Staffing Structures

Effective management and deployment of support staff

scameron — Sat, 30 Aug 2008 10:20:52 +0100

In most schools, the role of the business manager includes responsibility for the management of a wide range of support staff. Since the advent of workforce remodelling, however, support staff teams have grown at a rapid rate, sometimes even equalling or exceeding teaching staff numbers.

The role of the SENCO in improving ECM outcomes

admin — Sat, 30 Aug 2008 10:20:49 +0100

The Department for Children, Schools and Families (DCSF) along with the Training and Development Agency for Schools (TDA) are working together to enhance the SENCO role, enabling them to be a member of the senior leadership team. The recent findings of the Independent Study into School Leadership indicated that only 16% of SENCOs were members of the senior leadership team. In addition, as a result of the extended school initiative, some SENCOs were becoming inclusion managers, accountable to the director for ECM in school.

School business managers: Building your professional profile

jlee — Sat, 30 Aug 2008 10:20:46 +0100

IN THREE PREVIOUS articles in School Financial Management, we have discussed opportunities that would prepare a school business manager or bursar for even more senior leadership roles in schools. There has been a focus upon building knowledge of teaching and learning, among other things. We also suggested that a greater involvement in the working of the school more generally will make any school business manager or bursar more effective in their current role.

Facing the challenges of HR management

jlee — Sat, 30 Aug 2008 10:20:44 +0100

I find it incredible that the area of my work that takes up most of my time as a headteacher is seldom discussed. Human resource (HR) issues often dominate large chunks of my day to almost the total exclusion of all other things. These may include situations such as industrial tribunals, formal grievance procedures, informal grievance procedures, competency procedures, absence procedure interviews or timely warning meetings.

Balancing workloads and creating staffing structures for the future

admin — Sat, 30 Aug 2008 10:20:42 +0100

Starting work as a business manager in a large secondary school just a few years ago, not having worked in the education sector previously, presented a new challenge – one that I was extremely enthusiastic about. I was particularly attracted by the diverse nature of the role, being aware that it had undergone huge change over the years, its scope and size increasing dramatically to include a whole host of areas of responsibility including finance, human resources, premises, administration, income generation, catering and contract management.

Speaking school finances: support staff

jlee — Sat, 30 Aug 2008 10:20:25 +0100

By Ruth Bradbury

A friend of mine, a qualified and experienced accountant, was recently lucky enough to be appointed as a business manager at a high school recruiting for the post for the first time.

The selection process was rigorous; the competition was stiff and, on the day of the interviews, the headteacher and governors were keen to put across what an important strategic role they had created.

Making the most of your TAs

jlee — Sat, 30 Aug 2008 10:20:23 +0100

Teaching assistants can provide valuable help to hard-pressed teachers – if only they are used properly. Unfortunately this is not always the case. Young, inexperienced teachers can find it difficult organising other adults within the classroom especially while they are trying to find their feet in their first job. After all, the teaching assistant will probably know more about the class than they do! While some teachers who have been around for longer regard the teaching assistant as just a pair of hands to do the dogsbody work or help out a particular child.

Teachers' relationships in the workplace

jlee — Sat, 30 Aug 2008 10:20:22 +0100

In his British secondary school-based research of the 1970s, Andy Hargreaves drew attention to a little mentioned or understood aspect of schools. This was that ‘the social relationships of teachers form an important part of being a teacher...’ and also that ‘[their] impact upon the teacher constitutes one of the most significant gaps in our knowledge of the social processes within the school.’

TDA Futures project: the future of education

ewtemp — Sat, 30 Aug 2008 10:20:21 +0100

Suppose, instead of educating children and young people for today’s world, we look ahead to the time when they become adults and set our sights on that – on a world perhaps 10 years away from ours, perhaps even 20? What kind of education will be needed then? What sort of curriculum, schools, teachers...?

Leaving the scene: but the play must go on

admin — Sat, 30 Aug 2008 10:20:13 +0100

‘From now on [choosing my successor] is the most important decision I’ll make. It occupies a considerable amount of thought every day.’

Jack Welch, CEO General Electric, nine years before his retirement. Quoted by Collins and Porras.

What every school business manager needs to know

admin — Sat, 30 Aug 2008 10:20:10 +0100

The role of the school business/ finance manager is a hugely complex and responsible one but – until recently at least – there has been little acknowledgement of the demands of the post, or any framework or guidance to help newly or recently appointed individuals.

Performance management: all change?

admin — Sat, 30 Aug 2008 10:20:09 +0100

I don’t want to frighten anyone by using those two emotive words – ‘more change’ – but the Rewards and Incentives Group (RIG) have consulted and are proposing to alter how schools use performance management. Changes should be in place by autumn 2007, so let’s try to get ahead of the game.

Leading an early years team

admin — Sat, 30 Aug 2008 10:19:58 +0100

‘One can never consent to creep when one feels an impulse to soar.’
(Helen Keller, quoted in Vos, J, and Dryden,G [1999] The Learning Revolution, p368 )

Manx-style: a view from across the water

admin — Sat, 30 Aug 2008 10:19:52 +0100

After 15 years of teaching in large, multicultural comprehensive schools in London, I obtained my first headship at a rural comprehensive on the Isle of Man. This meant not only adjusting to the obvious differences between large urban schools and a smaller rural one but also learning the ropes of a different education system with its own acronyms and laws.

How has the role of deputy head changed?

admin — Sat, 30 Aug 2008 10:19:52 +0100

I have been a deputy headteacher for some 20 years, serving in two different schools and working with three different headteachers. Then and now the role is both a privilege and a considerable challenge, but the role I fulfil now bears very little comparison to that which I took on 20 years ago.

Headship and the teaching conundrum

admin — Sat, 30 Aug 2008 10:19:51 +0100

The role of the headteacher is extremely complex, encompassing a wide range of responsibilities. As we develop into an ever more litigious society, it could be argued that the responsibilities have become too onerous – hence the large number of unfilled headteacher vacancies.

The challenges facing independent schools

admin — Sat, 30 Aug 2008 10:19:51 +0100

There is a perception in some areas of the press – and indeed the wider public – that independent schools are wealthy institutions, with acres of land and massive assets which radiate elitism of a type it is popular to mock. As such, they should be viewed with suspicion and possibly envy.

Supply teaching: from the outside looking in

admin — Sat, 30 Aug 2008 10:19:51 +0100

Retirement for me has meant several sea changes; some of them, like an Eccles cake in the morning and listening to Humphrey Lyttleton shows on internet radio, seem utterly decadent; some have been about earning money to top up the pension. The chief earner is supply teaching, which seems, incidentally, to net about £110 daily.

Equipping the workforce: role of SENCOs

admin — Sat, 30 Aug 2008 10:19:49 +0100

The report notes that the DfES has placed a great many responsibilities on the shoulders of SENCOs but has not ensured that SENCOs are always given the appropriate training – or the appropriate authority – to be able to undertake these significant responsibilities.

The staffing structure review: the philosophy, rules and reality

admin — Sat, 30 Aug 2008 10:19:36 +0100

As a headteacher of a secondary school, and also as an external adviser to other governing bodies, I know that the one task which has been occupying us all over the past few months has been the statutory review of the staffing structure. Having been involved in workforce reform for the past couple of years, few of us could have been totally surprised by the DfES initiative to force schools to take a tough look at the staffing structure to ensure that teachers focus on teaching and learning and support staff take on administrative duties.

DCSF wants all SENCOs to be qualified teachers

admin — Sat, 30 Aug 2008 10:19:31 +0100

The document also outlines progress towards developing nationally accredited training for newly appointed SENCOs.

These proposals are in response to the Education and Skills Select Committee report on SEN in July 2006, which recorded a number of concerns in relation to SENCOs:

The role of the gifted and talented coordinator

admin — Sat, 30 Aug 2008 10:19:28 +0100

The job description looks great doesn’t it? ‘Teacher needed to work with bright, motivated, able pupils to celebrate learning and to oversee opportunities for extra curricular excellence’. Who, in the daily grind of detentions, homework chases and teenage mood swings, wouldn’t want to be a part of that?

Speaking school finances: support staff

admin — Sat, 30 Aug 2008 10:19:20 +0100

By Ruth Bradbury

Reviewing the school staffing and pay structure

admin — Sat, 30 Aug 2008 10:19:19 +0100

Few headteachers will need reminding that the review and future planning of their school’s staffing has to be completed by the end of December. Time is disappearing fast!
In summary, this is what has to happen before January 2006 in the new planning structure:

Staffing structures now at formal consultation stage

admin — Sat, 30 Aug 2008 10:19:18 +0100

Headteachers were expected to present governing bodies with draft structures during September so that the review process could remain on target for completion by December 31 – the deadline for governing bodies to have the new structure and a plan for its implementation in place.

There will be a transition period of three years, by the end of which all changes to schools’ staffing arrangements must be fully implemented.