MORE SCHOOLS OPT FOR TRUST STATUS

The 69 pathfinder schools piloting the Trust model have been joined in the last six months by a further 140 secondary and special schools. This is double the number of applicants that were expected.

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E-AUCTION HALVES PROCUREMENT COSTS

Fourteen councils and six NHS Trusts have cut the cost of procuring IT hardware by 50 per cent in the latest e-auction run by the Office of Government Commerce with the London Centre of Excellence. The councils and trusts pooled their IT hardware requirements worth 13.7 million pounds at pre-auction benchmarked prices and achieved a price at the end of the five hour auction of 6.9 million pounds giving an average saving of 50 per cent across the six lots.

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This report from the Office for Standards in Education, Children’s Services and Skills (Ofsted) says that inspectors found that most local authorities are making a good contribution towards delivering better outcomes for the majority of children and young people. However a significant minority provision is not good enough and authorities need to do more to redress this inequity.Children’s services are improving with 107 out of the 139 authorities covered by the report making at least a good contribution towards delivering better outcomes for children and young people. The biggest challenge continues to be narrowing the gap in opportunities, provision and outcomes between the majority of children and those that are vulnerable or underachieving.

Read more on NARROWING THE GAP: THE INSPECTION OF CHILDREN’S SERVICES…