School to school support fund Application guidance October 2015
Contents Overview 3 Teaching school alliances 3 National leaders of education 3 Online application 3 Section 1 Applicant school 4 Applicant school criteria 4 Applicant school questions 4 Section 2 Client schools 6 Client school criteria 6 Client school questions 6 2
Overview Teaching school alliances Teaching school alliances can co-ordinate national leaders of education (NLEs), specialist leaders of education (SLEs) and other system leaders to support school improvement. There is no limit to the number of schools that can be nominated to receive support. However, teaching schools must have secured appropriate system leaders to provide support before applying and ensure they have capacity to lead and manage the deployment/s. The teaching school alliance will be accountable for the full amount of funding and the outcomes of the activity for all nominated schools. National leaders of education NLEs can apply for funding for their national support school to provide support to a client school. It is recommended that NLEs applying for funding do not support more than 3 schools. If you are an NLE with capacity to provide support but have not identified any client schools please contact your local teaching and leadership adviser, tla.enquiries@education.gsi.gov.uk or local teaching school alliance, who may be able to broker appropriate links with client schools. Online application You must submit your application online by midday on Friday 27 November. If you want to save and return to your application, you must create an account before you start. We would recommend you draft your application on a Word document so that you can copy and paste your responses into the online application. You cannot return to your application once you have submitted it. The application questions are outlined in this document. Answers requiring free text have an upper limit of 1200 characters. 3
Section 1 Applicant school Applicant school criteria As a school offering support, you should be either: a designated national support school, committed to the client school to support them raise standards or a designated teaching school with capacity to co-ordinate and oversee high quality support to a number of schools from a number of system leaders If your designation is under review by NCTL or likely to be reviewed for reasons that may impact on the successful delivery of the deployment, we may seek further information in order to confirm your capacity to carry out the deployments. If you need to discuss any issues regarding this point prior to submitting your application please contact nle.enquiries@education.gsi.gov.uk. Applicant school questions Declaration Applicants must have signed and returned the collaborative fund terms and conditions. 1. Please enter the unique reference number (URN) for the National Support School (NSS)/Teaching School who is accountable for the delivery of the support. Please ensure you enter this correctly as this will be used to obtain the details of your school. If you do not know the URN you can search for it on the Edubase website. 2. Please confirm that the school name and local authority is correct. Once you have entered the URN the school name and local authority will be shown on the screen. Please tick to confirm that the school name and local authority are correct. If the details shown are not correct please ensure you have entered the correct URN for question 1. 3. How many schools does the national leader of education or teaching school intend to support through this application. Please select the number of client schools for whom you are applying to provide support. You will then be prompted to complete details for each school. It is recommended that an NLE supports no more than 3 schools. 4
There is no limit to the number of schools that teaching schools can apply to support. However, teaching schools must have secured appropriate system leaders to provide support before applying and ensure they have capacity to coordinate and oversee the deployment/s. The teaching school alliance will be accountable for the full amount of funding and the outcomes of the activity for all nominated schools. For applications of more than 10 client schools, please complete an additional application form. 5
Section 2 Client schools Client school criteria Schools receiving support should: be a school judged by Ofsted as requires improvement or an academy judged as requires improvement or inadequate. We will consider applications to support schools and academies with different Ofsted judgements in exceptional circumstances be open to receiving support from an NLE or teaching school to help improve the schools performance not be receiving funding from other sources for similar school improvement purposes, such as funding from an academy sponsor or grants for academy conversion Client school questions 1. Please enter the URN for the client school. Please ensure you enter this correctly as this will be used to obtain the school s details. If you do not know the URN you can search for it on the Edubase website. Please confirm that the school name and Local Authority are correct. Once you have entered the URN the school name and Local Authority will be shown on the screen. Please tick to confirm that the school name and Local Authority are correct. If the details shown are not correct please ensure you have entered the correct URN for question 1. 2. Please provide the email address of the contact at the client school. This will be used for application correspondence. 3. Is the client school receiving or scheduled to receive any other support for school improvement? Yes/No answer required. If yes: 3a. Please provide details of any support the school is receiving or due to be receiving for school improvement. 6
Client schools must not be receiving funding from other sources for similar school improvement purposes, such as funding from an academy sponsor or grants for academy conversion. If you are aware of any other support, please provide details. 4. Did the client school receive support in round 1 or 2 of the school to school support fund in Autumn 2014? Yes/No answer required. If yes: 4a. Please indicate the impact to date of that funding. Please indicate when the deployment started, what impact has been achieved to date and whether the deployment has ended. 4b. Please outline what additional impact will occur as a result of this application? The school to school support fund is to support time-bound, focused, school to school support deployments with clear outcomes to support school improvement. We are not able to fund a deployment for the same school which has the same focus or outcomes as the previous application. 5. Please indicate the name of the system leader accountable for the deployment. If you do not know the name(s) at the time of applying, they must be emailed to nle.enquiries@education.gsi.gov.uk prior to the application round closing. 6. Please provide details of the package of support to be given to the client school. This should include: the number of system leaders, the focus of their work and the number of days support they will provide. All applications should outline the support that will be provided to each client school. This support should help to raise school performance, with specific interventions by system leaders providing a systematic and strategic approach to school improvement that addresses the latest Ofsted findings. The support provided should not include access to continuing professional development (CPD) and leadership programmes which already attract grant funding. This would be assessed as double funding and the application therefore declined. 7
Access to generic CPD programmes should only be included if there is a clear indication that the client school is not in a position to release staff. The client school should consider whether they are able to supplement school to school support funding in order to cover the cost of generic CPD programmes in the normal way. The school to school support should focus on providing support over and above these programmes. Declaration that the head and governing body of the client school have agreed to receive support and are aware of this application. System leaders applying to support a school must gain agreement from the client school prior to submitting the application. 7. What are the circumstances of this school that make it a priority for receiving support? All client schools should meet the client school criteria. We ask for school performance data in a later question but any additional information about the school s circumstances which are relevant to the application should be outlined here, so that NCTL can prioritise funding to those schools most in need. 8. Who identified the school as requiring support? You will be asked to select all that apply from the following: Regional Schools Commissioner Teaching Schools Council Representative Teaching School Alliance Local Authority Diocese NCTL Teaching and Leadership Advisor Self-referred by Client School NLE/TSA identified Client School Other - please provide details on who identified the school as requiring support. 9. Please select which model of support is applicable for this client school. From the delivery models illustrated below, please select which is applicable to the client school listed in your application. If you are unsure which model to choose please email nle.enquiries@education.gsi.gov.uk. 8
Model 1: One teaching school or national support school is applying to provide support for up to 10 client schools. The focus of support and intended outcomes for each client school is specific to that school. Model 2: One teaching school or national support school is applying to provide support for up to 10 client schools. The focus of support and intended outcomes is the same for each client school and the teaching school or national support school will work with these schools as a group. You will need to provide information about all client schools to be supported in this model, as not all schools may be prioritised for funding. Model 3: A strategic lead has coordinated a number of teaching schools or national support schools to deliver support to a number of client schools (eg a TSA has coordinated an approach across the locality). Each teaching school or national support school must submit an application for the client school they are supporting. The focus and outcomes for each client school are specific to each school. 9
If you select model 3, please indicate the name of the strategic lead in the box provided. 10. Is the client school an academy? Yes/No answer required. If yes: 10a. Does the regional schools commissioners endorse the application? We would advise NLEs / teaching schools applying to support academies to have a conversation with the regional schools commissioner prior to submitting an application. 10b. Is the academy part of a national chain? Yes/No answer required. If yes, please provide the name of the chain. Please provide the official name of the chain. 10c. Is the client school within your own academy chain? Yes/No answer required. 10d. If the client school is one with which there is an existing formal arrangement (this may be as part of a multi-academy trust, another type of trust or a partnership agreement) please provide a summary of why this support is not covered within the existing terms of that agreement? Please outline existing provision for school improvement within the trust, and the additional support that school-to-school support fund will provide. 11. As far as you know at this stage, what are the intended outcomes and 10
impact for this deployment and over what timescale? The school to school support fund supports time-bound, focused, deployments with clear outcomes to support school improvement. The intended outcomes should be clear, measurable and evidence-based. 12. How do you intend to monitor and evaluate progress and impact of the deployment? Successful applicants will be asked to report back on their impact against their intended outcomes in summer 2016 and summer 2017 as part of the NCTL collaborative fund evaluation process. Please outline how you will monitor the impact of your work and when. 13. Please indicate the anticipated start date of the deployment All deployments should start early 2016. 14. Please select the amount of funding you are requesting. We will determine the level of funding to be awarded based on the described support activity and planned impact. Consideration will be given in instances where you are applying to support client schools outside your own region which may incur additional travel costs. If you are submitting a bid as per model 2, for your first client school, select the total amount of funding you are applying for to support all the schools and select 0 when you complete section 2 for the remaining schools. 15. Please select the key stage(s) of the client school that the support will focus on. You will see the below option and you will be able to select multiple options: KS1 KS2 KS4 KS5 N/A If N/A is selected: Please outline the context for the client school and any relevant performance measures. Please provide any information that will assist us in prioritising applications. 16. Please provide the latest key stage data requested below for the client school you are currently applying for. 11
You will be asked to provide school performance data based on your selections in question 15. Key Stage 1 % of pupils achieving level 2 or above in reading* % of pupils achieving level 2 or above in writing* % of pupils achieving level 2 or above in maths* Key Stage 2 % of pupils achieving level 4+ in reading, maths test and writing* % of pupils making expected progress at the end of KS2 in reading* % of pupils making expected progress at the end of KS2 in writing* % of pupils making expected progress at the end of KS2 in maths* Key Stage 4 % of pupils achieving 5+ A*-C GCSEs (or equivalent) including English and maths GCSEs* % of pupils making expected progress at the end of KS4 in English* % of pupils making expected progress at the end of KS4 in maths* Key Stage 5 % achieving 2+ A levels A*-E* % achieving 3+ A levels A*-E* Average point score per A level student (incl FT equivalent)* Average point score per A level entry (inc FT equivalent)* Your details Please provide the name of the NLE or Teaching School Lead responsible for this application. Please provide the email address of NLE or Teaching School Lead. This will be used for contacting you about your application and informing you of its outcome. Are you the NLE or Teaching School Lead responsible for this application? If you reply no, please complete the details for the NLE or Teaching School Lead: Name of NLE or Teaching School Lead responsible for this application Email address of NLE or Teaching School Lead 12
You are now ready to submit your application... In order for your application to be put forward for assessment you must submit your application by clicking the submit button. Once you have completed your application and clicked on submit, a copy of your application will be sent to the email address you have nominated. 13
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