Education improvement charity calls in administrators
Nina Jacobs
Sunday, October 17, 2021
Education improvement charity Achievement for All has gone into administration citing the “double impact” of the pandemic and pressures on school budgets on its ability to continue trading.
A statement issued on Friday (October 15) by the charity’s chair Dr Kulvarn Atwal said following financial advice its board of trustees had taken the “very difficult decision” to cease trading with immediate effect and enter formal administration.
The not-for-profit organisation, which worked in partnership with early years settings, schools and colleges to improve outcomes for children and young people, is reported to have folded with a deficit of around £1m.
According to the latest accounts for Achievement for All Ltd (3As), programmes were delivered to 30,000 children in 1,879 schools across England and Wales in the 12 months to March last year.
However, records for the financial year ending March 2020 show a deficit of £1.04m and net liabilities of around £1.18m, indicating it was facing significant financial pressures before the Covid-19 crisis started.
In its trustees’ report published in January, the charity says Covid impacted on the start date of projects in March 2020, with programme income down by £852,000 and a reduction in project income of £254,000.
It estimates around 40 per cent of its project income did not “materialise or start delivery” in the financial year.
Atwal said despite the challenges presented by the pandemic, staff had worked “tirelessly” throughout to attract new funding and to create new opportunities for schools and settings.
“However, the double impact of the pandemic and current pressures on school budgets means that we are currently no longer able to complete our programmes to schools and settings or offer new programmes,” he said.
“Our priorities and focus going forwards are our staff and partners. Many of our staff are long-term employees and have gone above and beyond, throughout the 10 years of the charity’s existence,” he added.
Atwal said the charity was “working hard” to enable current schools and settings to continue accessing online resources that had been created and developed in the past decade.
“We sincerely thank all schools, settings and their leaders who have worked with us over the years to improve the life chances of all children and young people,” he said.
The charity has instructed FRP Advisory to act as administrators and said it would contact staff to advise on the next steps.
The closure of the charity follows a highly critical evaluation of its whole-school improvement programme for Key Stage 2 pupils carried out by the Education Endowment Foundation.
A two-year randomised trial in 134 primary schools between 2016 and 2018 concluded the AfA programme did not improve academic outcomes and had “a detrimental effect on learning”.
Releasing the results last year, the foundation said it had done so to allow schools planning for 2021 to access information on a programme they might be considering delivering.
“On the basis of these highly secure findings, we recommend that schools think carefully before purchasing and using Afa,” it said.
