School Admin News

May I offer a thank you to everyone who wrote in about the BBC question on the use of apostrophes. I am sorry I haven’t been able to reply to everyone individually, but I would like to say that I have read all the comments with much interest.

I think the overall point is whether one takes the question to have within it every piece of information necessary, or whether one assumes that people who set exam questions are sometimes slap-dash and don’t incorporate into the question every piece of information needed.

I think my rebellious tendencies lead me to think that sometimes question writers make assumptions – but of course I do recognise that the view that the question is utterly complete in itself in terms of the amount of information needed to find one, and only one, correct answer is what was intended.

Apostrophes are always a problem. The predictive text on my mobile phone finds it very hard to accept that I might ever want to write the word “ill” and insists on changing “David is ill” into the nonsensical “David is I’ll”.

Again thanks to everyone for the interest in the topic. I’ll (I will) try to ensure that the next topic is as gripping.
Tony Attwood
Director, School of Educational Management and Administration

For many of us who work in a school office there can be many areas of the work that can cause problems, not to say a certain amount of stress.

To help resolve these issues we have created a course in Work Management and Administration which focuses on three areas that many of our colleagues have reported as sometimes becoming problematic.

The three areas are:

• Time Management
• Stress Management
• Dealing with School Visitors.

It is often the case that where one person seems to be able to manage all the workload without worry or stress, another might regularly find that the working day is just too short to get things done

It is also the case that two people doing the same job can have totally different reactions to it – one finding that the work is the cause of stress and another finding this is not so.

So in this course we ask, how can this be the case? What makes a job stressful for one person and not another? How can one organise one’s time in such a way that everything is done on time, and done without generating stress.

And then there is that very special issue – dealing with visitors. The course explores why visitors can cause friction, and how parents can bring in a complaint and express it to the school office, even though there is no one there who can deal with the complaint.

The course looks at ways of turning confrontational meetings to your advantage, the whole issue of complaints and the ways in which language can be used.

The programme is taught by distance learning (which means you don’t have to take any time off to attend seminars, etc).

The next intake for this two-month distance learning course (which is one module of the full National Certificate course) starts on 10 June with registration required by 3 June. If you think that you or any of your colleagues would be interested in this course please contact us or click on the links below for further information.

• To see the prospectus on line click here
• To request a printed prospectus click here, or phone 01536 399 007
• For more information click here
• For an application form click here

What makes one school efficient and another not? What allows one school to locate a range of areas where money or time can be saved while other schools conclude that there are no real savings to be made?

Three years ago the School of Educational Administration and Management started to investigate the phenomena that some schools can find savings and others cannot – and we quickly realised that there are savings that can be made in every school.

The problem is not related to whether the school has some areas of inefficiency – for every organisation has that. Rather the key lies in the way in which the inefficiencies are rooted out and the way in which new procedures are implemented.

The Certificate in School Efficiency course digs into this issue and presents the answers – not just the answers arrived at by the course team, but also by many of the administrators, managers and teachers who have themselves undertaken projects as part of the course.

Students complete activities relating to efficiency and conclude the course by proposing or reporting on an actual project that is relevant to their school.

Students are also sent a selection of comments made by those who have taken the course previously, a range of efficiency projects that other students have taken and a course manual with supplements supplied on line.

The course is taught on line and takes two months. Intakes for students occur throughout the year, including some dates which allow the course to run through a school term and others which allow students to work on the course through school holiday periods.

• For more information click here
• To see the prospectus click here
• For an application form click here

If you have any staff who would be interested in this course please call the SEAM on 01536 399 007.
Tony Attwood
Director, School of Educational Management and Administration

I’d like to arrange for a box of chocolates to be sent to you completely free of charge.

It’s rather a nice box of chocolates and one that, even if you are not a chocolate eater yourself, almost certainly will be appreciated by anyone to whom you pass it on.

Of course, since there is never such a thing as a free lunch (not that I am suggesting you eat chocolates for lunch) I am going to ask you to do something for me in return.

It will take you no more than two minutes, and it involves looking at a very short questionnaire.

The whole process is straightforward, and you’ll hardly notice you have undertaken it. You end up by telling us whom to send the box of chocs to, and lo and behold, it is all done.

I do hope you (or at least someone you know) likes chocolates.

Here’s the link to get going: http://www.surveymonkey.com/s/StationerySurveyApril

Increasingly companies are supplying free resources and free information services to school managers and administrators via websites and emails. Indeed this news service (through which you are receiving this message) is one such free service providing information here and on our website.

This sort of approach is obviously a good thing in that the issues, ideas and lesson plans are provided free of charge and without using any paper based resources or the postal system with its reliance on consumables.

But there is such a multiplicity of email and internet systems that I thought it would be helpful to find out what is being used.

So here are two questions. There’s no form to fill in – if you just answer by emailing my colleague Laura@hamilton-house.com we’ll collate the answers and hopefully ensure you can see everything we send out as we want it to be seen!

1. What browser do you use to access the internet (e.g. Firefox, Internet Explorer, Chrome, or….)
2. What email system do you use (e.g. Windows Mail, Outlook Express, Outlook, Mozilla Thunderbird…)

That’s all. I’ll post the results later, in case you are interested in what your colleagues are using.

Many thanks

Tony Attwood

The number of organisations that have been fined by the Information Commissioner’s Office increased by more than 200% in the last year.

25 organisations were fined, there were three enforcement notices, six criminal prosecutions and 31 “undertakings” issued.

Data security breaches are the most common failure – and something that is a significant issue in schools.

Schools and colleges are very much on the ICO’s radar and my own experience (when a school inadvertently added my office to their email list, leading to my getting a lot of highly personal data which I should never have had) is that some schools are still very slow at dealing with issues.

Certainly when I told the school was what happening, I received a reply three days later saying “we’ll look into it”. It actually took three weeks to get the security leak fixed.

The ICO have guidelines for schools – details are to be found on this link…

http://www.ico.org.uk/for_organisations/sector_guides/education
Tony Attwood
Director, School of Educational Management and Administration

What would you do if a parent wrote complaining that a classroom was too hot or too cold? Or if, perhaps, one or more of your colleagues was clearly suffering from stress because of the work levels or attitude of colleagues?

The chances are that such problems would end up on your desk. And yet it is quite possible for such matters to be handled by your senior administrator.

Many schools have, over the last five years, used the Certificate in School Administration course from the School of Educational Administration and Management as a way of helping administrative colleagues broaden their scope.

This one year, distance learning course covers such topics as models of leadership, budgeting, educational marketing, handling visitors, stress, and so on.

As a result of having a colleague work through this course there is no doubt that the administrator in question will be able to expand his/her duties and take on some of the work that currently goes straight to the senior management of the school.

The School of Educational Administration and Management – an organisation that was initially funded by the Department of Trade and Industry and set up in co-operation with the University of Northampton – has been running this course for over five years now.

Now, responding to changes in the way in which schools are making use of their administrative staff, the whole programme has been fully revised to meet these changes.

There are more details including an online prospectus on http://www.admin.org.uk/certificate%20course.html

If you would like a printed prospectus, or have any queries about the course, please do get in touch either on 01536 399 007 or via email to enquires@admin.org.uk

Finally if you would like to know about the wide range of work in which the SEAM is involved, you will find an index on www.admin.org.uk

Tony Attwood
Director, School of Educational Administration and Management

We have been asked if anyone knows of good Business Continuity Planning training specifically for schools.

I have to admit that when the question came into our office at the SEAM there was some debate as to what Business Continuity Planning (BCP) actually is. So here’s our understanding…

BCP is in fact widely used in business and universities, and for many organisations is seen as an essential part of the organisation’s planning of arrangements in response to a specific, disruptive event.

For a school it would set out how the school will operate following an incident and how it expects to return to ‘business as usual’ in the quickest possible time afterwards.

A BCP need not be specific to a specific incident but should apply to any major disruption such as a fire, flooding, or power fault. With such events it would not only consider where the work of the school could carry on after a fire, but also what would be done about lost books, materials etc.

In school terms it might also apply to such events as:

• The sudden closure of the school due to weather conditions, heating failure or other sudden event
• An event gaining negative publicity such as criminal charges against an employee
• A successful industrial tribunal appeal by a member of staff following the removal of the member of staff after internal disciplinary proceedings
• A serious injury or death of a member of the school on a school trip.

The plan itself sets out the agreed arrangements for bringing events under control, the necessary resources for maintaining critical school functions and the staff required for co-ordinating actions.

If anyone has any information on BCP training we would love to hear from you. Anything we learn will be passed on via this newsletter as usual.
Tony Attwood
Director, School of Educational Management and Administration

What would you do if a parent wrote complaining that a classroom was too hot or too cold? Or if perhaps, you, or one of your colleagues was clearly suffering from stress because of the work levels or attitude of colleagues?

How would you react if you were asked to give more leadership within the administration department? Or if suddenly you were asked to expand your work into an area that you have not undertaken before, such as budgeting or educational marketing?

Although such issues may never have come your way thus far, there is a strong chance that at some time in the next year or two, aspects of your job will change dramatically (if they have not already done so).

I can say this with some certainty, because administration within schools is changing at a dramatic pace.

Indeed, it was because of the nature of this change that we set up the National Certificate in Educational Administration.

This is a one year course taught by distance learning and organised under the auspices of the School of Educational Administration and Management – an organisation that was initially funded by the Department of Trade and Industry and set up in co-operation with the University of Northampton.

The course, which was fully updated and revised at the start of this year, is open to all school administrators within the UK. There are more details including an online prospectus on http://www.admin.org.uk/certificate%20course.html

If you would like a printed prospectus or have any queries about the course please do get in touch either on 01536 399 007 or via email to enquires@admin.org.uk

Finally if you would like to know about the wide range of work in which the SEAM is involved, you will find an index on www.admin.org.uk

Tony Attwood
Director, School of Educational Administration and Management

It is a sad fact of life that many school leases contain errors and omissions. In fact the current estimate is that well over 50% of leases signed by schools contain errors that result in the school paying more than it should.

Where this is as a result of mis-selling then the school may well be entitled to a refund.

That mis-selling exists in the school market has been known for a long time, and it is something that we at the School of Educational Administration and Management have spent a bit of time investigating.

As a result of these investigations we have teamed up with a company that will offer a free audit of all the schools’ past and current leases. Then, if any error is found in the lease, the company will negotiate a suitable refund for the school.

Better still, the investigating company only takes a commission from the refund it achieves. If it finds no errors, or it fails to negotiate a refund, then it gets no payment.

The sort of leases that may well have overcharging within their contracts are those for photocopiers, printers, laptops, franking machines, etc.

Typical problems that arise in leases include the over-charging for equipment, hidden commissions, incorrect calculations, unwanted insurance policies and incorrect documentation. Of course, this list is far from all-inclusive – there are many other examples.

To stress the key point, with this company it costs nothing to submit a lease for checking, and the company in question (Leasing Disputes Ltd) only takes a commission from what you claim.

One other point. I know that in many schools the legal department or local authority may well have vetted each lease, but even then lease specialists can still find clauses which invalidate your lease agreement and thus result in your getting a sizeable refund.

To request an audit simply email my colleague Stephen@schools.co.uk and attach to the email a scanned copy of your leasing agreements, and Leasing Disputes Ltd will let you know if you may be entitled to a refund.

You will have no obligation to proceed – and if you do you will not be required to pay anything. Instead you will be told what percentage reimbursement the company will require in the event of their making a successful claim on your behalf.
Tony Attwood
Director, School of Educational Administration