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Essential Documents for your Primary School Website Ofsted 2024

SECTION 1 – SCHOOL CONTACT DETAILS

NOTE: Schools that do not have a website

You must still publish all of the information which is set out on this webpage online even if you do not maintain your own website. You can use an alternative website to host the information as long as you make the address and details of the website known to parents, for example, by providing parents with the URL (website address) and any other relevant details.

Your school or college website should include the following contact details:

Requirements

  • Name of your school or college
  • Postal address of your school or college
  • Telephone number of your school or college
  • The name of the member of staff who deals with queries from parents and other members of the public
  • Name of the headteacher or principal (only for Academies but we advise all schools action)
  • Name and address of the chair of the governing body (if you have one)
  • The name and contact details of your special educational needs (SEN) co-ordinator (SENCO) unless you’re a special school

Collective Tip

When we build your website we always ensure that your school address is on the website as well as contact details.
We recommend your address be available on every page – usually in the footer of your website.
As an aside, the address of your Chair of Governors can be c/o your school.
Also make sure there is a contact name is added to your contact page.

SECTION 2 – ADMISSIONS ARRANGEMENTS

The admission arrangements section is different depending on your school type and who determines your admissions.

Requirements

  • Community schools and voluntary-controlled schools

    As the local authority manages your admissions process, refer parents to the local authority to find out about your school’s admission and appeal arrangements.

  • Foundation schools and voluntary-aided schools

    As the school’s governing body decides your admissions, you must publish your school’s admission arrangements by the 15th March each year (As set out in the Admissions Code) and keep them online for the whole school year.

Collective Tip

You must explain:

  • how you’ll consider applications for each relevant age group at your school
  • what parents should do if they want to apply for their child to attend your school
  • your arrangements for selecting the pupils who apply (if you are a selective school)
  • your ‘over-subscription criteria’ (how you offer places if there are more applicants than places)You must also set out how your school’s in-year applications will be dealt with by 31 August at the latest each year.If the school’s governing body will manage in-year applications for your school, you must provide a suitable application form to enable parents to apply for an in-year place at your school. You must also provide a supplementary information form where necessary.If the school is to be a part of the local authority’s in-year co-ordination scheme, you must provide information on where parents can find details of the relevant scheme.You must also publish a timetable for organising and hearing admission appeals for your school by the 28 February each year. This must:
  • include a deadline for lodging appeals which allows those making an appeal at least 20 school days from the date of notification that their application was unsuccessful to prepare and lodge their written appeal
  • include reasonable deadlines for those making an appeal to submit additional evidence, for admission authorities to submit their evidence and for the clerk to send appeal papers to the panel and parties
  • ensure that those making an appeal receive at least 10 school days’ notice of their appeal hearing
  • ensure that decision letters are sent within 5 school days of the hearing wherever possible

SECTION 3 – OFSTED REPORT

Schools and colleges should do one of the following:

Requirements

  • Publish a copy of your school’s or college’s most recent OFSTED report

  • Publish a link to the webpage where users can find your school’s most recent OFSTED report

Collective Tip

The OFSTED reports requirement advises that one of the requirements must be met. However we recommend you provide information for both requirements. We also encourage having statements from the report throughout your website to highlight positive comments.

SECTION 4 –EXAM AND ASSESSMENT RESULTS

IMPORTANT UPDATE

You do not need to publish your key stage 2 results for the academic year 2021 to 2022 on your website, as the Secretary of State will not publish this data. This is because statutory assessments returned for the first time since 2019, without adaptations, after disruption caused by the pandemic.

You should continue to display your school’s most recent key stage 2 performance measures, as published by the Secretary of State, on your website. For most schools, these will be the performance measures published for the 2018 to 2019 academic year.

You should clearly mark that these performance measures are for the 2018 to 2019 academic year and are not current. For example, you could add the following sentence to your results:

Requirements

  • You must continue to display your 2018 to 2019 performance measures until new performance measures are published. You should clearly mark that these performance measures are not current.
  • You should continue to display your school’s most recent average progress scores in reading, writing and maths
  • You should continue to display your school’s most recent average ‘scaled scores’ in reading and maths
  • You should continue to display your school’s most recent percentage of pupils who achieved the expected standard or above in reading, writing and maths
  • You should continue to display your school’s most percentage of pupils who achieved a high level of attainment in reading, writing and maths

Collective Tip

The DfE have recommended you add the following sentence to your results page:  “The government will not publish KS2 school level data for the 2021 to 2022 academic year. The last available public data is from the 2018 to 2019 academic year. It is important to note that the data from that year may no longer reflect current performance.”

SECTION 5 – PERFORMANCE MEASURES WEBSITE

This requirement ensures a link to the school and college performance measures website is present.

Requirements

  • You must include a link to the school and college performance tables and your school’s performance tables page.

Collective Tip

Link to your own school page on the performance tables website, not just the main website. This link could be included from your results page, your Ofsted page, or straight from a menu item.

SECTION 6 – CURRICULUM

NOTE for all schools: Your approach to the curriculum should also include how you are complying with your duties in the Equality Act 2010 and the Special Educational Needs and Disability Regulations 2014 about making the curriculum accessible for those with disabilities or special educational needs.

Requirements

  • The content of your school curriculum in each academic year for every subject, including Religious Education even if it is taught as part of another subject or subjects, or is called something else
  • The names of any phonics or reading schemes you’re using in key stage 1
  • How parents or other members of the public can find out more about the curriculum your school is following
  • You must also set out how over time you will increase the extent to which disabled pupils participate in the school’s curriculum, as part of your school’s accessibility plan.

Collective Tip

The new Ofsted Inspection Framework (May 2019) states that inspectors will make graded judgements on the quality of education. This includes an evaluation of your curriculum which should be “broad and balanced”. In particular:

  • Intent – do you have an ambitious curriculum that provides the knowledge and cultural capital learners need to succeed in life?
  • Implementation – how well is the curriculum delivered?
  • Impact – do learners develop detailed knowledge and skills across the curriculum and, as a result, achieve well?

SECTION 7 – BEHAVIOUR POLICY

NOTE for all schools: Additional information is available in the government guidance for school leaders and staff on developing and publishing your school’s behaviour policy.

Requirements

  • Publish details of your school’s behaviour policy.
    This must comply with section 89 of the Education and Inspections Act 2006.

Collective Tip

We would recommend that you also publish your anti- bullying strategy. The DfE recommends that this policy is reviewed annually. Consider grouping your policy documents for easier navigation.

SECTION 8 – PUPIL PREMIUM

All schools that receive pupil premium funding must publish a pupil premium strategy statement each year by 31 December. The details listed below as requirements are the main focus, but, you must use the template linked here.

Notes from guidance: In the strategy statement, you must explain how your pupil premium and recovery premium is being spent and the outcomes that are being achieved for pupils. It’s important that parents and governors understand this, and you should write it with them in mind.

You must use the DfE template to produce your statement. This can be found alongside completed examples and guidance for school leaders on the pupil premium guidance page.

The template has been designed to ensure that your statement reflects the requirements in the pupil premium conditions of grant. This includes a requirement for pupil premium and recovery premium to be spent in line with the department’s ‘menu of approaches’ from the start of the 2022 to 2023 academic year. The menu can be found in the document ‘Using pupil premium: guidance for school leaders’, on the pupil premium guidance page.

We recommend that you plan your pupil premium use over 3 years. If you do so, you are still required to update your statement each year to reflect your spending activity for that academic year and the impact of pupil premium in the previous academic year.

Requirements

For the current academic year, you must include:

  • How much pupil premium funding you received for this academic year
  • Details of the main barriers to educational achievement that the disadvantaged children in your school face
  • How you will spend your pupil premium funding to address these barriers and the reasons for the approach you’ve chosen

For the previous academic year:

  • How you spent your pupil premium funding
  • How you will measure the impact of the pupil premium
  • The date of the next pupil premium strategy review
  • The effect that the pupil premium had on pupils

Collective Tip

Review the guidance and look at the sample filled out strategy templates and use them as a basis for providing the information required.

SECTION 9 – PE & SPORT PREMIUM FOR PRIMARY SCHOOLS

If your school receives PE (physical education) and sport premium funding, you must publish a report by the end of the summer term, or by the 31st July at the latest. You must include:

Requirements

  • How much funding you received
  • A full breakdown of how you’ve spent the funding or will spend the funding
  • The impact of the premium on pupils’ PE and sport participation and attainment
  • How you’ll make sure these improvements are sustainable

How many pupils within their year 6 cohort can do each of the following:

  • Swim competently, confidently and proficiently over a distance of at least 25 metres
  • Use a range of strokes effectively
  • Perform safe self-rescue in different water-based situations

Collective Tip

To help you plan, monitor and report on the impact of your spending, it’s recommended that you download a template to record your activity. The Department has commissioned partners in the physical education and school sport sector to develop a template, which is available at The Association for PE.

SECTION 10 – SPECIAL EDUCATIONAL NEEDS (SEN) AND DISABILITY INFORMATION

You must publish a report on your school’s policy for pupils with SEN and update it annually. You should update any changes occurring during the year as soon as possible. You should update any changes occurring during the year as soon as possible. The report must comply with section 69 of the Children and Families Act 2014.

Requirements

  • The ‘SEN Information’ specified in schedule 1 to the Special Educational Needs and Disability Regulations 2014. (Statutory guidance on this is contained in section 6.79 to 6.82 of the Special educational needs and disability code of practice: 0 to 25 years)
  • The arrangements for the admission of disabled pupils
  • The steps you have taken to prevent disabled pupils from being treated less favourably than other pupils
  • Information as to the plan prepared by the governing body or proprietor under paragraph 3

How many pupils within their year 6 cohort can do each of the following:

  • Increasing the extent to which disabled pupils can participate in the school’s curriculum
  • Improving the physical environment of the school for the purpose of increasing the extent to which disabled pupils are able to take advantage of education and benefits, facilities and services provided or offered by the school
  • The facilities you provide to help disabled pupils to access the school
  • Improving the delivery to disabled pupils of information which is readily accessible to pupils who are not disabled

Collective Tip

If you’re a mainstream school make this page about the students by talking about them and celebrating them like all the other students. Have a page with more than just some reports!
Make sure you reference legislation in your reports.

SECTION 11 – GOVERNORS’ INFORMATION & DUTIES

You must publish information on the governing body in line with statutory guidance on the constitution of governing bodies of maintained schools.

Please note: In the interests of transparency, a governing body should publish on its website up-to-date details of its governance arrangements in a readily accessible form. Readily accessible means that the information should be on a webpage without the need to download or open a separate document.

Requirements

  • The structure and responsibilities of the governing body and any committees, and the full names of the chair of each

For each governor who has served at any point over the past 12 months:

  • Their full names, date of appointment, term of office, date they stepped down (where applicable), who appointed them (in accordance with the governing body’s instrument of government)
  • Relevant business and pecuniary interests (as recorded in the register of interests) including:

    • governance roles in other educational institutions;
    • any material interests arising from relationships between governors or relationships between governors and school staff (including spouses, partners and close relatives);

  • Their attendance record at governing body and committee meetings over the last academic year.

Collective Tip

You should also publish the same information for associate members making it clear whether they have voting rights on any of the committees to which they have been appointed. – Governance Handbook 2020

SECTION 12 – CHARGING & REMISSIONS POLICIES

Publish your school’s charging and remissions policies. Read about school charging and remission.

The policies must include details of

Requirements

  • The activities or cases for which your school will charge pupils’ parents
  • The circumstances where your school will make an exception on a payment you would normally expect to receive under your charging policy

Collective Tip

Make sure you have this policy (or policies) on your website and that you are covering both charging and remissions, one policy is probably easier with information about both included.

SECTION 13 – VALUES & ETHOS

Schools and colleges should:

Requirements

  • Publish a statement of their ethos and values

Collective Tip

Have a headteacher’s/principal’s welcome on your website as well as the ethos and values page. Maybe create a link between the two pages so visitors who read the welcome will also be able to go straight to your ethos and values page. We have also provided a number of video introductions from Head Teachers to help further enhance engagement.

SECTION 14 – REQUESTS FOR COPIES

Regarding requests for paper copies of information on your school website.

Requirements

  • If a parent requests a paper copy of the information on your school’s or college’s website, you must provide this free of charge.

Collective Tip

The requirement is that you provide the copies, but we always advise writing something on your website (usually on the policies page or contact us page) explaining that this option is available, and the best way to request it.

SECTION 15 – PUBLIC SECTOR EQUALITY DUTY

Previously titled, Equality Objectives – Public bodies, including Maintained Schools, Academies and Free Schools must comply with the public sector equality duty in the Equality Act 2010 and the Equality Act 2010 (Specific Duties and Public Authorities) Regulations 2017.

The Equality Act 2010 and Advice for Schools provide information as to how your school can demonstrate compliance, for example, including details of how your school is:

This means you must publish:

Requirements

  • Publish details of how your school is complying with the public sector equality duty – you should update this every year
  • Eliminating discrimination (see the Equalities Act 2010)
  • Improving equality of opportunity for people with protected characteristics
  • Consulting and involving those affected by inequality in the decisions your school or college takes to promote equality and eliminate discrimination (affected people could include parents, pupils, staff and members of the local community)
  • Publish your school’s equality objectives – you should update this at least once every 4 years
  • Under the Equality Act 2010 (Specific Duties and Public Authorities) Regulations 2017 organisations are required to publish information on its website about the gender pay gap in their organisation. [note: this requirement is only for organisations with over 250 employees]

Collective Tip

This is likely to be in the form of a report. We’d recommend publishing this either with your other policies, or on a page specially for all information regarding equality.

SECTION 16 – COMPLAINTS

All schools and colleges should publish details about their complaints policies and procedures.

Read guidance on developing your school’s complaints procedure.

Requirements

  • You must publish details of your school’s complaints procedure, which must comply with Section 29 of the Education Act 2002.
  • Publish any arrangements for handling complaints from parents of children with special educational needs (SEN) about the support the school provides.

Collective Tip

These requirements are here to ensure these documents are available and easy to find on your website. Consider grouping all your policies into categories or groups and including the policies above in groups.

SECTION 17 – ANNUAL ACCOUNTS

Your school or college website should include certain financial information.

(See ‘Academies financial handbook’ for more info)

Requirements

  • Annual report
  • Annual audited accounts
  • Memorandum of association
  • Articles of association
  • Names of charity trustees and members
  • Funding agreement

Collective Tip

This information is probably deserving of it’s own page on your website, but try to keep it easily accessible, probably in a related menu structure alongside other information about your school/college so it’s easy to find. This must be on the school website as well as the Trust website.

SECTION 18 – FINANCIAL INFORMATION & EXECUTIVE PAY

All schools must meet the first requirement below, including Trusts. Maintained schools must also publish a link to the Schools financial benchmarking service as below.:

Requirements

  • How many school employees (if any) have a gross annual salary of £100,000 or more in increments of £10,000 – we recommend using a table to display this.
  • a link to the webpage which is dedicated to your school on the schools financial benchmarking service – follow the prompts to find your school’s specific page.

Collective Tip

The recommendation is to add information as a table. Read the blog article linked here of information on how to achieve this. Also, if you don’t have anyone earning over £100,000 still reference that.

SECTION 19 – SAFEGUARDING

Not published on the main requirements pages currently but as of September 2019 the new guidelines around Keeping Children Safe in Education makes specific mention of the requirement to publish safeguarding information on the school website.

In an inspection, the lead inspector will prepare for the inspection by gaining an overview of the school’s recent performance, and any changes since the last inspection. There is also a requirement around making some of your safeguarding information available publicly, with your website being the specific medium mentioned to do this.

Requirements

Pre-inspection planning will be informed by analysis of information on the school’s website including the presence and suitability of the safeguarding guidance

  • Include suitable safeguarding guidance on your school website. The child protection policy should describe procedures which are in accordance with government guidance and refer to locally agreed multi-agency safeguarding arrangements put in place by the three safeguarding partner

Individual schools and colleges should ensure they have an effective child protection policy

  • This should be updated annually (as a minimum), and be available publicly either via the school or college website or by other means.

Collective Tip

Inspectors will consider three key areas:
– Identify the right children. How does the school do that?
– Help: what timely action do staff within the school take, and how well do they work with other agencies?
– Manage: how do governors and staff manage their statutory responsibilities, and, in particular, how do they respond to allegations about staff and other adults?
Include specific information and evidence where possible as to how you meet these areas.

SECTION 20 – SCHOOL UNIFORM POLICY

The DfE produces statutory guidance on the cost of school uniforms which you must consider when developing and implementing your school uniform policy. This guidance requires schools to publish your uniform policy on your website.

Requirements

  • You must publish your school uniform policy.

Collective Tip

The published uniform policy should be easy to understand and, where a school has a school uniform, should:
• clearly state whether an item is optional or required
• make clear if the item will only be worn at certain times of the year (for example, if it’s summer or winter uniform)
• make clear whether a generic item will be accepted or if a branded item is required
• make clear whether an item can only be purchased from a specific retailer or if it can be purchased more widely, including from second-hand retailers

SECTION 21 – SCHOOL OPENING HOURS

Requirements

  • You should publish on your website your school’s opening and closing times and the total time this amounts to in a typical week (for example 32.5 hours).
  • You should show the compulsory times the school is open. This time runs from the official start of the school day (morning registration) to the official end of the compulsory school day. It includes breaks, but not optional before or after school activities.

SECTION 21 – ADDITIONAL REQUIRED INFORMATION

Although information such as your Child Protection policy, Relationships and Sex education policy, and British Values are not included in the ‘what maintained schools must publish online’ guide, there is still a statutory requirement for you to make this, and other, information available online or through other means.

Please note that this is not an exhaustive list of other information that you should publish and serves only as a starting point for your consideration.

Requirements

Child Protection Policy

Relationships and Sex Education

  • You are required to have an up-to-date Relationships policy, which is made available to parents and others. The DfE states that this policy should be reviewed annually. Schools must provide a copy of the policy free of charge to anyone who asks for one and should publish the policy on the school website.
    To find out more, read Relationships and sex education (RSE) and health education

British Values

  • You are required to publish how you will incorporate British Values into the broader curriculum.
    Maintained schools have obligations under section 78 of the Education Act (2002) which requires schools, as part of a broad and balanced curriculum, to promote the spiritual, moral, cultural, mental and physical development of pupils at the school and of society.
    To find out more, read Promoting fundamental British values through SMSC

GDPR – Privacy Notice

  • You are required to have an up to date privacy notice which sets out what personal data is held for parents/guardians and their children in order to comply with GDPR. This should also explain why you hold the data, who it is shared with and the individuals’ rights in relation to how you process their data.
    • Subject access – your pupils and students have rights to see their personal information. They can make a request to access the personal information you hold about them. They – and their parents – also have the right to see their educational records.
    • Useful from the Information Commissioners Office – please just click the links
    o Guide to the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) o GDPR – FAQs for the education sector
    o Taking photographs in school
    o Publication of exam results by schools o Bring your own device (BYOD)

Remote Education

  • You should consider publishing information about your school’s remote education provision on your website.
    o An optional template is available to support schools with this requirement.
    o Find out more about remote education expectations in the actions for schools during the coronavirus
    (COVID-19 outbreak

Collecting and publishing governing board diversity data

  • You should consider publishing information about the diversity of your school’s governing body.
    • Diversity is important and the DfE wants governing boards to be increasingly reflective of the communities they serve.
    • The DfE encourages schools to collect and publish governing board members’ diversity data. Information must be widely accessible to members of the school community and the public. Board members can opt out of sharing their information, including protected characteristics, at any given time including after publication.
    • Schools must ensure that individuals cannot be identified through the publication of data, particularly
    when board member levels are low. Read more about this in the data protection toolkit for schools and
    Equality Act 2010: advice for schools.
    • There is no prescriptive way to collect diversity data from volunteers; this needs to be done on a voluntary
    basis. Schools may prefer to adopt a similar approach to how they collate the diversity data of pupils.

Collective Tip

Inspectors will consider three key areas:
– Identify the right children. How does the school do that?
– Help: what timely action do staff within the school take, and how well do they work with other agencies?
– Manage: how do governors and staff manage their statutory responsibilities, and, in particular, how do they respond to allegations about staff and other adults?
Include specific information and evidence where possible as to how you meet these areas.
09/01/2024
warblefly
News, Ofsted
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