25/11/2008 by Tony Attwood.

Hundreds of school modernisation projects are to start early after the Government announced it was accelerating up to £800 million capital investment by 12 months.

The Pre-Budget Report announced that funding originally earmarked for the Primary Capital Programme (PCP) and three other capital programmes in 2010-11 is now available in 2009-10.

Overall schools capital spending has risen seven-fold in real terms over the last decade – up from under £700m in 1997 to £6.67billion this year. This announcement adds to the £7.02 billion capital investment already being pumped into schools next year.

All 150 local authorities in England are being asked to identify building and refurbishment spending which can be brought forward - with the funding being released from April 2009.

The vast bulk of the projects that can be brought forward will be small-scale modernisations and refurbishments – giving immediate cash injections to thousands of small and medium-sized businesses fitting out these new facilities.

The full details of the announcement are:

£800 million to be advanced 12 months from the 2010-11 allocations from the Primary Capital Programme; Local Authority Modernisation Grant; Locally Controlled Voluntarily Aided Programme and Targeted Capital Fund for 14-19, SEN and disabilities fund.

The specific programmes involved are:

Primary Capital Programme: 41 local authorities with approved strategies for the next two years could bring forward up to nationally £280 million from 2010-11. The DCSF announced earlier this month it is working with the other local authorities to bring their plans up to speed quickly.

Local Authority Modernisation Grant (capital grant): to improve the infrastructure of the school estate (other than voluntary-aided schools and academies) - up to £470 million could be brought forward;

Locally Controlled Voluntarily Aided Programme: to improve the infrastructure of the voluntary-aided school estate; to support the provision of new pupil places; and to facilitate physical access to schools - up to £220 million could be brought forward;

Targeted Capital Fund for 14-19; Special Educational Needs and Disabilities: to provide additional funding to areas not currently in the BSF programme to build facilities to deliver 14 to 19 reforms; diplomas; and to improve facilities for SEN and disabled pupils those local - up to £460 million could be brought forward.

Local authorities are being asked to identify by Christmas what is suitable expenditure to bring forward, depending on the readiness of locally managed projects – the Government will confirm by decisions by January 16 2009.

Building Schools for the Future

This announcement is in addition to ongoing measures taken to accelerate the Building Schools for the Future programme,

The Pre Budget Report sets out that the 41 local authorities able to bring forward 2010-11 Primary Capital Programme funding to next year: Barnet, Bracknell Forest, Bradford, Bromley, Camden, Cornwall, Coventry, Darlington, Devon, Doncaster, Dorset, Ealing, Essex, Gateshead, Gloucestershire, Greenwich, Hackney, Hampshire, Harrow, Hartlepool, Hertfordshire, Kensington and Chelsea, Kingston upon Thames, Kirklees, Lambeth, Leicester, Lewisham, Lincolnshire, Luton, Middlesbrough, Newham, Portsmouth, Redbridge, Redcar and Cleveland, Richmond upon Thames, Rutland, Tameside, Walsall, Warwickshire, Wolverhampton, Worcestershire

The full local authority funding breakdown and other background material on Primary Capital Programme is at: www.teachernet.gov.uk/management/resourcesfinanceandbuilding/pcp/

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19/11/2008 by Tony Attwood.

Schools in England are on 3 year finance systems now following the introduction of the Schools Financial Management Standard and other measures.  There are details of this in the article at http://www.hamilton-house.com/free%20reports/When.pdf (see part 2 in particular).So schools certainly should know what they have got this year and next year and the credit crunch won’t be affecting them.

However last financial year was the year in which schools were able to run over as much of their money as they liked without losing it.  (This as a final much-delayed response to the chaos of 2003 when schools ended up making huge numbers of teachers redundant, only to re-employ them 6 months later when the funding came through).

So in the financial year 2007/8 schools were told to spend everything they had accumulated over previous years - and they did.  That rule hit in November 2007 and that put spending up dramatically in November and December last year.

This year there is no roll over, and no old funds to use.   So firstly, the extra money of last year is not there.  

And secondly, because the old roll-over rules don’t apply now, I think people are holding back just in case they need to buy something urgently in February.   That suggests that there should be a big load of sales in February - although you can’t sue me if there isn’t.

Thirdly, e-learning credits came to an end in August, which means that IT products are competing for real money once again - and that means that non-IT purchases are competing for a pot of money that is being squeezed over a wider range of products.

That I think is it.   They know about the budgets, they haven’t got last year’s bonus, they know they have to spend the money by April and are holding back to next term, and they ain’t got no e-learning credits.

Other than that it is business as usual.

If you would like to know more please do call me on 01536 399 000 or email Tony at schools.co.uk - or visit www.educationmarketing.org.uk 

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05/11/2008 by Tony Attwood.

Here’s a simple analysis: the companies that I see that generate the greatest profit from schools all do three things:

They vary their advertising message all the time

They work across the five different direct marketing media

They undertake trial mailings to ensure that each full-scale promotion works to the maximum effect.

Varying the message and using the different media are both vital, because different teachers respond in different ways.  A teacher who responds to a solo mailing might not opt in to an email list.   A school that forwards emails sent to the general school address might not do the same with shared mailing leaflets, and so on.  

And the same variance can be found with different types of message.  

Combine the five approaches (shared, solo, school email, opt in email, and subscriber email) with the fact that advertising messages can be endlessly changed and re-written, and you’ll see just how the marketing can be developed in order to keep the orders coming in.

In an ideal scenario this endless rotation of media and message will be combined with a continual regime of testing - so at any one time you might be sending out a promotion to 300 schools as a direct mail shot to measure the response on that, while running a different promotion on an generic email campaign that was tested earlier.  A couple of weeks later it might be a shared mailing that is going out, along with a test email mailing using the Subscribers email list.

Of course this is not easy - which is why many companies don’t follow this rigorous approach.   It is necessary to be thinking and planning weeks and months ahead in order to get the trial mailings out on time.  It may seem a bit complex, but the savings and additional sales will always make it worthwhile.  

To help make this approach of testing and varying both the message and the media work, Hamilton House has a service through which we work with our clients running and monitoring these promotions, tracking and analysing the response rates, and coming up with ideas as to what should happen next both in terms of the message and the media.  

If you would like to talk about any of these three topics (that is varying the message, varying the media, and testing before full promotions) please just give myself or my colleagues a call on 01536 399 000

Tony Attwood

Hamilton House Mailings plc reg number 2444392 VAT 354907535GB.  Phone 01536 399 000.

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