ITEM CH10 CHILDREN’S SERVICES SCRUTINY COMMITTEE – 22 MAY 2007 FULL TIME ADMISSION FOR RECEPTION AGED FOUR YEAR OLDS Report by Director for Children Young People & Families Introduction 1. Oxfordshire schools are funded to offer half-time places for children from the September after their fourth birthday until the term after their fifth birthday, when the funding becomes full time. The current position of part-time admission generates an increasing number of complaints from parents on the grounds of quality and equity. Oxfordshire County Council has undertaken a cost benefit analysis on proposals to change the current admission arrangements to offer full time education to all reception aged pupils. As part of this process the Council commissioned an independent survey of the views of parents on this issue. It has also undertaken full consultation with other stakeholders such as schools and private, voluntary and independent early years settings. A report to Cabinet on 20 June will give a full analysis of consultation responses so that it can make a decision on whether to implement a change to full-time from January 2009. As the consultation is not concluded at the time of writing this report for Scrutiny, an update of headline results and officers' likely recommendations to Cabinet will be reported verbally/tabled at the meeting on 22nd May. A summary of the parental survey is included at Annex 1 (download as .doc file).. 2. What would a change in admission arrangements to full time mean in practice? Impact for Children In many schools children already attend school full time for the whole or part of the reception (F1) year. In January 2007, 97.5% of children in this age group were already in maintained or independent schools and only 2.5% (164 children) were in private or voluntary settings. Of the children attending school 75% were already attending school full-time. It is not compulsory for children to attend school before they are 5. If preferred children under 5 years old can stay in a private or voluntary sector pre-school. The proposed change would not affect the right of parents to defer entry until the term after their child’s 5th birthday. There is little research around the benefits of full time versus part time attendance at school in the reception year. However the national Effective Provision of Pre-School Education (EPPE) research programme shows that the quality of provision is generally better when there is a qualified teacher involved and where care and education is combined in one centre. At the moment schools in Oxfordshire do very different things. Those schools that take only part-time 4 year olds often do so because they can only afford to employ part-time staff for part of the year. This means that there is a high turnover of staff and lack of continuity for children. If children were funded full time it would help schools maintain high standards and provide a more stable staffing structure with continuity of relationships for the children. Impact for Parents The current policy leads to a considerable number of complaints and has been highlighted as in need of review in the Local Authority Annual Performance Assessment (APA) in 2006. Under the current policy schools offer different packages of provision to this age range which impacts on parental choice. Some schools offer full time places as ‘childcare’ and charge for these places – but this leads to complaints that a child’s early years entitlement in these schools is subject to parents’ ability to pay. The current policy is very difficult for working parents whose children have to move from full-time day care to a part-time place at schools. An independent survey of parents has been undertaken by Oxfordshire Research Agency to ascertain parental views on the proposal. Over 80 % of parents supported the proposal. A full copy of the parental survey report is available in the Members’ Resource Centre and a summary is attached at Annex 1 (download as .doc file). Impact on SchoolsMany schools are already offering full time places to reception-aged children before they are 5. In January 2007 over 75% of children in the reception year were attending school full time. However, currently schools are only given part-time funding for children who attend full-time before they are five. This means that the provision is subsidized from the rest of the school budget. Those schools that cannot afford to make this subsidy are often in the position of having to employ additional staff for part of the year. This disrupts continuity for children and an age where relationships with staff are critical to children’s learning and development. The cost of implementing full-time admissions, based on current funding arrangements would be an additional £5.3 million. Additional Dedicated Schools Grant from the government would generate £4.2million of this funding. Most schools would stand to gain significantly from increased resources due to the additional full-time pupils. However a few schools would stand to lose funding – for example if they do not currently admit reception aged (F1) four year olds. Work is currently being undertaken to assess the impact on a school-by-school basis and to model the possible formula for redistribution of the available budget. Overall there would be significantly more in the pot to distribute and many schools are currently already offering full-time places without any additional resources. This will form part of a formula review in conjunction with the finance working group of the schools forum As most schools are providing full time education for all reception year children by the summer term, it is unlikely that there would be significant implications for use of school buildings and outdoor areas. A recent survey of all primary schools has confirmed this although a few individual cases are still to be followed up. Impact on Private, Voluntary and Independent Settings Oxfordshire has a high level of private, voluntary and independent provision (345 non-maintained settings supported by our advisory and development teams). The following table shows the number of reception aged (F1) children in the private, voluntary and independent sector in 2005/6. The independent sector is also recorded although these providers are unlikely to be significantly affected by any change in admission policy.
Source: Summer
and Spring data: termly extract EMS A change to full time admission is likely to mean that some parents would send their children to school at the beginning of the school year and fewer would defer their take up of a school place. This would impact on the funding of those settings especially in the autumn term. However the numbers in private and voluntary sectors are relatively small and spread across a large number of settings. The change is therefore unlikely to impact significantly on sustainability of places overall. In order to minimize the impact and to continue to give choice to parents, the full-time admissions proposal will extend the scheme for full-time funding to children in the private and voluntary sector, for those children whose parents defer take up of the place offered at school. Therefore, if the proposal is approved, the nursery education funding scheme would be changed to allow setting to claim funding for children who defer take up of a place on the same basis as those in schools – eg for up to 10 sessions a week rather than the current maximum of 5. This, together with the business and sustainability support offered through the Early Learning and Childcare Services should lessen the impact even further and ensure overall sustainability of provision. There would be an additional impact on those settings currently providing wrap around childcare for children in this year group who currently attend half time in schools. In the autumn term (2006) 359 children attended an average of 2.8 wraparound sessions per week in 86 settings. In the spring term this number had dropped to 217 children in 57 settings. A large number of these are accounted for by the County’s Partnership Foundation Stage Units. Where a formal partnership arrangement exists, schools and settings would be encouraged to continue with existing systems which already involve a qualified teacher and close partnership with the school. A system of split funding for children attending this type of provision could be developed to support this. 3. Options and Risks
4. Financial ImplicationsThe cost of implementing full-time admissions, based on current funding arrangements would be an additional £5.3 million. £4.2million of this funding would be generated by additional DSG attracted through increased numbers in the January PLASC (Pupil level annual school census) returns. The rest would need to be found through redistribution of current resources within the DSG. Most schools would stand to gain significantly from increased resources due to the additional full time pupils. However some schools would stand to lose some funding – mostly the 4 Junior schools or schools that do not admit children until they are 5. The picture would also change for the Voluntary Aided schools if they adopted the County Admission policy as a result of the change. Work is currently being undertaken to assess the impact on a school by school basis. The
earliest that any changes could be implemented would be January 2009.
As the DSG in any financial year is calculated on the PLASC pupil numbers
return and the Early Years Census of the preceding January, the children
would need to be in school full time in January in order to attract the
funding. However there would be a shortfall in the year of
implementation and timing is critical. Capital As most schools are providing full time for all reception year children by the summer term, it is unlikely that there would be significant capital implications. A recent survey of all primary schools has confirmed this. Implementation dates could coincide with new primary capital programme funding. TransportWhilst a change to full time admissions might generate more demands for support for transport for children prior to compulsory school age, the legal requirements and potential demand would not be affected by such a change in policy. Organising transport for full-time children is likely to be easier than transporting children at mid-day. 5. Summary and Links to Corporate PrioritiesThe current position of funding children part-time until the term after they are 5 combined with flexibility for schools to admit full-time (resourced from their own budgets) has led to a considerable amount of inconsistency across the County in how the admissions policy is applied. This has a direct impact on the quality and quantity of early education provision for individual children depending on where they live, when they were born, and the school they attend. A change to full-time admission would be in line with the council’s priority for improving real choice. It would also provide value for money by bringing significant additional resources into Oxfordshire schools that would provide greater consistency and higher quality education to the youngest children in schools. It would also create a simplified and more equitable entitlement and reduce the current number of concerns and complaints on this issue from parents. JIM CROOK Background papers: Full time admission consultation documents 2007 Oxford Research Agency survey of parental views 2007 Contact Officer: Annie Davy – Assistant Head, Early Years and Family Support (01865 815493) May 2007
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