Three quarters of respondents gave a negative verdict on the government’s performance in education over the past year, with 38% of respondents saying they find it difficult to get good candidates for headteacher positions and 48% saying their school finds it difficult to recruit to teaching posts.
Two-thirds of secondaries are struggling to recruit maths teachers, according to worrying new evidence on the extent of the recruitment crisis. Only funding eclipses teacher recruitment as the most important issue facing schools,.
It also found that more than half (51 per cent) of secondary school governors have difficulties recruiting physics teachers and 40 per cent say the same for chemistry.
Almost half of governors and trustees said that their school provides additional services for families in need, including washing school uniforms, meals outside of term time, food banks and emergency loans. 38% are providing financial support with purchasing school uniforms.
The report also reveals important trends about who is governing in state-funded schools and the sustainability of the role.
Key Findings:
- Three quarters of governors and trustees have a negative view of the government’s performance in education over the past year, with those governing calling for more funding and more stability in education policy.
- Funding is the biggest issue for governing boards, especially being felt in secondary schools, sixth forms and in early years. Just one in five are confident that they can manage budget constraints without compromising the quality of education. Indeed, only half of respondents said that they were balancing income and expenditure with almost a third drawing on reserves. 75% of those drawing on reserves said these would be exhausted within two years.
- High needs funding is a big concern, with 74% of respondents saying they disagree that current funding is sufficient; secondary schools especially are reporting being particularly badly hit.
- Diversity on governing boards is a major concern, including when it comes to who is elected chair, and not enough boards are actively considering the issue.
- Almost half of schools covered by the survey are providing additional services for families in need, including washing school uniforms, meals outside of term time, food banks and emergency loans. 38% of schools are providing financial support with purchasing school uniforms. This follows NGA’s Spotlight on Disadvantage research report, released in June 2018, finding that 46% still allocated funds above and beyond the pupil premium for disadvantaged pupils in their school.
- Volunteering to govern a school or group of schools is a form of professional development, yet the majority of governors and trustees are not getting paid time off work for governance.
- The time commitment involved in governing roles is a potential barrier to some volunteers taking on or continuing governance roles, particularly when it comes to stepping up to chair.
- Despite a trend towards smaller governing boards, recruiting volunteers to govern schools remains challenging with the number reporting two or more vacancies rising to 38% in 2018.
- It is concerning that despite the prominence of the need for effective clerking rising in recent years, 9% of respondents still either did not have – or did not know if they had – a clerk who could provide the board with advice on governance, constitutional and procedural matters.
- Staff recruitment is particularly challenging in regions surrounding London and in schools with lower Ofsted grades; many secondary schools are struggling to recruit teachers to core subjects.
- Only a little over a third of standalone schools are currently considering or in the process of forming or joining a multi-academy trust or federation, meaning that, in the absence of any clear direction from central government, maintained schools are likely to make up a substantial proportion of the schools sector for the foreseeable future.
- The majority of multi-academy trusts delegate significant responsibilities to their academy committees; this finding appears to contradict other reports in the sector that local governance is increasingly being overlooked by MATs.
- Most multi-academy trusts have overlap between people involved in different layers of governance, which poses a risk to effective governance as individuals are effectively responsible for holding themselves to account.