Published Edinburgh Evening News, Tuesday 7th December 2010

Education Secretary, Mike Russell, announced he plans more powers for Head Teachers under a review of devolved school management (DSM) to include a review of devolved education funding. He has asked David Cameron, former President of the Association of Directors of Education, to chair this review.
Russell says of the DSM review: “This will include looking at what education funding is devolved to head teachers, how much flexibility teachers have to determine what this is spent on and how devolved school management could work in clusters of schools. I believe this is important in order to empower head teachers.”
As a head teacher of an independent school, I know only too well the benefits of determining how and where to spend the annual budget. It allows a level of autonomy that ensures areas of need can be prioritised. This means money being spent in those areas where the greatest impact and benefit can be felt. This is intrinsically sensible.
Prior to working in the independent sector, I worked in a maintained school in West Lothian. In my first year there, the school ran out of ‘jotters’ for the pupils and teachers were using loose leaf paper, often paid for out of their own pockets, in order to keep the wheels of education grinding on. The Head Teacher at the time was powerless to buy more because she had fully utilised her “resources allowance” and was not allowed to move money from any other part of the budget, even if there was no prospect of all the money being used.
What Head teachers did, therefore, was to ensure all the money was spent, even when the areas being resourced, refurbished or renewed were not really required. This was clearly not a useful policy and lead to under-resource in one area and waste in another.
So, perhaps Russell has got it right. I am just wary of politicians who seem to be making common sense decisions which are purported to be about greater autonomy but which, in effect, are about cost cutting and allowing the Heads to take the blame when their parents are less than satisfied with the cuts that will surely come. I might be being overly cynical and this brave new world may produce a better product for Scotland’s children but there are a number of issues Heads will need to consider.
First, how many Heads have a commercial or financial background? I ask this because I am certain that many Heads will feel a little uneasy about being in charge of their own spending because with this responsibility also comes a higher degree of accountability. I am in the privileged position of having a finance director as part of my school’s management team and therefore the risk of me messing it up is greatly reduced. Heads will need significant support and training if autonomy on the scale I am imagining is to be successful.
This brings me on to whether the review will actually truly devolve all funding or whether they will devolve a percentage of it. My guess is the latter which whilst probably is sensible lessens the ability of Heads to prioritise successfully.
Even if this is the case, I can assure all Heads that a considerable amount of time will be taken up on budgetary implications, discussions, meetings and so on and so forth. This at a time when the job has already become overly administrative in nature and where the backdrop is an education sector going through enormous curricular change.
Heads will need a great many skills in order to balance those prerequisite administration roles with the all-important day job of ensuring our kids get the greatest possible benefit from education we can muster.
The position of Head has become less than popular in recent years, evidenced by the number of vacancies and Acting Head positions around the country. Whilst supporting Russell’s attempt at providing greater levels of autonomy for individual Heads, I am concerned that it will make the job of Head even less attractive than it already is.
However, I am prejudging what Cameron will suggest in his review, which will not provide new guidance until next March. I can only highly commend individual schools receiving a greater say on how they use their budget. The independent sector manages to do just that and is generally successful in balancing the books and spending money in the right places at the right times. What independent schools have as a check on a Head’s decisions is a Board of Governors who ensure the financial probity of a school by rigorous and regular consultation on budget and management accounts, annual audits by independent chartered accountants and a full-time finance director. Will the maintained sector provide the same level of rigour, support and advice for its Heads?
If there is a revolution and the ideas are bold and forward thinking, then it is imperative that Head teachers are given the support and training they will undoubtedly require. Oh, and that will cost and I’m not sure that’s in the agenda…

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