Invitation to first steering group meeting....

With some positive results to go on, I was advised to invite steering group members to a meeting at the beginning of May. In the run up to the meeting, my school had agreed only to release me as 'Lead' and for the responsibilities associated with the role, for 12 lessons and the equivalent of 16K of funding in return. A 14-19 Diploma Development Officer agreed this would be the best way forward and this was confirmed via a written e-mail to our headmaster. Consortium funding has now been increased to 40K for the year 2009-2010, and the allocation of the remainder of the funding as well as delegation of roles and responsibilities within the steering group will need to be on the agenda for an upcoming meeting (perhaps not the first one though!)

Collaboration, as anticipated, proves to be one of the main problems of working as a Consortia. Teachers are busy people! Replying to e-mails and coming to after-school e-mails aren't the sort of things they would automatically prioritise! Below is a copy of the second reminder e-mail I sent out to all members.

Dear Colleagues,

I am pleased to invite you to an IT Consortium Meeting on the 6th May, Wednesday at Archbishop Tenison's (3:30-5PM) Details are in the attached meeting agenda. As we are at a crucial stage of both perfecting our application and embarking on the preparatory year leading to delivery in 2010, I appreciate your commitment to attending these meetings. Your input will be necessary (see agenda) on a number of things, and it will also be an ideal opportunity for formal introductions to members in the group! We hope to present an overview of the year ahead as well as look at a Diploma in IT specification comparison (which promises to be revealing!) Please confirm your attendance (or let me know if you are unable to make it) by replying to this e-mail. Snacks/drinks will be provided so I do need numbers ASAP. You can also visit a site (still under construction) www.croydondiplomas.tk for a copy of the agenda and all related documents. I have created an online forum for any questions or answers you might have to the posted threads.

With warm regards,

RB

I used moonfruit (www.moonfruit.com) to set up a super-quick website complete with a forum and poll! http://croydondiploma.moonfruit.com/ No one uses it of course, but it is useful (even just for me) to have a record of meetings, logs, and important documents altogether in one public place! Fronter may have been an alternative but logging in and remembering an id and password is just one more thing to do!

It's all about the money: Capital funding, grants...

Sometimes you have to wonder what the priority for schools is. The money or the pupils. I suppose before you are quick to jump to a judgement it is important to realise that money (funding) is important in order to facilitate learning in the first place. So...is it all about the money after all?

There are a million different words for money -or so I'm told -when it comes to the Diploma. There is the £3o,000 grant, that will only come into play if the Consortium bid is successful. (if it doesn't come through after all this we may as well shoot ourselves for being more incompetent than it is even possible to be!) Then there is capital funding available for innovative projects or needs for institutions in the Consortium. Our school has decided to make a bid for a meeting room, and it most definitely would be needed. The idea is to have an additional mobile unit built. This place would become a dedicated meeting room. Dedicated, that is, when there are scheduled meetings. With being the lead centre and all -assuming it all goes through -this would be a necessary facility.

In the spirit of the Diploma and all the tax payers money that seems to be being poured into it, I thought the following article may be of some interest.

http://www.whitehallpages.net/modules.php?op=modload&name=News&file=article&sid=113280

This is all the wonderful Ed Ball's doing of course. The article talks about £23 million cash injection to help rural areas put in place comprehensive plans to ensure all young people can benefit from the exciting new opportunities offered by the Diploma.

£23 million?!

One part of the article reads: "Today's announcement means £1 million in capital funding will be provided to each of the 20 most rural local authorities so they can provide innovative solutions to overcoming barriers to delivering the Diploma in their areas. The areas which will benefit are: Northumberland; North Yorkshire; Cumbria; Herefordshire; Shropshire: Devon; Lincolnshire; Rutland; Wiltshire; East Riding of Yorkshire; Cornwall; Norfolk; Dorset; Somerset; Cambridgeshire; Suffolk; North Lincolnshire; Gloucestershire; Oxfordshire; and Durham "

No mention of Croydon! Mention or no mention, I hope our school manages to get some of that capital funding for a new meeting room!