Independent:
Parents reduced to crowdfunding for whiteboards due to education cuts
5 June 2017
Following years of government budget cuts, parents are now turning to crowdfunding websites in order to provide basic school supplies. Appeals have been launched on websites including Justgiving.com for online donations towards items such as whiteboards and computers, as well as to pay for crossing attendents. … Prime Minister has echoed this claim several times, stating in an interview with Andrew Marr: “The level of funding going into schools is at record level.” However, Professor Sandra McNally from the School of Economics, University of Surrey, published an article fact-checking this “highest level on record” claim. She explains that only the “per pupil expenditure” (the amount spent on each pupil) is relevant, rather than the total amount of money available. According to Professor McNally, current spending per pupil was “largely frozen in real terms” between 2010 and 2016. And as onward spending is frozen in cash terms, this will likely lead to a “real terms reduction of around 6.5 per cent by 2019-2020”.
Related links
Sandra McNally CEP publications webpage: http://cep.lse.ac.uk/_new/publications/author.asp?author=mcnally