2021-05-31-accounts - The Education Futures Collaboration

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The Education Futures Collaboration Trustees’ Annual Report 1[st] June 2020 – 31[st] May 2021

Charity name: The Education Futures Collaboration Registered charity number: 1157511 Charity’s principal address: c/o Hewitsons, Exchange House 456 Midsummer Boulevard Milton Keynes MK9 2EA Trustees: Prof Marilyn Leask – co-chair Dr Sarah Younie – co-chair Mr Michael Blamires Mr Jonathan Noakes Mr Stephen Hall

Aims

The Education Futures Collaboration is an education sector developed and managed initiative, providing an e-infrastructure to support education as it transforms into a ‘knowledge industry’ and supporting knowledge transfer, collaborative knowledge building and sharing within education sectors in individual countries as well as worldwide.

We aim to professionalise teaching and to support professional judgement with evidence through the creation of a sustainable model for knowledge mobilisation and collaboration using digital tools in the education sector.

Objectives

We define success as increasing numbers of educators, worldwide, using the MESHGuides to support decision making. For a number of subject areas, we have been inundated with expressions of interest.

Transform the quality of learning and teaching in education by providing accessible relevant research informed professional knowledge.
Create a joined-up education profession linking pockets of excellence in teaching, research, and evidence-based practice.
Provide diagnosis and intervention strategies to help educators and students overcome misconceptions and break through barriers to learning threshold concepts.
Develop models of transformational and translational research in education, using scalable and cost-effective technologies.

Activities

International partnerships - UN Teacher Task Force

The EFC (MESH project) has formally been appointed as an NGO to the UN International Teacher Task Force (UN TTF) this year. This involves regular meetings with the UN TTF panel, and EFC membership to the thematic sub-groups of this panel. See above for EFC personnel and groups in which we are represented.

International partnerships - VSO

EFC/MESH has been working collaboratively with VSO (International Volunteer Services Overseas) on multiple projects this year; including ‘Numeracy for All’; 'Inclusive Education' and ‘Psycho-Social Development’. In addition, VSO & EFC collaborated on a UNICEF bid to deliver teacher education in Cambodia

International partnerships - ICET

EFC/MESH worked with ICET (International Council on Education for Teaching) in 2020 leading online webinars for teachers globally, collecting data via focus groups to produce a report in 2021. This included LMIC (low- and middle-income countries) and an analysis and evaluation of the COVID-19 pandemic on education.

International publications – ICET/MESH Global Report 2021

The ICET/MESH Global Report was published in autumn 2021 and is available on the MESH website. This publication reports on the research that was undertaken during the global webinars on COVID19. Report - ‘Teachers’ Experiences during Covid-19 ‘.

Research Project BRIST Project - 2019-2022 (Building a Research Infrastructure for Teachers)

Erasmus is a European grant to help develop global citizens. Academics from the Education Futures Collaboration Charity, working on the MESH project, have joined forces with the University of Hull, to lead a three-year international project that will develop teachers’ research skills and networking practices. The researchers have been awarded €354k of European funding for the project, which will develop teachers into teacher-researchers and evidence-informed practitioners through an innovative infrastructure. The budget is allocated for specific actions allocated to different partners in the project. The funding was awarded through the Erasmus+ programme, which supports international partnerships seeking to enhance education. The Education Futures Collaboration Charity and the University of Hull has been joined with research partners from across Europe, including the Republic of Ireland, Poland, Greece and Spain. The project is seeking to inform teacher education practice in its partner countries and strategically target stakeholders and policy makers at its external multiplier events. The resources will also be made freely available for across the European Union, following project completion in August 2022.

MESHGuide Development

One of the main achievements of the EFC is the publishing of MESHGuides. There continues to be much interest in writing for MESH across a range of relevant topics. Much developmental work has been undertaken this year which welcomes new authors and has the potential to secure completed Guides in the future. Statistics show an extremely buoyant picture of MESHGuide use in the last year. 2 new guides were published this year:

Video-supported collaborative learning. Dr Minna Koskinen et al Schools as learning Organisations. Dr Jonathan Doherty

Communication and Publicity

Several key communication and publicity activities have taken place during the year. They include:

Naace Journal (August 2021); MESHGuides article published with specific reference to Rohingya project.
Gaining a shared focus for the potential of MESHGuides to play a major role in reshaping education post Covid-19 locally, regionally, nationally and internationally.
Launching and supporting extensive Twitter and LinkedIn campaigns with a consistent approach and style to sharing news and events.

Website Reach

The main point of access for people is the website. The MESHGuides themselves get the most views with almost 250,000 pageviews in the last year. The Philippines is the largest viewer of the guide’s site. The main webpage had around 15,000 pageviews. The MESHGuides have seen an extra 50,000 views on the previous year.

Further Work

Members of the steering group continue to contribute to education research and development across the world. Some of these activities have been working with a number of VSO countries including Nepal, Kenya, Pakistan, Uganda, and Nigeria. From this work courses and briefings on Psycho Social Skills have been done, including the creation of a resource wall. Also created were resources that included information a number of areas that are not so well covered such as selfharm and bereavement. Alongside this there has been work on the Research Informed School Self Evaluation Toolkit (RISE) which is now at a pilot stage.

EFC Board

The EFC trustees are supported by the EFC board. This group sets and reviews the short-term and long-term strategy. Decisions are normally made on the basis of consensus at board meetings, but the trustees have the ultimate legal responsibility. The name below are the list of current board members and the roles they have on the board:

|Marilyn Leask|Co-chair | STEM rep on UN TTF| |---|---| |Sarah Younie|Co-chair | Rep on UN TT Panel and thematic group for Inclusion| |Jon Audain|Newsletter and social media| |Mike Blamires|Core editorial team on MESHGuides | Badging development| |Linda Delvin|Twitter strategy | Rep on UN TTF – thematic group for school leadership| |Jonathon Doherty|MESHGuide development | Rep on UN TTF early childhood| |Stephen Hall|Communications & media lead | Rep on UN TTF School Leadership| |Christina Preston|Press lead|

Richard Procter	MESHGuides Website and software development Officer
Matt Scase	Finance Officer
Chris Shelton	Teacher education lead
Purna Shrestha	Guest Partner - VSO international – link to projects and UN TTF work

Next Steps

Our major challenges for the next few years are filling the gaps and managing the financial burden of expansion of use – editorial and web hosting costs increase with usage.

The next stage of development then, is necessarily focused on establishing sustainable funding and a number of models are relevant. A major challenge is that we wish to keep resources open to all at the point of use. National subscriptions which provide access to all teachers, parents and learners are the most obvious solution to this challenge.

Public Benefit Statement

The Trustees confirm that they have referred to the guidance contained in the Charity Commission's general guidance on public benefit when reviewing the charity's aims and objectives and in planning future activities. The trustees refer to public benefit throughout this report.

Our charity was set up to benefit the general public and in particular education professionals and students. The organisation's purpose is beneficial as is aims to advance the standards of education and in particular, teaching, learning, research and collaboration amongst education professionals. The trustees are not aware of any detriment or harm which might result from the organisation’s purpose. The charity has a Conflict of Interest Register, which is updated at every Management Meeting and Meeting of Trustees.

Financial Review

It has been agreed to keep one year’s worth of regular expenditure in reserve. This is to cover costs of such things like web hosting, tech support and the finance role. Therefore, it is agreed the reserves should be kept at £2,000.

On top of our reserve policy, it is agreed to make sure we carry enough money to be able to support the running of the website, hosting the MESHGuides, for a least the next five years.

Annual accounts for the financial year 1[st] June 2020 – 31[st] May 2021

Opening Balance	1st June 2020	£21,944.50
Receipts
EFC BRIST Project		£5,738.66
Other		£5.00
Total		£5,743.66
Payments
EFC Brist Project		£5,149.05
VSO Numeracy Project		£40.00

Technical Support £1,000.00 Website Costs (hosting, domain,…) £413.73 Bank Charges £75.00 Finance £365.00 Offline Data Storage £145.23 Total £7,188.01 Closing Balance 31[st] May 2021 £20,500.15

The principal sources of income for the charity are currently by way of contributions from educational organisations and universities. Expenditure has been kept to a minimum during this period, with funding received being used to pay for web hosting, minimal travel expenses and the MESHGuides website development. We currently are not in a position to invest funds. If we achieve surplus funds, a decision will be taken by the board on how to best invest these ethically. Currently balance levels are higher than normal due to the money we have received towards the BRIST project that has not yet been spent, as this project is taking place over a number of years.

Names and addresses of advisers

Solicitors: Hewitsons LLP Solicitors Exchange House 456 Midsummer Boulevard Milton Keynes MK9 2EA Accountants: Keens Shay Keens MK LLP c/o Sovereign Court 230 Upper Fifth Street Central Milton Keynes MK9 2HR