Welcome to the ScholarPack blog

I like to look on the bright side of life, but even I’ll admit that 2021 feels like it’s being directed by Quentin Tarantino. We’ve seen an attempted coup across the pond, alarming COVID-19 statistics over here, and most notably for school leaders - an announcement to partially close all schools with less than 12 hours notice.

Of course, school leaders took the announcement in their stride - which is admirable, given that they probably still have whiplash from the many other sharp government U-turns over the past year. Nonetheless, they’ve still been expected to pick up where they left off and deliver quality remote provision, and at a moment's warning. If this rings true for you, take a look at this advice from our colleagues over at The Key, and their practical examples from the school leaders within their network. 

For those of you who keep a keen eye on this blog, you will know that over the last few weeks I’ve been sharing insights from a report written by our colleagues at The Key about the challenges of school business management during COVID-19. In the first blog, we looked at the worrying impact of COVID-19 on wellbeing and workload, and in the second, we delved into how the workload of an SBM has changed, and the subsequent challenges that have come up. 

While The Key is not a campaigning group, the team  are committed to making the life of any school leader easier through their expertise and guidance. In that vein, the report includes some recommendations for remedying the identified challenges:

We are very excited to announce that Arbor Education is joining ScholarPack as part of The Key Group. Together ScholarPack and Arbor provide 2,800 schools across the country with a modern, cloud-based MIS that offers schools a better way of working. We share a drive to make sure every school has access to better systems, and together, we can now expand this to all phases - from nursery through to secondary.

I recently shared some findings from a report by The Key, about the impact of COVID-19 on SBMs. These findings illustrated an increase in the already high workload of an SBM, coupled with a decrease in their levels of wellbeing.

In part 2 of this blog series, I wanted to shed a little more light on how the workload of an SBM has changed since the pandemic hit, as well as the unforeseen challenges that have followed.