In the fourth and final part of our mini-series on best practice for school condition management, we’re doing some show-and-tell! Our school compliance management software, Every Compliance By IRIS, is used by schools and MATs up and down the country to support with the range of compliance-related tasks faced daily.
Yet in the last few years, both school condition management and capital funding have become two of the most prevalent areas of focus that our customers use Every Compliance to manage.
So, we thought it’s a good idea to explain how you can make your next funding application as strong as possible to secure the cash you need to improve the condition of the buildings across your school estate.
Read on to find out:
- How to compile evidence for funding applications with Every Compliance
- Why consistency is key in good estate management – and how to achieve it
- The difference between managing school condition projects on spreadsheets and within a dedicated, digital system
(All the insight in this blog comes from a recent webinar ran by Ben Tummons, one of our Every Compliance Specialists. You can watch the session back by clicking the button below as well as catching up on the GEMS mini-series in full.)
Compiling evidence for funding applications with Every Compliance
Within Every Compliance, there’s a dedicated area for school staff to log maintenance issues which are then picked up by the relevant team – the ‘Helpdesk’. Over the years, we’ve heard how lots of happy customers have used the Helpdesk to form the evidence they need to apply for, and secure, capital funding, like the Condition Improvement Fund (CIF) or Trust Capacity Fund (TCaF).
All issues logged in the Helpdesk are tracked, with a full audit trail of time stamps against any remedial activities that are carried out. This evidence-based tool has become a goldmine for Every Compliance customers bidding for funding. Thanks to the end-to-end tracking, it’s straightforward to show just how much capital expenditure is being spent on reactive maintenance requests.
Improving school condition management with our ‘Helpdesk’
It doesn’t matter if you have three or thirty schools in your MAT or if you’re an individual school. When an issue is logged in the Helpdesk, you’re able to put an estimated cost against the required work. Decision-makers then have the insight they need to make the most informed choices about both the priority of the funding and where it’s coming from to ensure both reactive and planned work can be completed.
Consistency is key in good estate management
Once you’ve got visibility over the projects and issues needing a piece of the funding pie, consistency in how they’re managed and completed is key. The more standardised you can make maintenance management across your organisation, the more assurance you’ll feel that activities are being carried out effectively.
In Every Compliance, there’s a range of templates to support school condition management projects and the related capital funding. If all academies in a MAT are following the same process and template, it’s far easier to make activities consistent – not to mention straightforward for all relevant stakeholders to understand.
Spreadsheets VS project management software
Putting this into perspective, 77% of attendees who joined us for this webinar said they currently use spreadsheets to plan and manage their capital projects. Whilst spreadsheets are simple way of entering and manipulating data, there’s a ceiling to how much value you can get from the data within.
Ben told the audience of a West Midlands-based MAT that’s grown from six to 16 academies since they started using Every Compliance in 2015. Prior to using our school compliance management software, they were one of the 77% relying on spreadsheets to manage all their buildings (and the immense amount of data that comes with it). It took them days, if not weeks, to find and organise the relevant data to plan capital projects and then use this to work out where funding needed prioritising most.
Enhanced visibility over school condition management decisions
But with the help of our Project Management module, they’ve seen a huge improvement in both the ease and speed of spotting the maintenance issues that are the highest priority. This now means they’re better informed to channel available capital funding to the issues and buildings that need it the most, improving the overall learning and environment for the MAT’s students.
Next steps for better school condition management
Ultimately, the aim of school capital funding is to make positive impacts on the classrooms, canteens, sports halls (and so on) we rely on to educate students. Ensure your organisation is making the best use of the funding that’s available with the support of Every Compliance.
