Catch up on the latest education, teaching, recruitment and Flourish HQ news below:

Older News

• The number of Children Missing School in England is a National Crisis – what can be done to tackle this crisis?

  Thursday, October 19, 2023

  Figures for the 2022-23 academic year show the number of Children missing school in England has increased significantly since COVID-19, with an overall absence rate of 7.6%, up from around 4-5% pre-pandemic. Alarmingly, figures also show 22.3% of pupils were "persistently absent", which is defined as missing 10% or more of their lessons during the 2022-23 academic year - What can be done to tackle this school absence crisis?

• Flourish Education Sponsored the BASBM Autumn Conference

  Wednesday, October 4, 2023

  We had a fantastic day at Edgbaston Cricket Club yesterday, sponsoring the Birmingham Association of School Business Managers (BASBM) Autumn Conference.

• The Cost-Of-Living Crisis, together with existing pressures, is creating a self-perpetuating cycle of negative impact on pupils and schools.

  Thursday, September 21, 2023

  The Cost-Of-Living Crisis, together with existing pressures, is creating a self-perpetuating cycle of negative impact on pupils and schools; that is the findings from the latest research released by the National Foundation For Education Research (NFER)

• New Taskforce has been created to tackle teacher workload

  Monday, September 18, 2023

  Gillian Keegan, the Secretary State for Education has announced the introduction of a new task force to tackle unnecessary workload for teachers and school leaders. The taskforce will look at ways of how to reduce the working hours for teachers and leaders by 5 hours per week within the next 3 week

• A look back at the 22/23 academic year

  Friday, July 21, 2023

  Before we end the academic year, we'd like to share some of the memorable highlights of the year and to show you what we have achieved with the support and partnership of our schools and our Flourish Champions.

• Teachers offered 6.5% pay rise from September 2023

  Friday, July 14, 2023

  Yesterday, the Department For Education (DfE) accepted the School Teachers’ Review Body (STRB) recommendation and announced a 6.5% pay rise across all pay scales for teachers and school leaders in England from September. The DfE will provide additional funding to cover 3% of the rise and schools are expected to fund the remaining 3.5% from existing school budgets. Unions are encouraging it’s members to accept this offer and are describing the deal as “fairly funded”.

• A 6.5% pay rise is unlikely to solve the Teacher Recruitment & Retention Crisis

  Wednesday, July 12, 2023

  New National Foundation for Educational Research (NFER) research, published today, shows that a teacher pay increase of 6.5% in 2023/24, as reportedly recommended by the School Teachers’ Review Body (STRB), is unlikely to solve the teacher recruitment and retention crisis on it’s own.
  
  The new report, Policy options for a long-term teacher pay and financial incentive strategy: an assessment of options and their impacts and costs carried out by the NFER and funded by the Gatsby Foundation suggests a new long term strategy is required to improve teacher recruitment and retention, particularly in Secondary Education STEM. The report suggests this long term strategy should focus on well-targeted financial incentives and action to improve the non-financial attractiveness of teaching alongside improving the competitiveness of teacher pay.

• Keeping Children Safe in Education 2023 Update

  Friday, July 7, 2023

  Ready for September 2023, Keeping children safe in Education 2023 has been updated by the Department for Education (DFE) and has been amended from its 2022 version for the wording to fall in line with the Behaviour in schools guidance. There have been a number of changes that everyone in the education sector needs to embrace, so in this news article; our Compliance Manager, Toni Pike runs through these changes and explains what they mean in more details.

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  Flourish Champions Of The Summer Term

  Thursday, July 6, 2023

  We are delighted to announce that this term, our Flourish Champions of the term are:
  Rajma, Bright and Rachel.

• Teacher Burnout: The warning signs

  Wednesday, June 28, 2023

  Many people outside of the teaching profession see the 6 weeks’ holiday and the short school hours and think teaching is easy and teachers have nothing to complain about. They don’t see the work teachers do at home, the long working days, the worry they have for some students and the pressure to make sure their students are progressing, engaged and focused. These factors and others, can be a massive contributor to teacher burnout.