NORTH YORKSHIRE COUNCIL
17 May 2023
STATEMENT OF THE EXECUTIVE MEMBER FOR EDUCATION, LEARNING AND SKILLS
Council Statement Schools - May 2023
Since introducing a ‘soft’ national funding formula in 2018-19, the Department for Education continue to move towards a direct National Funding Formula to distribute school funding across the country. The move to a direct NFF will require a number of complex, technical changes to the funding system and the DfE continue to consult with local authorities, schools and academies around the implementation of proposed changes including further requirements on how local authorities operate their growth and falling rolls funding and the introduction of a national split sites factor.
The local authority continues to work with a number of schools in, or projecting, financial deficit to support school leaders to deliver a good quality, financially sustainable education to children and young people. Work will continue with individual schools to ensure that they are able to deploy their resources efficiently.
Medium Term Financial Strategy - May 2023
Demand increases in the number of children and young people assessed as requiring an Education, Health and Care Plan has resulted in additional pressure on a range of budgets in children and young people’s services including SEN casework and education psychology teams as well as high needs commissioning and SEND transport budgets. A capital programme of £20.5m has been agreed to establish over 300 new places within specialist provision across the county over the next three to five years, including places within targeted mainstream provision and special schools to ensure that children and young people can find the right provision locally.
Directorate savings and transformation proposals totalling nearly £5.7m are included in the Medium Term Financial Strategy covering the period 2023 through to 2026.
Although this information appears in my Statement to Council is should be noted that both Executive Members for the Children and Young People’s Service have joint responsibility for all relevant resources.
School Improvement Service
During this academic year (since September 2022 to the end of April 2023), there have been in excess of 90 Ofsted inspections of both LA maintained schools and academies.
The latest Ofsted monthly management report (March 2023) shows that the proportion of North Yorkshire schools and academies judged good or outstanding has increased by 2.1% compared to the March 2022 figure. The rate of increase compares favourably with the national figure (2.1% increase in North Yorkshire compared to 1.3% nationally).
One particularly notable success is that Ripley Endowed CE School improved from inadequate to good at its recent graded (section 5) inspection. After a long period of underperformance, the school has benefitted from the support of the council’s education teams, the appointment of an Interim Executive Board and a local community that have been responsive to the changes.
Music service
We are proposing to bid for Arts Council funding to remain as the Lead Organisation in the Music Hub. Geographies have been re-drawn and if successful we would receive funds for both (current) hub areas and will operate as one single, but larger, hub area, we would intend to retain the services across the current NY footprint as well as extending into York.
The service is holding a series of end of term concerts at our Music Centre and will be running a residential for the North Yorkshire Youth Orchestra, Choir and new Training Orchestra at Harrogate Ladies College in early July.
The North Yorkshire Youth Big Band will be touring Holland, Germany and Luxembourg also in late July.
Adult learning
The new strategy was implemented last autumn, which links to regional skills priorities.
The recent Ofsted inspection identified that the changes are positive – though we acknowledge they are not yet fully embedded.
Our high needs service, (PLC – Personalised Learning College) was a recognised as good provision by Ofsted.
A major focus of the delivery approach has been identifying ways that will encourage adults to engage. To test approaches to this we targeted the authority’s Multiply funding to identify ‘hooks’ for engagement: working with Better Connect (community and Voluntary sector infrastructure partner) the team have spent 96% of the 2022-23 grant funding, engaged over 1600 adults with 400 learners going onto other learning provision. Activities have ranged from numbers-focused heritage treasure trails to money management workshops, from learning to use a slow cooker to feed your family for less as well as learning lunches and bite size maths sessions.
Outdoor Learning Service
The Outdoor Learning Service has completed its first full financial year of residential visits since re-opening and schools have returned with enthusiasm.
The re-organisation of the service has been embedded over the last eight months.
The service is currently recruiting for a new role of Apprentice Outdoor Education Tutors, partnering with a national organisation to provide two Level 3 apprenticeship roles.
A substantive Head of Outdoor Learning has been appointed, who will take up post in July. We are monitoring the service closely and have a business case ready to return for an Executive decision in the autumn. The service has had a successful financial year 2022-23 and we are preparing for a busy 2023-24.
School Organisation including admissions
Primary admissions: 96% of families of primary age children in North Yorkshire have secured their first choice of school.
Of all the families in the county who requested a primary school place for their child from September 2022, just under 99 per cent (98.97 per cent) received an offer from one of their top three preferences for a school. The total size of the cohort starting primary school in September 2023 is 5,334 pupils.
Statutory Proposals have now been published for the Amalgamation of Caedmon College Whitby and Eskdale School, through the technical closure of Eskdale School as a separate entity, and an increase in the published admission number of Caedmon College Whitby. These proposals are available to view at https://www.northyorks.gov.uk/your-council/consultations/current-consultations
Statutory Proposals have now been published on the proposal to close Skelton Newby Hall Church of England (Voluntary Controlled) Primary School. These proposals are available to view at:
Skills
The new Economic Development Service is working closely with the Education & Skills Service and the York and North Yorkshire LEP to ensure we provide a co-ordinated approach to supporting the skills agenda in North Yorkshire. This includes exploring opportunities to engage and inspire people, develop progression pathways within our workforce and support our young and older people to access training and employment.
Our economic development and business advisors continue to work with businesses to help them address labour market shortages, unlock apprenticeship opportunities and upskill their workforce eg. recent work with Cranswick in Sherburn-in Elmet and a major engineering firm in Scarborough. We are also supporting the Y&NY Chamber of Commerce to develop a Local Skills Improvement Plan.
COUNCILLOR ANNABEL WILKINSON