Newsletter

Welcome to our summer 2011 newsletter
The dust is settling on school budgets, with capital cuts biting hardest but significant variation between schools on revenue budgets. Some are slightly ahead of last year but others are having to face tough decisions on staffing levels.

The Pupil Premium is one of the Government’s answers to closing the attainment gap, so schools who had hoped to add this funding to general budgets may find themselves being called to account further down the road. Ensuring good access to learning technologies at home, as well as at school, has been identified as one of the practical ways that the attainment gap can be reduced. Schools that deploy their Pupil Premium to support home access will be doing so on the basis of sound evidence.

Schools to be judged on how they spend their Pupil Premium
New league tables are planned to monitor what schools are using their Pupil Premium funding for and what impact it is having on the attainment gap. From September 2012 schools will have to publish online what they are doing with their funding.

In a response to a question recently put to Lord Hill in the House of Lords about what evaluation of the impact of the Pupil Premium was planned, he responded that “schools are best placed to decide how to support their most deprived pupils and that the Pupil Premium will be spent by them in ways that they judge to be most effective”.

The Minister also confirmed that league tables are being set up to monitor the impact of the Pupil Premium. They will show for each school how exam or test results of pupils who attract the Pupil Premium differ from the other pupils.

And from September 2012 schools will be required to publish on-line how they are spending the Pupil Premium so parents and others can see how well the school is closing the gap and how they are doing it.

Lord Hill stated that the Department will make evidence available that helps schools know which interventions are effective in supporting the achievement of pupils from deprived backgrounds. The e-Learning Foundation will also provide links to relevant research including the Institute of Fiscal Studies study to help schools make decisions based on the evidence.

The good news is that as the Department has delegated all decision making on how to spend their budgets to schools, Headteachers would appear to be free to use their Pupil Premium funds to ensure that every pupil has access to the learning technologies they need, when and where they need them. This means not just those on Free School Meals but all children, including those children in low income working families caught in the benefits trap. 

Spring conference success
Our Spring Conference took place on May 25th in London with a tremendous reception. We were very lucky to have such a powerful line up of speakers and delegates were treated to some inspiring worlds and motivating demonstrations.
Highlights of the presentations and links to some of the videos they used are now available on our website.
> View the highlights

Autumn Conference launched
Our Autumn Conference is entitled 'Closing the attainment gap'. This time we are heading for Manchester and the excellently equipped Manchester Conference Centre just a 5min walk from Manchester Piccadilly station.
As always we are putting together a top line-up of speakers who will look at exactly how ICT can make a significant impact in the quest to close the gap.
> Read more

Home Access Awards 2011 launched
Two new categories have been introduced to the e-Learning Foundation's Home Access Awards for 2011; Primary School Teacher of the Year and Secondary School Teacher of the Year. Both of these categories will allow us to recognise teachers that have fully embraced the opportunities that fully integrated ICT can offer. The criteria can be found on our website along with full details of all the other categories and the entry form.
> Visit the Awards page

Volunteers join the team
The e-Learning Foundation has kicked off a pilot working with volunteer “Digital Champions” who will represent the Foundation in their own local community. Initially operating in the South East under the watchful eye of School Liaison Manager Ken Holloway three volunteers have received their induction and training and are raring to go. An excellent response to a national invitation for volunteers means we are well poised to roll out the scheme nationwide once we have ironed out any operational issues.

Grant Update
In our latest grant round applications were received from 40 schools requesting £158,000 of funding. The grants committee, which includes Professor Diana Laurillard of the Institute of Education and Lord Knight, former Schools Minister, felt that 38 of them met the Foundation’s criteria and awarded £139,000 in grants.

The value of all the projects in total was £2.5m of which only £578k was coming from school budgets. The largest element by far was from parental contributions at £1.8m. This is a great example of the Big Society with local schools and their communities of parents working together to ensure local children have excellent learning support at home as well as in the classroom.

Open days are declared open!
The first of our series of school Open Days kicked off at Writhlington School in Somerset on June 16th.

These Open Days are run by schools that have an established programme giving visitors a unique opportunity to see a programme in action and talk to the team that developed it. Not only will you have a presentation from the key players and the local School Liaison Manager but you will also be able to see how the teaching staff and pupils have embraced the opportunities that 1:1 provision provides.

> Read more

Time to affiliate
All affiliations expired at the end of March and schools have now been sent a renewal notice inviting them to renew their affiliattion or sign up for the first time.

Along with the advice and support from our School Liaison Team, affiliation brings with it access to supplier offers, including a means of keeping families online whose Home Access internet is about to run out, discounted conference rates and of course an opportunity to apply for a grant. For a very modest sum your school can benefit from all of these services – and help the e-Learning Foundation to continue to offer its services.
> Affiliate now