Teaching unions and the teachers’ employers’ body have joined the Secretary of State for Education to put forward joint proposals to reform pay structures in order to reward the best teachers. The Rewards and Incentives Group – made up of five teachers’ and head teachers’ bodies as well as the employers’ organisation – has published jointly agreed evidence to the School Teachers’ Review Body.The agreement sets out proposals for a new Excellent Teachers Scheme that would see extra rewards to high achieving staff for their work in the classroom and in supporting colleagues within their schools. In addition it proposes that Management Allowances make way for a new framework of Teaching and Learning Responsibility Payments that would reward teachers who have a significant specified responsibility focussed on teaching and learning.

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Voluntary bodies and charities are being urged to form benchmarking clubs so they can compare their experiences and share best practice. The recommendation comes in ‘Measuring Up’, the National Umbrella Forum’s study of benchmarking in the voluntary sector, which is published today by the National Council for Voluntary Organisations.The report suggests that voluntary organisations working in similar areas, such as young people, health or social care, establish the benchmarking clubs. The Forum came to this conclusion following the success of a pilot benchmarking club of 22 organisations that carried out a detailed study of how they could learn from one another and set common performance measurements for areas such as communicating with their members and providing representation to government.

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