Student Resource Package – Managing the Budget

Policy

This policy provides schools with information about managing their budgets.

Details

This section outlines some further requirements for schools in managing their budget and provides advice and further detail regarding specific aspects of the Student Resource Package (SRP) and staffing costs.

The Guidance tab provides information on the following categories:

• Salary and Related Expenditure – reports and processes to assist schools with the SRP Budget Management
• Relief Staffing – issues relating to teacher and other staff leave management
• Surplus/Deficit – credit financial position of a school
• Credit Carryover Policy
• Reports – some of the key SRP reports
• Planning – SRP modelling tool for school
• Reconciliation – the annual reconciliation cycle used to finalise the position of a school at the end of a budget year.
• Cash – Quarterly Cash Grants, offline payments and other information about cash payments
• Deficit Management and Workforce Bridging – assistance provisions for schools with deficit or workforce management issues
• Principal Classification Budget – remuneration range for each principal position
• Enrolment Variation Funding

In particular, the information in the guidance on how to manage the budget sets out the following requirements for schools.

Workforce planning

• All schools are expected to have planning strategies in place to manage their workforce requirements within available funds, including adequate provision for relief staffing.
  • Casual relief teaching staff are to be provided only when face-to-face teaching is required and where no internal resources are available.
  • School workforce plans must include contingency planning to deal with changing circumstances, including factors such as enrolment variations and changing workforce commitments.
• Schools participating in re-organisations are expected to undertake workforce planning within their overall budget allocation while giving due consideration to clauses contained in the department's Human Resources School Merger or Closure — Staffing Guide.
• Teacher relief for periods in excess of 30 working days must be through fixed-term arrangements on eduPay. If a casual relief teacher is used initially because the absence is believed to be short-term, the employment must be converted, where the teacher is absent on personal leave, to fixed-term immediately when it is recognised that the absence will extend beyond 30 days. Refer to the Casual Relief policy.
• A school is responsible for administering pay and workplace entitlements for the period of employment, as recorded in eduPay, undertaken at that school.

Budgeting requirements

• Actual salary costs on eduPay are charged to schools each year according to the actual number of working days in the year. Schools must take into account the minor variations in working days as part of their normal budget planning.
• Credit/cash transfer (CCT) requests must be based on the annual amount of the transfer (not monthly or quarterly) except where the transfer relates to a surplus brought forward from the previous year or an accumulated balance.
• All cash payments must be recorded appropriately in CASES21 Finance using the general ledger and sub-program codes provided in the EFT remittance advice descriptions.
• Where there is insufficient overall credit surplus in the SRP to employ relief, schools must have a deficit management strategy in place to reduce the deficit and to meet relief contingencies, having a view to using both the credit and cash components of the SRP.

Related policies

• Student Resource Package – Overview
• Student Resource Package – Core Student Learning Allocation funding (Student Based Funding)
• Student Resource Package – Equity Funding (Student Based Funding)
• Student Resource Package – School Infrastructure
• Student Resource Package – School Specific Programs
• Student Resource Package – Targeted Initiatives

Other contacts

For regional contacts, refer to Office locations.