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Reminder—2023 school-year data is closing to make way for 2024 data!

By Somerset Education


 

Many thanks for your support of the Financial Survey for Schools (FSS). Joining the Financial Survey for Schools (FSS) not only empowers you with data-driven decisions but also contributes to sector innovation and improvement. Every participant adds to the comprehensive dataset, benefiting all schools.

Key Dates 
In preparation to receive the 2024 school-year data, at 5pm Friday 18 April 2025 we will close Option 1 Enter Financial Data – 2023 School Year on the FSS portal. You will still have access to your 2023 school-year reports (Options 2 to 11 on the Somerset Education portal) until early July 2025.

This means that after 18 April 2024, you will no longer be able to enter or change 2023 school-year data.

If you do not have a copy of your 2023 school-year data, please go to the last page of the survey (via selection 1 on the portal) to download a pdf version — see screen shot below:

For Australian schools, data input for the Financial Survey for Schools is based on the latest Commonwealth Financial Questionnaire which is now available. We plan that from Monday 21 April 2025 you will be able to enter the 2024 school-year data into the FSS. And we aim to have 2025 reports (2024 school-year) available from 1 August 2025.

Q | Any questions?

For more information about the FSS or our budgeting and reporting tools, please do not hesitate to contact Cathy or Jessica at survey@somerseteducation.net or call 1300 781 968 (from outside Australia +61 7 3263 5300).

If I can help in any way with the financial governance of your school, please contact me at john@somerseteducation.net or mobile 0417 618 899.

We look forward to your ongoing support, or if new to the survey, we warmly welcome you joining in.

 

REMINDER | Last chance to help us improve the Financial Survey for Schools

By Somerset Education


 

Thank you to those who have already provided feedback on the survey! As a valued member of the non-government school sector, your contribution to the continual improvement of the Financial Survey for Schools (FSS) is invaluable.

Irrespective of whether your school participated in 2024, we would greatly appreciate it if you could take just six-minutes to complete this important Feedback Survey on the FSS.

Your contribution will directly influence improvements to the FSS which will be discussed at our upcoming survey committee meeting with ASBA and CEBA. Please send your feedback no later than by Friday 28 March 2025.

Thank you again for your support of our mission to help schools make confident financial decisions, maintain sector financial health, and positively contribute to the education of youth.

We look forward to our continual relationship with you and your school

Q | Any questions?

For more information about the FSS or our budgeting and reporting tools, please do not hesitate to contact Cathy or Jessica at survey@somerseteducation.net or call 1300 781 968 (from outside Australia +61 7 3263 5300).

If I can help in any way with the financial governance of your school, please contact me at john@somerseteducation.net or mobile 0417 618 899.

We look forward to your ongoing support, or if new to the survey, we warmly welcome you joining in.

 

How to secure part of $450 million capital grants for non-government schools

By Somerset Education


 

In 2024, Australian governments approved over $450 million in capital grants to more than 337 non-government schools to improve school infrastructure. This funding translates to an average grant of approximately $1.3 million per school.
 
As non-government school enrolments grow and costs increase, these grants address critical infrastructure needs for schools with demonstrated financial need. And we know an important attribute of financially sustainable schools is maintaining and improving facilities.
 
Capital grant programs available 
Information from Government websites about various funding programs include: 

Applications for grant funding must be made to the Block Grant Authority in your state or territory.

How Somerset Education can assist your school
Somerset Education can provide assistance with the preparation or review of applications in accordance with Australian and State government program guidelines. This helps schools to:

  • Ensure the project aligns with minimum viable project principles
  • Develop project justification documentation
  • Develop multi-year budget models
  • Assess the financial capacity of the school
  • Determine the requested capital grant in support of the project.
Our SKI Scenario Builder™ forecasting tool offers advanced support for planning capital expenditure, funding and borrowing strategies. This tool ensures that schools can present robust financial plans as part of their BGA applications including “what if” scenarios. Our multi-year budget model is also available. This model builds a Statement of Comprehensive Income, Cash Flows, and Financial Position (Balance Sheet) 10 years into the future plus a KPI sheet which analyses key ratios.

Somerset team experience
John Somerset | John is a Fellow of Chartered Accountants Australia and New Zealand (FCA) with qualifications in Commerce plus a Master of Business by Research on the topic of school financial sustainability. John has over 38 years’ experience in chartered accounting with the past 28 years focused on the Independent Schools sector including benchmarking, financial analysis and governance.
Contact | Email john@somerseteducation.net or phone 0417 618 899.

David Reed | David is a Fellow Certified Practicing Accountant (FCPA) with qualifications in Business, Finance and Accounting plus a Master of Business Administration. David has over 12 years’ experience in the education business sector, including a concurrent role on the finance advisory committee of ISQ BGA for five years. 
Contact | Email david@somerseteducation.net or phone 0429 164 528.

Next steps
To seek support or a review of your capital application, or for more information, reach out to David or John at Somerset Education. 
 

Kindest regards
David, John, and the Somerset Education team.

 

Q | Any questions?

For more information about the FSS or our budgeting and reporting tools, please do not hesitate to contact Cathy or Jessica at survey@somerseteducation.net or call 1300 781 968 (from outside Australia +61 7 3263 5300).

If I can help in any way with the financial governance of your school, please contact me at john@somerseteducation.net or mobile 0417 618 899.

We look forward to your ongoing support, or if new to the survey, we warmly welcome you joining in.

 

First 100 days towards financial sustainability — for school business leaders

By Somerset Education


 

Despite unyielding changes in both internal and external environments, it remains crucial for schools to maintain financial sustainability. This requirement is mandated by Australian governments, overseen by school governors, and entrusted to principals and school business leaders for implementation. So, what exactly is financial sustainability in schools and how is it achieved?

To date, no commonly accepted definition of a financially sustainable school exists. However, Somerset Education research provides the following:
A financially sustainable independent school responds to stakeholder needs by using strengths, managing weaknesses, generating adequate operating surpluses to fund debt, reinvestment and cash reserves, identifies changing circumstances, and adapts in a timely manner.

Simply, set a target Net Operating Margin (operating surplus) to ensure you can adequately meet debt servicing, asset replacement, and cash reserve needs and if things change, re-forecast, and adapt in a timely manner.

Understanding stakeholder needs 
Whether you’re a new or seasoned school governor, principal, or business leader, the initial step toward achieving financial sustainability involves understanding stakeholder needs from three perspectives.

Financial needs

  1. Cash flow: What level of operating surplus is necessary to service debt and replace assets?
  2. Cash reserves: What is the minimum level of cash reserves for the school?
  3. Debt and debt servicing: How much debt can the school responsibly manage?
  4. Ratios and benchmarks: What do the trends in your school’s key ratios tell you and comparing with others what is the target improvement and in which areas?

Non-financial needs

  1. Enrolments: What is your enrolment trend, catchment demographic and fee affordability?
  2. Culture: How can a positive and innovative culture be enhanced?
  3. Service quality: Does the quality of teaching and learning and student wellbeing meet expectations?
  4. Facilities: Are facilities being updated and aligned with quality teaching and learning standards?
  5. Staff: How can you attract and retain high-quality, engaged, and innovative staff?

Leadership needs

  1. Board quality and governance: Does the skills mix, culture, and systems support effective governance?
  2. Strategy: Is the strategic plan effective, monitored, and achieving its objectives?
  3. Management quality: How can the financial literacy skills of school management be enhanced?
  4. Budgeting and reporting: Is it timely, accurate and is re-forecasting done during the year?
  5. Stakeholder management: How do you monitor and meet the needs of parents, students, staff, banks others?

3-month action plan
Several actions can be implemented within 100 days to help financial sustainability. It may be wise to gather, listen and understand in the first 100 days rather than act too quickly. Focus on insight.

👀 Month 1 | Understanding the lay of the land

  • Gather essential documents such as the board/management calendar including audit and AGM, strategic plan, master building plan, approved budgets (current year and five years), financial policies, compliance/lodgement checklists and feedback from parent, staff and student satisfaction surveys.
  • Understand delegations of authority including bank accounts and bank operating procedures.
  • Assess financial report working papers, accuracy and timeliness, and the finance team’s skills.
  • Assess the Board’s skills to identify gaps in areas such as education, finance, technology, law, governance, commerce, risk management and built environments. You may need to support/manage up.
  • Understand what finance reports the Principal and Board receive and consider using the Somerset Education One-page Monthly Finance Report as an easy, economical and fulsome option.
  • Consider financial literacy professional development needs to support governors and managers.
  • Ensure school management understands the financial implications of major decisions including reference to agreed financial policies and risk thresholds e.g. Net Operating Margin, debt servicing, cash reserves.
  • Analyse enrolment trends across the whole school and relevant sub-schools.
  • Evaluate financial performance and risk through three key questions:
    • Are we profitable? Review trends in net operating margin compared to your budget and similar schools.
    • Are we solvent? Does working capital ratio exceeds 1.0 and 1-3 month’s expenses in cash reserves.
    • Are we sustainable? Does operating surplus cover asset reinvestment plus debt servicing.

🚧 Month 2 | Averting any impending financial stress and how can we be stronger

  • Review or establish governing body handbooks or charters to clarify roles, responsibilities, procedures, and financial risk thresholds for key ratios.
  • Collaborate with stakeholders to understand strategy, key performance indicators (KPIs) for financial and non-financial areas and use these to set and monitor policies and performance.
  • Use the Somerset Education Comparative Financial Report (benchmarking) to identify and quantify financial strengths and weaknesses to help target operational improvements.
  • Review short-term budgets and year-end forecasts to ensure the production of reliable and relevant management reports and timely decisions to avert unwanted financial “surprises” at year end.
  • Develop an action plan to address immediate concerns identified.

⭐️ Month 3 | Setting a plan

  • Discuss the strategy and long-term budget with key stakeholders to ensure progress towards KPI’s is reported on a regular basis to remedy any shortfalls.
  • Conduct scenario planning to anticipate and manage changes in enrolments, income, expenditure, staffing, capital expenditure, or borrowings to maintain financial sustainability.
  • Develop or revise a long-term budget that supports strategic and operational plans whilst maintaining KPI’s related to profitability, solvency, and sustainability.

The bottom line
After 100 days you should have a good understanding of the strategy and its alignment with the school budget, financial risks, and current performance including how financial risk can be mitigated.

At Somerset Education, our mission is to enable leaders to achieve the school’s vision by offering simple, intuitive financial tools and advice to help make financial decisions with confidence. Our tools include: the Financial Survey for Schools (FSS), Staff Estimator, 10-year school budget, Somerset Key Indicator (SKI) Report, and SKI Scenario Builder™. Additionally, our practical and interactive Board and Management Presentation financial governance, literacy, decision making, and therefore financial sustainability. Please contact us for more information.

FSS | Participate now 
If you haven’t yet participated in the FSS, it is not too late, you can do so until April 2025. Your participation in this comprehensive database benefits your school and all schools by informing financial decisions and driving industry sustainability.

Q | Any questions?

For more information about the FSS or our budgeting and reporting tools, please do not hesitate to contact Cathy or Jessica at survey@somerseteducation.net or call 1300 781 968 (from outside Australia +61 7 3263 5300).

If I can help in any way with the financial governance of your school, please contact me at john@somerseteducation.net or mobile 0417 618 899.

We look forward to your ongoing support, or if new to the survey, we warmly welcome you joining in.

 

Season’s Greetings from Somerset Education

By Somerset Education


 

We sincerely thank you for your continued support of the Financial Survey for Schools (FSS) and the work we do.

Highlights for 2024 include:

⭐️ 2024 Financial Survey for Schools (FSS)

  • Reconvened survey committee (ASBA, CEBA, AIS)
  • 500 schools participated to date
  • 80 schools underway — Reminder 2024 survey (2023 school-year data) closes in April 2025
  • Participants represent $13.3 billion in turnover, 462,000 enrolments (60% of Australian Independent school enrolments)
  • Approximately 2,000 reports generated
  • 40 + presentations to individual schools and groups
  • Consistent 10 out of 10 customer satisfaction — thank you.
“John Somerset has been an important partner with our school…. His work has been critical in enabling us to plan and grow. John understands the independent sector and provides deep insight to the key factors to support sustainable schools. His regular reports provide our Finance Committee with data to monitor and support careful stewardship, allowing us to monitor and benchmark our practice. …I strongly recommend his range of services.”
David Smith, Principal, Calrossy Anglican School, October 2024

⭐️ Enhancements this year
  • Improved IT survey
  • New ratios re Students with disability and fee collection
  • SKI Scenario Report proving to be a brilliant forecasting tool
  • ELC survey — 101 participants in year 1 — thank you for your support
  • Saving valuable time — FSS data upload using FQ and SKI Report data upload
  • Inaugural participation from International schools in Asia Pacific.
⭐️ Welcome to the Somerset Education team
  • Mike Zammit, School Advisor — experienced school Business Manager, based in Victoria
  • Cheryl Taylor, Accountant.


The Somerset Team and associates celebrating a successful 2024 at our year-end celebrations at Tattersall’s Club, Brisbane.

FSS | Participate now 
If you haven’t yet participated in the FSS, it is not too late, you can do so until April 2025. Your participation in this comprehensive database benefits your school and all schools by informing financial decisions and driving industry sustainability.

Q | Any questions?

For more information about the FSS or our budgeting and reporting tools, please do not hesitate to contact Cathy or Jessica at survey@somerseteducation.net or call 1300 781 968 (from outside Australia +61 7 3263 5300).

If I can help in any way with the financial governance of your school, please contact me at john@somerseteducation.net or mobile 0417 618 899.

We look forward to your ongoing support, or if new to the survey, we warmly welcome you joining in.

 

School budgets — a key to financial confidence

By Somerset Education


In the September blog, we discussed good budgeting being the key to financial confidence around cost control, fee affordability, and funding capital expenditure.

In recent weeks we have helped several schools to integrity-check their budget and develop options to achieve operational, capital expenditure, and loan servicing needs. Here are some 🎬 short videos explaining how you can do this efficiently and effectively using Somerset Education tools.

1 | 3-Way Budget Model

  • How to use the 3-Way Budget Model to improve and enhance the financial confidence in your overall budget.

2 | Budget Integrity 

  • Learn how to use your KPI sheet in our budget model to improve budget integrity.

3 | Staff Estimator

  • Compare your staff with similar schools to inform staffing decisions.

4 | Budget Scenarios

  • Learn how to use the SKI Scenario Builder™ tool to instantly “dollarise” and risk assess budget options.

How we can help

  • Financial Survey for Schools (FSS) — Join up to 600 participating schools to make data-driven financial decisions with confidence by analysing trends in your performance plus comparing KPIs with similar schools. Every participant adds to the comprehensive dataset which benefits all schools and drives industry progress.
  • Budget Model — If you don’t have a reliable school budget model, contact us because we have a very detailed three-way (comprehensive income, financial position, and cash flow) model that references back to sample average KPIs that you can obtain from the FSS.
  • SKI Scenario Builder™ — Use this FSS tool to easily evaluate the financial impact on budgets for changes in key metrics and test strategic scenarios. This tool reduces forecasting to seconds enabling you to meaningfully discuss strategies while the key decision makers are in the room.

FSS | Participate now 
The FSS is always open and currently receiving data for the 2023 school year. Participation starts from AU$1,045 including GST (half price if less than 250 enrolments).

Q | Any questions?

For more information about the FSS or our budgeting and reporting tools, please do not hesitate to contact Cathy or Jessica at survey@somerseteducation.net or call 1300 781 968 (from outside Australia +61 7 3263 5300).

If I can help in any way with the financial governance of your school, please contact me at john@somerseteducation.net or mobile 0417 618 899.

We look forward to your ongoing support, or if new to the survey, we warmly welcome you joining in.

 

Expenses up by 10%, what are the solutions?

By Somerset Education


What schools want
We run a number of presentations each year using the Financial Survey for Schools (FSS) to analyse schools’ performance, pinpoint risks and provide solutions to mitigate these risks. At every presentation we ask for feedback including what worries schools and what more information they want from us.

This year schools are telling us they want to understand industry trends and find solutions to address increasing costs, especially wages, and how to set affordable fees whilst funding capital expenditure and debt servicing.

This is not surprising given preliminary results show average expenses for independent schools rose 10% in 2023 over the prior year and income is struggling to keep pace.

With cost pressures expected to continue in 2024 and 2025, how do schools set fee levels to sustainably fund capital expenditure and debt servicing?

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💡 | Solutions

To address these questions, some steps schools can take include the following:

  • Develop a detailed budget to at least 2028 which also calculates your school’s past and budgeted key ratios (including income and expenditure per student, net operating margin, staffing, cash reserves, debt and debt servicing) to highlight trends and address areas of concern — be like the canary in the mine to raise warnings.
  • Use ratio averages of similar schools to pinpoint areas for continual improvement and inform strategy. 🎬 This video may assist — 20-minute crash course on school analysis. 
  • Uncover potential efficiencies to restrain fee increases and maintain adequate operating surpluses to meet capital expenditure and debt servicing needs. Don’t over borrow.
  • Test strategies using a financial forecasting tool before updating your detailed budget.

📈 | How we can help

  • Financial Survey for Schools (FSS) — join over 600 participating schools to make data-driven financial decisions with confidence by analysing trends in your performance plus compare with similar schools. Every participant adds to the comprehensive dataset which benefits all schools and drives industry progress.
  • Budget Model — If you don’t have a reliable school budget model, contact us because we have a very detailed three-way (comprehensive income, financial position and cash flow) model that references back to sample average KPIs that you can obtain from the FSS.
  • SKI Scenario Builder™ — use this FSS tool to easily evaluate the financial impact on budgets for changes in key metrics and test strategic scenarios. This tool reduces forecasting to seconds enabling you to meaningfully discuss strategies while the key decision makers are in the room.

FSS | Participate now to take advantage of early bird prices 
Even though the FSS is always open and can receive participant data at any time until April 2025, schools are encouraged to complete their 2023 school-year data entry by 30 September 2024 in readiness for the 2024 strategy and budget season.

Participation starts from AU$913 including GST (half price if less than 250 enrolments). This includes an early bird discount if you complete data entry by 30 September 2024.

Q | Any questions?

For more information about the FSS or our budgeting and reporting tools, please do not hesitate to contact Cathy or Jessica at survey@somerseteducation.net or call 1300 781 968 (from outside Australia +61 7 3263 5300).

If I can help in any way with the financial governance of your school, please contact me at john@somerseteducation.net or mobile 0417 618 899.

We look forward to your ongoing support, or if new to the survey, we warmly welcome you joining in.

 

Now available! Improved 2024 (2023 school-year) Financial Survey for Schools(FSS) Reports to help you look ahead with confidence…

By Somerset Education



Reports available and samples will grow as more school complete
2024 (2023 school year) ratio analysis/benchmarking FSS reports are now available. Samples will grow as more schools participate over the months ahead.

Haven’t entered your data yet? Don’t worry it’s not too late you can participate at any time but early bird participation prices* end on 30 September, 2024.

Our mission is simple: equip schools with knowledge and confidence to make informed financial decisions, mitigate risk and reduce financial worries… with ease. So, joining the Financial Survey for Schools (FSS) not only empowers you with data-driven decisions but also contributes to innovation and continual improvement of the sector. Every participant adds to the comprehensive dataset benefiting all schools.

So why wait, participate now and be part of the largest and longest running school financial survey in Australia and New Zealand.

R&D improvements to school financial sustainability reports
Somerset Education has unparalleled experience in school business with almost 40 years in chartered accounting including almost 30 years dedicated to non-government school financial health. John’s Masters research identified attributes of financially sustainable schools and his current PhD is aimed at predicting and prevent financial stress in schools — benefiting participants no matter the size of the school.

🎬 This 5-minute video is worth watching to see how reports have benefited from research in the past 12 months. Also new this year is, our first Early Learning Centre (ELC) industry benchmarking report.

Access to FSS Reports 
Please log into the Somerset Portal and then:

  1. Accept updated Terms and Conditions (if required)
  2. Select a sample of similar schools
  3. Generate your reports.

To assist you with accessing the Portal, here are the step-by-step instructions: Navigating the Somerset Education Portal.

Updated | 20-minute ‘crash course’ video to help you read and analyse FSS reports 
Watch this recently updated video to help analyse your school’s FSS reports. The great thing about this video is that you can ‘pause’ or ‘replay’ as you view your reports. Hope you find this useful.  🎬 Here’s the video link.

FSS | Participate now
Schools can participate at any time until April next year, but early bird prices* end on 30 September, 2024. (*Early bird price -– Survey completed and invoice requested prior to 30 September, 2024.)To encourage schools to use both trend and comparative analysis, Somerset Education offers the Financial Performance Report, Historical Report (school’s results 2018 to 2023) and SKI Report (school’s results 2022 to 2028) as a package. The Package price — including past participant loyalty discount — is AU$1,800 (plus GST) per school for all three reports; or half price — AU$900 (plus GST) —  if less than 250 enrolments. This discount means you almost receive three reports for the price of two.

Q | Any questions?

For more information about the FSS or our budgeting and reporting tools, please do not hesitate to contact Cathy or Jessica at survey@somerseteducation.net or call 1300 781 968 (from outside Australia +61 7 3263 5300).

If I can help in any way with the financial governance of your school, please contact me at john@somerseteducation.net or mobile 0417 618 899.

We look forward to your ongoing support, or if new to the survey, we warmly welcome you joining in.

 

2022 School-year reports closing to make way for 2023 reports!

By Somerset Education


 

Many thanks for your support of the Financial Survey for Schools (FSS).

2022 School-year reports close Monday, 15 July 2024
On Monday, 15 July 2024, we will close Options 2 to 9 on the FSS portal to make way for the 2023 school-year reports. So please make sure you have downloaded and saved last year’s survey reports (2022 school-year) before that date.

During this time, you can still enter your 2023 school-year data (Option 1).

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Target release of 2023 school-year reports on Thursday, 1 August 2024.
We are aiming to release 2023 school-year FSS reports on Thursday, 1 August 2023, which is why we need to close last year’s reporting so we can prepare and test the system.

Continual improvement 
In response to sector needs, this year’s reports include a revamped IT benchmarking report, a new Early Learning Centre (ELC) benchmarking report and our revolutionary SKI Scenario Builder™ that enables adjustments to key variables to instantly re-forecast budgeted financials, key ratios and risk assessment.

Accessing the Portal
To assist you with accessing the Portal, here are the step-by-step instructions: Navigating the Somerset Education Portal.

🎥 NEW | To ensure every school has access to important videos, we are pleased to announce our Financial Governance Training Videos as well as our ‘How to…’ Instructional Videos are now available on-demand for those who wish to undertake further training. To access the videos here is the link: Training Videos.

Q | Any questions?

For more information about the FSS or our budgeting and reporting tools, please do not hesitate to contact Cathy or Jessica at survey@somerseteducation.net or call 1300 781 968 (from outside Australia +61 7 3263 5300).

If I can help in any way with the financial governance of your school, please contact me at john@somerseteducation.net or mobile 0417 618 899.

We look forward to your ongoing support, or if new to the survey, we warmly welcome you joining in.

 

‘Heads Up’ on early results from FSS

By Somerset Education


 

Positive Feedback
The Financial Survey for Schools (FSS) has been operating for almost 30 years, growing to over 600 participants in 2023 from Australia and New Zealand. It represents 70%+ of enrolments in Australian Independent schools. With average satisfaction of 4.2 stars (out of 5) and 10 out of 10 recommending it to others, we are confident the FSS is valued by the sector.

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Figure 1: Results of satisfaction survey conducted April 2024.

Innovation
We discussed feedback at a survey committee meeting represented by Association of School Business Administrators (ASBA), Catholic Education Business Administrators (CEBA), Association of Independent Schools (AIS), and Netstrategy (IT and cybersecurity specialists). Outcomes include first time Early Learning Centre (ELC) benchmarks, improved IT survey benchmarks among other continual improvements.

Participate now
With your AGM and Commonwealth Financial Questionnaire (FQ) done, it’s the perfect time to complete the survey. Joining the Financial Survey for Schools (FSS) not only empowers you with data-driven decisions but also contributes to sector innovation and improvement. Every participant adds to the comprehensive dataset, benefiting all schools. So, why wait? Let’s create a benchmarking resource that sets the standard for non-government school financial sustainability and drives industry progress.

Participation currently starts from A$913 including GST (half price if less than 250 enrolments). This includes an early bird discount if you complete data entry by 30 September 2024. [Note: 2024 (2023 school-year) data entry remains open as we transition to 2023 school-year reports available from 1st August 2024. We will turn off 2022 school-year reports on 15 July 2024.]

2024 FSS (2023 school-year) sneak peek
We appreciate growing financial pressure from large wage increases, payroll tax for some schools, over budget capital expenditure, changes in government funding and financial pressure on families during this period of high inflation. Survey participants can use the FSS to identify efficiencies and subscribe for our SKI Scenario Builder™ tool to model changes to key budget inputs and instantly re-forecast financials, key ratios, and risk assessment — a must have tool for schools.

Early 2023 school-year results indicate a 4% increase in expenses, reduced operating surpluses mitigated by reduced debt. Our new ELC survey indicates a strong contribution to operating surplus especially if ELC wages are kept close to the average of 66% of income. The improved IT survey indicates an average recurrent IT expenditure of A$850 per student; 67% of schools have adopted a cybersecurity framework but only 35% of boards have a governor with IT experience.

Participate in the FSS to compare your performance with similar schools in these and many more crucial ratios to help inform decisions — your statutory and fiduciary responsibility.

🎥 NEW | To ensure every school has access to important videos, we are pleased to announce our Financial Governance Training Videos as well as our ‘How to…’ Instructional Videos are now available on-demand for those who wish to undertake further training. To access the videos here is the link: Training Videos.

 

Q | Any questions?

For more information about the FSS or our budgeting and reporting tools, please do not hesitate to contact Cathy or Jessica at survey@somerseteducation.net or call 1300 781 968 (from outside Australia +61 7 3263 5300).

If I can help in any way with the financial governance of your school, please contact me at john@somerseteducation.net or mobile 0417 618 899.

We look forward to your ongoing support, or if new to the survey, we warmly welcome you joining in.