Decision details

West Sussex County Council is required, under national funding regulations, to consult schools and the Schools Forum on proposed changes to funding arrangements affecting school budgets. The School Funding Review 2021/22 consultation document was published on 21st October 2020. Responses to the consultation and feedback from Schools Forum have been taken into account in the development of the local funding formula for mainstream schools in 2021/22.

To help alleviate pressures on the High Needs budget a proposal to transfer £2.5m of funding from the Schools block to the High Needs block of the Dedicated Schools Grant (DSG) was also included as part of the schools funding consultation. Under the funding regulations, any transfer between blocks is a decision that is taken by Schools Forum, although the County Council can seek to overturn this by applying to the Secretary of State for Education through a disapplication request. The Schools Forum declined to approve the proposed transfer and the County Council’s application to the Secretary of State was rejected and so no transfer to the High Needs block is included.

(1)The Cabinet Member for Education and Skills has agreed the proposals in relation to the local funding formula for mainstream schools as set out in section two of the report and specifically at paragraph 2.26 to:

Ø  Continue to protect the primary lump sum at a rate of £130,000, by continuing to scale back the primary unit values for Low Prior Attainment (LPA) from the National Funding Formula (NFF) primary unit value,

Ø  Continue to use 50% of the Sparsity funding that the County Council receives through the NFF to fund the payment of an additional transitional sparsity lump sum to those primary schools with less than 150 pupils.

Ø  Set the Minimum Funding Guarantee level at 2% to ensure that all mainstream schools benefit by this increase in their pupil-led funding.

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