Agenda item

Any other business

7.1          It was noted that this paper relates to the Local Authority asking for School Forum approval for a number of services to be de-delegated for 2019/20. The voting relates to ‘School’ Members only and specifically maintained schools only.     

7.2          Sarah gave an introduction to the 5 items which are referred to within the paper.

Sarah spoke about the 3 services below in more detail referring to the paper presented.

Maintained schools representatives only, from respective phases were asked to vote whether to de-delegate the 3 items. The voting outcomes were:

For clarity, School Members present were:

Primary Phase: Richard Thomas, Richard Blakeley, Vicky Richards and Lizzie Field

Secondary Phase: Emily Beer, Caroline Tucker, Monica Whitehead and Janine Slade

7.3          Beth gave an update on EALS, going through the paper and also referencing the presentation given at the last Schools’ Forum. This included the fact that 21 Syrian refugees were supported by the service in the last academic year and 95% of pupils supported by EALS showed accelerated progress in English Language levels following the intervention from EALS. Beth went on to deliver an overview of the different benefits of the service and the positive feedback from parent and school evaluations. Beth stressed that EALS is not an SEN and that pupils with EAL are often high achievers when the right support is given. Beth went on to explain the de-delegation system and how the feedback around fair contribution to the formula has been fed back in to the new funding formula and how the premiums work. Schools now contribute an amount that better reflects their cohort in terms of EAL pupils. Beth explained that the service from EALS is not available elsewhere in the county, for example settling of refugees and the fact that specialist teachers in the service are able to understand the wider educational context of individual schools. There are some other translation services available, however they are more expensive to schools.

7.4          Beth then led the update on ESBAS by going through the paper and referencing the presentation given at the last Schools’ Forum, and gave an update on the recent service offer developments. She explained the impact of developing the capacity of the universal offer within schools and how this has supported schools to find alternatives to exclusion.

7.5          Nathan then gave an update on the wider issues including the relationship between the decision today and HNB expenditure and explained that compared with other counties ESCC is in a very strong position with regard to the pressure on this budget. This is because, in part, we have support services which work with schools to keep children in mainstream schools and reduce unnecessary demand.

Nathan explained that the EALS service would most likely have to close should the de-delegation not be agreed.

7.6          A comment was raised regarding the number of voters within Schools Forum today and that the representation was very small. Nathan went on to explain should the service close what the consequences of this would be. Fiona expanded on this and advised that we weren’t in a position to postpone a decision, as if de-delegation is not approved we would need to manage a staff consultation process with possible redundancies. At this stage the LA could not look at a different avenue, i.e. a different funding model. She stressed that the decision to de-delegate would be irreversible.

7.7          It was commented that should the service close this would be a tragedy and the impact and effect would be on all schools and academies.

7.8          Nathan went on to explain that, should de-delegation be agreed for a further year, a different funding model could be explored for both EAL and BSS. This was on the back of comments from academies who wanted to explore a ‘pooled budget’ that operated in a similar way to de-delegation, but is open to academies as well as maintained schools. It would be possible to explore what a future core offer and model could potentially look like from 2019 onwards, should the service continue for another year.

7.9          It was commented that heads and colleagues from all schools have spoken about this and there was a significant response. Emily stated that Schools Forum members were representing other schools and this vote for a potential service closure was a great responsibility. Emily asked if the cost of EALS and BSS was higher for maintained schools, compared to academies. Nathan confirmed that the de-delegated funding model secures a more favourable position for maintained schools, and that academies pay more.

7.10        Ed then gave an update on the EALS funding within the schools budget. Nathan gave a further update on the de delegated models and referred to additional costing information. This shows that the only service that is available in the private sector is a translation service, which is also significantly more costly than that provided by EALS. Unlike EALS this service does not provide support for schools which have to integrate children at very short notice (like Syrian refugee children). Stuart raised the point that the number of refugee children would not decrease due to the location of East Sussex and location of the ports and airports; those children would be subsidised by the LA not the Government, the Government do not fund these services.

7.11        Reps voted and the outcomes are as below:

7.12        Fiona commented on the outcome of the vote and that the LA will need to consider whether there was any option for offering part of the service by phase as it would not be viable in the current form. Sarah Pringle asked if she could be involved in looking at how the service could be saved or looking at other funding models. Fiona stated that we will undertake to look at other options but commented that if we cannot secure sufficient revenue up front, the EAL service would close.