Independent schools are turning to online and hybrid providers to keep their curriculum offer as VAT on fees bites
By Dorothy Lepkowska. 34 minutes ago
The full impact of VAT on independent school fees has yet to be fully felt in the state sector, but the policy is having a tangible impact on the relative new-comers to the education landscape – online and hybrid schools.
Owners are reporting increased interest from independent schools keen to keep their fees as low as possible, continuing to offer a full range of subjects and stay solvent.
Vanessa Temple, director of education at Sophia High School, said that it had been in conversations with independent schools for more than a year to discuss how it could support the sector in the face of falling rolls due to the imposition of VAT on fees.
What is a school going to do if it can’t afford to pay a teacher?
She told School Management Plus: “Independent schools are looking for ways to stay open, and we can support them by offering a hybrid model. Several have reached out to us, and they are usually small schools that want to keep all their existing students.
“However, sometimes these students want to take iGCSEs and A-levels in less popular or niche subjects, for example, economics. What is a school going to do if it can’t afford to pay a teacher because only a handful of pupils want to do the subject?
“They can’t afford to lose the students, but they can’t afford to pay for a teacher either. We are being contacted regularly now to provide teaching as a hybrid model.”
In practice, it means that pupils enrolled in a physical school will do their lessons as normal, but in niche or less popular subjects will be taught by teachers from Sophia or other online and hybrid schools. The online lessons are paid for by the independent school out of the students’ fees and are timetabled separately from lessons taken by Sophia’s own students.
Hybrid classes offered by Sophia to independent schools have comprised up to six students, but Temple said there was scope for pupils from different schools to come together to share the costs of online lessons.
“Our teachers have been going into independent schools so the leadership team and parents can meet them and see that they are real, qualified teachers,” Temple added. “We hope we can help schools through these challenging times with high quality teaching and a timetable that we develop around their pupils’ needs.
Schools risk losing students when they can’t offer a full subject portfolio.
“It allows physical schools to offer a scope of subjects that they might not otherwise have been able to offer before because of small class numbers, and it allows them to keep the students they already have because they can meet their needs.”
Minerva Virtual Academy has just launched its hybrid model MVA Hybrid as it expands to meet growing demand for hybrid education from local authorities and independent schools.
Lawrence Tubb, who leads MVA Hybrid, told SMP: “One of the main strands of MVA Hybrid will be offering niche subjects, or any subject, at GCSE and A-level which might be really important to the three or so students who want to take it, but there is a realistic chance of schools losing fees if they can’t offer it – or that that students end up not being able to study what they want. Schools risk losing students when they can’t offer a full subject portfolio, particularly in areas like business, psychology, languages or computer science, which seem to be worst affected.
“We are about to begin our outreach in UK independent schools and are doing a series of webinars to show what we can offer.”
Hugh Viney, founder of MVA, said one reason for creating MVA Hybrid was “because of the conversation we have had with independent schools in the past two years”. MVA already works with some local authorities and schools to provide hybrid teaching for pupils and “we couldn’t ignore the demand from independent schools any longer”.
The challenge is for schools to break the traditional model of face-to-face teaching.
Suzie Longstaff, principal of London Park Schools, which runs London Park Hybrid, said there was a tangible shift taking place in the independent school sector.
London Park Schools is opening a second hybrid school in Cambridge building on the success of the one in London which opened last September.
Longstaff believes the current crisis facing independent education is leading to both school leaders and parents having to reassess how they view education generally.
“There are now new and interesting ways of delivering education and the challenge is for schools to break the traditional model of face-to-face teaching which has been with us for hundreds of years and needs to change,” she said.
“While not a surge, we have seen an increase in interest in recent months. Parents recognise the benefit of independent education for their children and don’t want them to be in a large school where their children might not thrive.
“But with the rising costs of independent school they have to think differently. I think these two things are intertwined and together lead to quite a strong demand for the hybrid model.”
Rudolf Eliott Lockhart, CEO of the Independent Schools Association, whose membership comprises schools more likely to be affected by the disruption caused by VAT on school fees, said: “Online and hybrid schools are a very interesting development in education and there is potential for traditional schools to work with them for some really innovative approaches on issues such as low pupil numbers for niche subjects, long-term teacher sickness, or recruitment difficulties in specific subjects.
“Schools within the ISA family often reach out to each other for support or to exchange ideas and hybrid schools and what they offer are no exception. In an increasingly digitally literate world, they will play an important role in education and could offer more opportunities for partnership work between state and independent schools.”