CHANGES have been made to how pupil expansions are funded in St Helens to avoid schools becoming “financially disadvantaged”.

Members of St Helens Council’s schools forum this week agreed to amend the criteria to access funding from the growth fund in respect of expanding schools.

The growth fund is contained within the schools block of the Dedicated Schools Grant (DSG) and enables the council to support schools with significant in-year pupil growth.

The schools forum has previously set the size of the growth fund, which can only be utilised to class sizes of 30, as £450,000 for 2018-2019 and established a set criteria to access this.

Stephen Webb, the council’s business support manager for people’s services, told members of the forum that schools may be “financially disadvantaged” under the current criteria.

He said: “If the council request that the PAN (published admission number) increased by say 15 pupil number at a primary school, the current criteria within the growth fund would allow an allocation for the period September to the end of the financial year, March 31.

“After which those 15 pupils would be in the headcount for the school and they would receive an allocation in the school’s funding formula.

“It’s been identified that those 15 pupils themselves wouldn’t attract enough funding from the school’s funding formula to support a teacher and a learning assistant within the additional class that would be required.”

Mr Webb said the amendment to the criteria will allow the growth fund to support that gap.

Greg Tyrer, the council’s head of finance, systems support and procurement, said the change has been driven by the proposed expansion to Bleak Hill Primary School in Windle.

The proposals, which is currently out for public consultation, are to accommodate 75 additional places for the September 2019 intake, rising to a permanent 90 places for the 2020 intake.

Mr Tyrer said the council need to consider the implications of that expansion, whether Bleak Hill can absorb the pupils and whether it is “financially sustainable”.

He said there was “nothing to suggest” the proposed strategy was “unaffordable”.

However, Mr Tyrer said if the council did not amend the criteria to access funding from the growth fund, the costs to the authority would likely be higher because pupils would need to be absorbed by other schools.

The schools forum approved the recommendations in the council report.