially and again, it’s a different world than 20 years ago! I imagine the exec teams of these trusts earn their money. Exec roles are a ‘buyers’ market’ and it’s really hard to recruit abs retain a good Team.

What I can say for certain is that there is no way any company, charity or otherwise, would be cutting a marketing budget right now. As someone who works with many charities and has access to their accounts, I can tell you that. The actual cost of marketing has also massively increased, especially as demand has increased. Printing costs, out if home, magazine ads etc. - all at least doubled, if not tripled.

There would certainly be little point in sustaining pensions at the expense of marketing if this led to fewer pupils, schools closures and no jobs in the end! That seriously is the trajectory for any charity that doesn’t invest in marketing and good leadership.

I just do not believe that any company, charity, school would be doing this if they didn’t feel it was necessary to avoid closures. Why risk their reputation and deal with posts and comments like the ones on this thread?

I’m not sure what vested interests you are referring to @TheReluctantPhoenix? I’m a parent with a child in an independent school if that’s what you mean? I’m also an accountant who understands accounts and affordability.

For avoidance of doubt, if I was the intended target of the 'vested interest' comment, I have no link to GDST schools whatsoever.

I recommend you AS me if you want to work out my likely background.

Just move to state where you will be valued.
They are so much better than in the past ----well equipped, better run and so many great families with well educated parents just cannot afford fees.
I honestly cannot believe how bad an experience we had at a GDST recently and a completely different atmosphere to when I attended one in the 90s. Reading this thread does explain a lot.
We are very impressed with daughter's state secondary and glad we abandoned the private sector. Fantastic teachers and facilities and a supportive atmosphere. We do extra curricular outside of school, sports, music and LAMDA etc

I was in state before (6 years, been at independent for about the same length of time). The workload was brutal because the classes were so large. You can't work 7 days a week, week in, week out if you have your own children. Teaching doesn't pay enough to hire a nanny.

One thing this thread has encouraged me to do is to look into pay and conditions for my DC's teachers.

I don't think the hours the staff worked (at the state schools) were visible to students and parents and I agree that students had a good experience at the schools on the whole.

In my opinion, having e.g. a theatre, a swimming pool and state-of-the-art-labs doesn't make as much difference to students as a good peer group. But it may well sway parental decision-making.

I think this thread has shown that organisations such as GDST are doing something that makes sense in their terms, as sadly teachers as a profession and education for its own sake are not much valued by UK society and so they will get away with it.

The damage done won't be apparent till much later. Those managers will be long gone.

The thing is that schools have choices.

School accounts are pretty simple really, I have no trouble understanding them.

And, as for marketing budgets, do they really make the difference that you think? A well marketed school with larger classes and worse teachers vs a poorly marketed school with smaller classes and better teachers, the choice for me is pretty easy.

The single most important marketing any private school has is results and leavers’ destinations. Everything else is secondary to the vast majority of parents.

I am not against private schools at all (I went to one in the top 50 in the country). I think they have taken a wrong turn, though, and are emphasising the wrong things and spending money unwisely. Better to spend more on smaller classes than flashy facilities and ‘enrichment’.

Ultimately, it is the teachers that make a school good and, although it does vary wildly by subject, it is hard to recruit really good teachers.

No vested interests here. I have no involvement with GDST at all. I really don't care about this one way or the other. My only interest in this thread is correcting untrue statements.

that the schools could still afford to stay in the pension fund

On unrestricted funds (which is where your pay and pension come from), they are running an operating deficit - £2.3M in 2019, £1.8M in 2020 (in large part due to actuarial losses on the defined benefit schemes for support staff, the main one of which is closed to new entrants). The overall operating surplus comes from restricted and endowed funds, which cannot legally be used for your pensions unless they were donated for that purpose (which is unlikely).

Whilst it is true that their reserves are just over their target level, the target they have set is significantly lower than that recommended by the Charity Commission. If the deficit for 2021 is similar to that for the last two years, the reserves will have come into the target range. In any event, the reserves are not there to be spent on pensions. They are there so that the charity can continue operating if its income dries up and to meet other unexpected events. Similarly, as pointed out previously, reducing capital spending only helps marginally.

Looking at GDST's accounts, they clearly need to make savings. That doesn't mean it has to come from pensions, but they need to make savings somewhere.

how SMT have chosen to reward themselves (generally with the connivance of take governors that they have had a role in appointing)

I'm surprised you say the governors have a role in setting SMT salaries. For a charity, they are normally set by the trustees.

When appointed, Cheryl Giovanni was on salary and pension contributions of £266,399 - about £1,500 more than her predecessor. Whilst she had a significant rise in 2020, she did not have any pay rise in 2019 and a smaller increase in 2018. Her pay has not kept up with inflation. As I have said previously, I don't know if her salary is value for money. It certainly makes her one of the highest paid charity CEOs. As far as I can tell, most of those paid more than her are CEOs of medical charities such as the Wellcome Trust.

increase in office costs (including a large marketing budget) and ‘office costs’

Support costs were reduced by £2M in 2020. Around £200k of the saving came from marketing, which is something to which you seem to object but which is increasingly necessary for independent schools. Governance costs have barely changed from 2016 to 2020.

My ‘vested interest’ comment was not named at any particular poster, there is a degree of paranoia on here!

I just think that parents should want to pay a little more to keep happy motivated teachers, rather than keeping fees lower and cutting teachers’ pay. Would you want to eat at a restaurant where the kitchen staff were forced to take a pay cut, or would you tip a little more?

Of course, we will hear of parents who would struggle to pay and schools that would close, but maybe those parents just cannot afford private schooling any more and some schools should close. As people keep saying, schools are businesses and it is a competitive market.

Ultimately it is a negotiation between parents, schools and teachers, and teachers need to be able to negotiate. Hence the strike.

@TheReluctantPhoenix your arrogance towards parents that send their children to fee paying schools is eye opening . Not all fee paying parents are millionaires, you seem to think that if there isn’t enough money to pay for everything the teachers want then we shouldn’t be there. Your entitlement is shocking.

But when you say negotiate @TheReluctantPhoenix you mean what? It seems as though the strikes are there to say all or nothing - certainly no sense of ‘negotiation’ from the news coverage (and relentless tweeting of the NEU). Negotiation implies give abs take, when really you mean give me my pension or I withhold children’s education.

"The single most important marketing any private school has is results and leavers’ destinations. Everything else is secondary to the vast majority of parents.

I am not against private schools at all (I went to one in the top 50 in the country). I think they have taken a wrong turn, though, and are emphasising the wrong things and spending money unwisely. Better to spend more on smaller classes than flashy facilities and ‘enrichment’.

Ultimately, it is the teachers that make a school good and, although it does vary wildly by subject, it is hard to recruit really good teachers"

Agree.

I would rather have shabby facilities but excellent teachers who are content with their wages and packages and those the schools can retain for a good length of time.
Agree too lots of parents have to and are willing to make sacrifices for very high private school fees and these families will opt out if they feel it's not worth it. However there do seem to be more and more uber wealthy families and plenty from overseas who want these schools, especially in London.
I do hope the GDST can revert back to how they used to be.

I asked about negotiation up thread. Other schools have compromised on this issue by going to conditional phased withdrawal (teachers can choose to pay the extra % themselves IF employers' TPS contributions go up in 2024), or by closing TPS to new entrants. There's also the option to wait and see what the actual increase will be. The compromise USS (the university scheme) came up with was lower earners stay in the DB scheme while higher earners join the DC (not sure of details and I don't think it's possible with TPS).

The response from other posters was that GDST would not consider compromise options, hence the strike. But there are compromise options.

No teacher would want to not teach because the problem lands back with the teacher who then hasn't covered enough - this is why it's easier to teach when ill/off with Covid.

The shiny facilities thing is an example of Game Theory. If you don't invest (or raise fees) you can't be sure other schools won't invest (or keep fees the same). You can't legally collude, so the lowest risk strategy is to invest and keep fees the same.

You also can't prove the teachers are good, but you can show off the new pool.

@Anjo2011,

My arrogance is shocking? Pots, kettles, black?!

In your opinion, teachers should take a pay cut and shut up.

@1forward2back,

I think you are missing the point a bit. Teachers are not striking for a rise or a new and better pension, merely keeping what they have.

How many on here would take a pay cut happily, when already poorly paid?

TPS employer contributions increased from 16.48% to 23.68% after the last valuation 3 years ago - this is a 44% increase. How would teachers feel if their contributions rose by this much and by ever bigger increases in the future? The average teacher currently contributes 9.2% of their salary themselves - a 44% increase would take this to 13.2%. At what contribution level of contribution would they draw the line at?

Also just to point out that in an independent school that is a charity the governors are the school trustees.

@CiderWithLizzie

Also just to point out that in an independent school that is a charity the governors are the school trustees.

GDST is a chain of 23 independent schools and 2 academies. The governors of the schools are not the trustees of the charity.

@prh47bridge - oh sorry - I was looking at the accounts of another independent school (not part of a group like the GPDST) where the governors are the trustees!