SIR JOHN DEANE’S COLLEGE
Minutes of the Meeting of the Policy & Resources Committee held at the College
on Wednesday, 12th November, 2014
Present:
1.
Mr D Sandbach (Chair)
Mrs J Hough
Miss K Kirkwood
Miss R Lloyd
Mr I Oulton
Mrs S Powell
Mrs J Tickridge
In attendance: Mr A Sumner (Director of Finance)
Mrs S Armstrong (Clerk)
APOLOGIES
Apologies had been received from Mr T Rawling and Mr P Allanach.
2.
DECLARATION OF INTEREST
None.
3.
MINUTES
Resolved that the minutes of the meeting held of 11th June, 2014 be approved.
4.
MATTERS ARISING
None.
5.
PRINCIPAL’S REPORTING ITEMS
PART A – STRATEGIC PLANNING AND QUALITY REVIEW
a
To receive a report on DfE/BIS/SFA/Ofsted/LA/SFCA and Partner High School
Matters
The Principal reported that the Principal of UCAN had left the School. An Acting
Principal had been appointed and the School had a new Deputy Principal who had
joined them from the Bright Futures Educational Trust at the beginning of term.
(i)
Funding for 2015/16
Mr Sumner said that the letter received from the EFA set out the high level intentions
for funding for next year. The letter stated that there would be no additional changes to
the funding factors within the national funding formula for 2015/16 and said that they
hoped to provide stability in funding rates for 2015/16. Mr Sumner said that there may
yet be some changes to the national rate which was £4,000 per student last year.
A Governor asked about the fact that the letter mentioned a demographic downturn.
Mr Sumner said that across the country as a whole there was a downturn in the number
of 16 year olds but that, with the development that was happening locally, it was not as
likely to be the case in Northwich. He said that the one of the changes that was being
seen was an increase in full time students due to a move by General FE colleges to
move their students into the band to class as full time.
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In response to a question as to whether a change of Government would impact the
funding, Mr Sumner said that the AoC were saying that there would be no changes for
next year. The next parliament will have to make significant savings, whoever is in
power and so the message was not optimistic.
The Committee discussed the large programme uplift that was detailed in the EFA’s
letter and whether that was an opportunity to increase funding. Mr Sumner said that it
was not worth trying to grow larger programmes because the extra costs for them
would be more than the 10% uplift that was paid for these programmes. The Principal
said that the College would consider allowing students to take 4 or 5 subjects.
However Oxbridge and the Russell Group Universities predominantly required only 3
subjects at A Level and were often asking for A*, A and B grades in those subjects.
Mr Sandbach asked about the conditions of the funding for GCSE Maths and English.
The Principal confirmed that any student who did not have Grade C or above in those
subjects was automatically on a re-sit programme for which the College did receive
funding. It was a pre-requisite of the funding that they pass their GCSE and there
would be a retention of funding if they did not. She added that there was only a very
small number of students at the College who needed to re-sit either Maths or English
GCSE.
(ii)
SFCA Proposals for reform of Professional Standards Payments
Mr Sumner said that there was currently a nationally agreed pay scale for teachers and
support staff which was agreed by the SFCA and the Unions. Teachers were appointed
to a six-point pay scale and received an automatic incremental pay rise each year.
Once they reached the top of their scale they had to apply for PSP and had to
demonstrate that they had met certain standards in order to qualify for that payment.
There was a feeling that the process was not robust enough and that the standards
required to qualify for PSP were not high enough.
The SFCA had come up with a different approach which had the benefits of linking pay
with performance and appraisal. There would be no automatic progression through the
pay scales apart from NQT’s moving up at the end of their first year. The SFCA’s
proposal also had the benefit that some pay scales would change which would make the
lower pay scales more attractive. There were a few scales where pay would reduce and
the College would need to protect the pay of teacher’s who were affected by that for
one year. Governors questioned why the protection was not for three years and Mr
Sumner said that, subject to satisfactory performance, all staff would move up on their
pay scales after one year and would then be earning more than without the need for pay
protection.
The SFCA would be asking colleges to vote on the proposals at their AGM the
following week. Across the sector as a whole, the proposals would be cost neutral.
However, within that there were “winners and losers” and there had been a mixed
response across the sector because the proposals came with a cost for a number of
colleges.
The proposals would mean an additional cost of £20,000 for the College which would
start in September 2015. The College had 14FTE teachers who would receive a pay
rise if the proposals were introduced. Governors asked if the vote on the proposals
would be binding across all colleges and the Principal confirmed that they would be.
She added that the proposals would allow the College to define “satisfactory”
performance for teachers at the College and they would need to achieve a Value Added
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score of 4 in the majority of their teaching groups in order to qualify for the additional
payments.
Mr Sumner said that whatever the outcome of the vote was, there is a huge benefit in
nationally agreed pay negotiations. He said that if it was introduced in September 2015
there would be practical issues in terms of timing that the College would need to
resolve.
The Principal said that the proposals would be a good cultural shift for teachers. It
would also allow the College the flexibility to reward excellent teachers by moving
them up the scale at a pace set by the College.
b.
To consider updates to other Strategic Planning and/or Financial Forecasting
information
All financial issues were covered under other agenda items.
c.
To recommend the approval of the annual financial statements
Overview
Mr Sumner said that several figures were missing in the summary document under
performance against financial targets. These figures were:
Cash days in hand – 128.5 (Target >45)
External debt to annual income – 37.2% (Target <40%)
Borrowing Costs to Income – 2.29% (Target <7%)
Revenue Reserves to Income – 44.4% (Target >10%)
Mr Oulton asked if the External Debt to Annual Income figure was lower than it had
been last year. Mr Sumner confirmed that that figure was reducing. He said that there
might be different figures in the financial forecast as there had been a change in the
way the College accounted for some of its income. He said that all targets had been
met and there had been a surplus at the end of the year compared with a deficit which
had originally been forecast.
In cash terms, the College was slightly better off. The operating cash flow had reduced
but was still over £350,000.
Income overall had reduced by 1.3% and the number of students at the College had
increased by 4.8%.
Report and Financial Statements
The report was in the standard format and mirrors the wording in the model set of
accounts. Mr Sumner said that it was now a requirement of the Charities Commission
that the College put a copy of the accounts on its website.
Pages 17 and 18 detailed that there had been a clean audit report on both regularity and
the trueness and fairness of the figures. There were no unadjusted errors in the
accounts.
Mr Sumner said that the Pension Liability figures on the balance sheet would only have
any affect if the scheme were to be closed down. There were several actuarial
assumptions within the figures and those were detailed on page 24 of the Report and
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Accounts.
The net debt had reduced due to the fact that the College had paid off some of its loan.
The AoC had issued an addendum regarding the Teachers’ Pension which was included
in the Accounts. Mr Sumner said that he would talk to Mr Benson regarding some
changes to the wording of that but there would be no change to the numbers.
Resolved that the Annual Financial Statements be recommended to the Board for
approval.
6.
PRINCIPAL’S REPORTING ITEMS
PART B – SMT RISK MANAGEMENT CONTROL REPORT
a.
To receive a report on financial control issues (inc. retention/update on associated
funding for 2014/15
The Principal said that an audit would be carried out of student hours, the result of
which would be fed back to both Curriculum & Quality and Policy & Resources so that
governors could be assured that students are doing the relevant number of hours in
order to be classified as full time.
The College currently had 24 students who would be 19 by the end of the programme.
The change in terms of funding last year would mean that the College would receive
17.5% less funding in respect of those students. Mr Sumner said that that needed to be
included into the financial model so that full funding was not assumed for every
student.
b.
To receive a report on other operational review items (inc. Quality Assurance, Premises
and Equipment
The Principal reported that teachers had been advised to set homework for students in
every lesson to keep them on track. Focus groups were being held with students and
the majority of them confirmed that they were receiving short homework from each
lesson. The Student Governor said that she had experienced an increase in homework
at the beginning of the year but that it was dropping off now. She said that it was
useful to have more work set as it gave guidance as to what students should be
studying. In response to a question from another governor regarding the standard of
marking and feedback on her work the Student Governor confirmed that all homework
was followed up by teachers.
c.
To receive a report on Safeguarding
The Principal said that an internal audit of Safeguarding was due.
The College had been working with the Police as there had been a number of issues
around the canal area. Recently a single girl had been stopped by an adult male as she
walked by the canal. The Police did not appear to be taking the type of action that the
College would like to see. The College had alerted all students to be aware if they were
in that area. Governors were concerned to hear of the recent events and Mrs Hough
said that she would follow the issue up with the Police.
d.
To receive a report on Health and Safety
There was nothing to add to Mr Lupton’s latest report which was included in the latest
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SLT Control minutes.
A Governor said that she had been disappointed in the coverage by the Northwich
Guardian regarding parking on the College’s site. The Principal said that, following
the article, she and Mr Sumner had met with two members of the Professional Drivers’
Consortium. She said that they would stick with the decision not to allow Driving
Instructors to pick up or drop off pupils on site. Apart from the reduced risk of
accidents due to fewer cars being on site, the traffic management had been much better
since the ban and buses were able to leave the site a lot quicker than they had
previously been able to.
7
Policies
a.
To approve the Management of Absence Policy
The Principal said that the revised Management of Absence policy was a significant
shift. It mirrored the good practice which had been taking place in Hartford High
School. It also mirrored the Disciplinary Policy and absence would now eventually
evoke disciplinary procedures.
A Governor asked if the policy would be worked through if a colleague was off sick.
The Principal said that it was not worked through in the same way but that they do
make a judgement on the colleague’s return to work about how to manage their return.
If someone was off due to a serious illness or an operation they would manage the
situation carefully and situations would be handled differently depending on the reason
for the absence.
Resolved that the Management of Absence policy be recommended for approval.
b.
To approve the Financial Regulations
Mr Sumner said that there were no major changes but that details such as titles,
authorised signatories, EU procurement thresholds and bank details had been updated.
Mr Sumner said that he had looked at the model Financial Regulations that CIPFA had
produced with universities in mind. He said that the College’s Financial Regulations
had become more detailed over the years as auditors had wanted more in them but that
he would like to condense it to a more high level document. He said that there should
not then be the requirement to change the document so often.
Resolved that the Financial Regulations be approved.
8.
ANY OTHER BUSINESS
Copies of a document from the Education Funding Agency on Sixth Form College
financial key performance indicators had been distributed. Mr Sumner had reviewed
the document and said that governors had already received all the information in
various other documents.
The benchmarking information showed the number of colleges in each financial
category. It showed the decline in the number of outstanding colleges and the shift that
had happened from outstanding to good.
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10.
DATE AND TIME OF NEXT MEETING
4th February, 2015 at 2.30 pm
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