Our new research on schools funding acutely shows one of the biggest challenges facing school leaders today.
How do you prioritise an ever-decreasing pot of resources in a world where the cost of everything has risen extortionately? Headteachers and school budget holders are having to make heartbreaking decisions – ones that they know aren’t in the overall best interest of their pupils – just to ensure that they balance their budgets for another year.
It is especially frustrating to see that school leaders are having to make such severe cuts across staffing in schools. Of the school leaders polled, 32% reported cuts to teaching staff, 69% to teaching assistants and 46% to support staff. On the one hand it makes sense: staffing costs will be the biggest chunk of a school budget. This is a natural place to trim expense. However, the reality of this is fewer experienced teachers delivering high quality lessons, fewer teaching assistants running desperately needed reading interventions and fewer pastoral leaders making referrals to mental health services. The impact of this is a reduced quality of education and a greater risk to the health and wellbeing of children.
The proliferation of schools using their pupil premium budget to plug gaps elsewhere in their budget is a similarly exasperating situation. It has risen again since our polling last year with 47% of senior leaders admitting to spending pupil premium money elsewhere. This money is set aside to specifically support our poorest children but what other choices do school leaders have? According to the Institute for Fiscal Studies, between 2010 and 2021 the most deprived schools have seen a 12% real-terms reduction in their budget compared to just 5% for the least deprived. Keeping their school open, staffed and safe must be the priority and so it is an inevitable consequence of diminished funding in a cost of living crisis.
