## **Trustees’ Annual Report for the period**
## **From 01-Jan-2024 (Period start date) To 31-Dec-2024 (Period end date)**
**Charity name: L’ecole des Filous**
## **Charity registration number: 1165754**
## **Objectives and Activities**
||SORP reference||
|---|---|---|
|Summary of the purposes of
the charity as set out in its
governing document|Para 1.17|To advance education in the French
language and culture in such ways as the
trustees shall think fit in East Hertfordshire
and the surrounding area, in particular by
providing tuition to bilingual children
attending local schools who have an
existing knowledge and understanding of
the French language to enable them to
practise the French language as an extra-
curricular activity in order to extend their
written and oral linguistic skills and by
providing tuition to promote their
understanding of the diverse cultures of the
French speaking world.|
|Summary of the main
activities in relation to those
purposes for the public
benefit, in particular, the
activities, projects or
services identified in the
accounts.|Para 1.17 and
1.19|• Providing language tuitions to bilingual
children in East Hertfordshire and
surrounding areas every Saturday
mornings during term time for 2 hours.
The quality of teaching has been valued by
our members. Our teachers are all native
French speakers and either qualified
teachers or experienced and as a result the
improvements in the children’s language
skills have been noticeable.
Our aim is to maintain small classes (about
8 children per teacher in each class) in
order to maintain the impact of teaching on
each pupil. We had 4 classes in the first 2
terms of 2024 down to 3 classes from
september 2024, and 1 to 2 teaching
assistants moving between classes in
order to maintain that close relationship
teacher/pupil or teaching assistant/pupil
especially when there is a different level of
aptitude in French within the same class.
• Offering a French literature library with
access for our students and their families.|
|||• Organising social and cultural events
open to our students and their families.
Through the years, we have arranged
events linked to celebrations from all
cultures, including French speaking
countries.
Examples of some of our events are listed
below:
●Workshop + cineclub themed
around specific events/celebrations
such as Easter, Halloween,
Christmas …
●Musical shows in collaboration with
another French school in Southgate
●Trip to London to see films as part
of the South Kensington Kids
festival or puppet show organised
by ‘les parapluies FLAM’
●Yearly participation in the Ware
Carnival
●End of year show followed by a
picnic/buffet to celebrate ‘Bastille
day’
●Christmas show
●2 to 3 day summer holiday club in
July for our students to enjoy
activities taught in French|
|---|---|---|
|Statement confirming
whether the trustees have
had regard to the guidance
issued by the Charity
Commission on public
benefit|Para 1.18|N/A|
## **Additional information (optional)** You may choose to include further statements where relevant about:
SORP reference N/A Para 1.38 Policy on grant making N/A Para 1.38 Policy on social investment including program related investment N/A Para 1.38 Contribution made by volunteers N/A Other
## **Achievements and Performance**
||SORP reference||
|---|---|---|
|Summary of the main
achievements of the charity,
identifying the difference the
charity’s work has made to
the circumstances of its
beneficiaries and any wider
benefits to society as a
whole.|Para 1.20|The year 2023 was our nineth year as
l’ecole des filous.
We have carried on working on improving
our communication with our current
students and their families but also with
new potential students via our Facebook
pages and Mailchimp, as well as
improving our use of Quickfile, a software
to manage our invoices to parents and
suppliers and launching our new website.
We have also continued using Seesaw to
help with better and faster communication
with the families and with the pupils around
sharing homework and tracking progress.
As in previous years, we have continued to
transfer our passion of the French culture
and language to our pupils.
One of our teachers led several lunch club
activities based on ‘French’ specific
themes
such as ‘La galette des rois’ in January,
‘Pancake day’ in February, or ‘Easter egg
hunt’ in April.
We organised our annual ‘end of year’
show mid July around ‘Bastille day’ and
celebrated the olympic games since they
were in Paris this year.
As previous years, teaching the French
language to children can be a challenge
due to the different levels of
speaking/understanding by the children
within the same class due to the small size
of the school, but the situation has been
well managed again by the whole team of
teachers, and all the pupils have shown
great progress in their ability to
understand, speak and write in French.|
## **Additional information (optional)** You may choose to include further statements where relevant about:
|Achievements against
objectives set|Para 1.41|See above for full details|
|---|---|---|
|Performance of fundraising
activities against objectives
set|Para 1.41|N/A|
N/A Investment performance Para 1.41 against objectives N/A Other
## **Financial Review**
|**Financial Review**|||
|---|---|---|
|Review of the charity’s
financial position at the end
of the period|Para 1.21|Our classes are attended in school
premises in Ware, Hertfordshire, that are
rented by the charity (cost of renting of £9
per hour per classroom, i.e. £72 for each
Saturday sessions).
Being now in our nineth year running, we
have kept the small increase of the tuition
fees initiated in September 2023, i.e. £145
for one child and £275 for two children, still
maintaining a discount for siblings.
The account shows a benefit this year. This
is because due to having fewer pupils at
the beginning of 2024 we have decided to
decrease the number of classes from 3 to
2.
With some of our reserve/income, we are
still planning to spend it towards investing
in new books for our library, organising
some workshops, arranging trips to French
speaking shows in or around London in
collaboration with other French schools
and maybe ultimately arranging an
exchange with a French school.
It has again been difficult to retain our
pupils (This year we have had again less
than 30 pupils attending our classes) so we
are hoping this number will remain stable
at least.
In the future, we are still keeping in mind to
potentially be able to open one or more
classes to British children or adults
alongside the bilingual children currently
attending l’école des filous.|
|Statement explaining the
policy for holding reserves
stating why they are held|Para 1.22|N/A|
|Amount of reserves held|Para 1.22|None|
|Reasons for holding zero
reserves|Para 1.22|Being in our nineth year running, we are
still not holding a reserve yet in a separate
bank account as we had to spend some of
the money towards a new website hoping
this will help recruiting new families.
We are aware that it is recommended, as a
good practice, to hold a third of the running
costs in a reserve account, and we are still
hoping to be looking into this in the near
future.|
|Details of fund materially in
deficit|Para 1.24|N/A|
|Explanation of any
uncertainties about the
charity continuing as a going
concern|Para 1.23||
**Account – Year end 2024 (January to December)**
|**Expenses**||||**Income**||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
|Teachers fees and
management cost|**£4,062.00**|||Tuition fees: School|**£10,359.93**|
|School rental costs|**£2,700.00**|||||
|Other expenses|**£1,189.10**|||||
|Insurance|**£238.74**|||||
|FLAM subscription|**£215.50**|||||
|**Total expenses**|**8,409.35**|||**Total income**|**£10,359.93**|
|**Benefit**|**£1,954.59**|||||
|||||||
|**Balance carried forward**
**from 2023**|**£12,158.28**|||||
|**Balance at the end of 2024**|**£14,112.87**|||||
|**Additional information (optional)**|**Additional information (optional)**|**Additional information (optional)**||
|---|---|---|---|
|You may choose to include further statements where relevant about:||||
||||The charity principal source of funds is the|
||||subscription fees from the families of the|
||The charity’s principal||children joining in.|
||sources of funds (including|Para 1.47||
||any fundraising)|||
|**Additional information (optional)**
You may choose to include further statements where relevant about:|**Additional information (optional)**
You may choose to include further statements where relevant about:|**Additional information (optional)**
You may choose to include further statements where relevant about:|
|---|---|---|
|The charity’s principal
sources of funds (including
any fundraising)|Para 1.47|The charity principal source of funds is the
subscription fees from the families of the
children joining in.|
|Investment policy and
objectives including any
social investment policy
adopted|Para 1.46|N/A|
|A description of the principal
risks facing the charity|Para 1.46|Due to the current increased cost of living,
the number of pupils attending the school
is potentially going to continue to decrease
in the coming years. Also, it is getting
harder to find French speaking native
teachers since Brexit.|
|Other||N/A|
## **Structure, Governance and Management**
|Description of charity’s
trusts:|||
|---|---|---|
|Type of governing document
(trust deed, royal charter)|Para 1.25|Constitution|
|How is the charity
constituted?
(e.g unincorporated
association, CIO)|Para 1.25|Charitable Incorporated Organisation|
|Trustee selection methods
including details of any
constitutional provisions e.g.
election to post or name of
any person or body entitled
to appoint one or more
trustees|Para 1.25|Trustees are appointed by a resolution
passed at a properly convened meeting of
charity trustees.|
## **Additional information (optional)**
## You may choose to include further statements where relevant about:
|Policies and procedures
adopted for the induction
and training of trustees|Para 1.51|As per constitution and including
safeguarding training and DBS if deemed
required.|
|---|---|---|
|The charity’s organisational
structure and any wider
network with which the
charity works|Para 1.51|Part of ‘ Parapluie FLAM’, French
organisation grouping several Saturday
morning schools teaching French and
providing educational, cultural and
administrative support.|
|Relationship with any related
parties|Para 1.51|N/A|
|Other||N/A|
## **Reference and Administrative details**
|Charity name|L’ecole des filous|
|---|---|
|Other name the charity uses||
|Registered charity number|1165754|
|Charity’s principal address|42 Heath drive
WARE
SG12 0RF|
## **Names of the charity trustees who manage the charity**
||||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
||**Trustee name**||**Office (if**
**any)**|**Dates acted if**
**not for whole**
**year**||**Name of person (or body)**
**entitled to appoint trustee**
**(if any)**|
|**1**|**Nadege Galle**||||||
|**2**|**Catherine O’Sullivan**||||||
|**3**|**Xavier Mutzig**||||||
|**4**|**Emilie VanBaalen**||||||
|**5**|**Marine Yalicheff**|||Started Sep-
24|||
|Corporate trustees–names of||the directors at the date the report was approved|||||
|**Director name**|||||||
|**N/A**||**N/A**|||**N/A**||
|Name of trustees holding title to property belonging to the charity|||||||
|**Trustee name**||**Dates acted if not for whole year**|||||
|**N/A**||**N/A**|||**N/A**||
## **Funds held as custodian trustees on behalf of others**
Description of the assets N/A held in this capacity Name and objects of the N/A charity on whose behalf the assets are held and how this falls within the custodian charity’s objects Details of arrangements for N/A safe custody and segregation of such assets from the charity’s own assets
## **Additional information (optional)**
## **Names and addresses of advisers (Optional information)**
||||
|---|---|---|
|**Type of**
**adviser**|**Name**|**Address**|
|**N/A**|**N/A**|**N/A**|
|**Name of chief executive or names of senior staff members (Optional information)**|||
|**N/A**|**N/A**|**N/A**|
## **Exemptions from disclosure**
Reason for non-disclosure of key personnel details
**N/A**
## **Other optional information**
**N/A**
## **Declarations**
**The trustees declare that they have approved the trustees’ report above. Signed on behalf of the charity’s trustees**
|**Signature(s)**|Electronically signed by: Nadege
Galle
Reason: I am signing for the
reasons as stated in the
document.
Date: Oct 29, 2025 21:59:38 GMT|
Electronically signed by:
Benjamin Garcia
Reason: I am signing for the
reasons as stated in the
document.
Date: Oct 29, 2025 22:11:40 GMT|
|---|---|---|
|**Full name(s)**|Nadege Galle|Benjamin Garcia|
|**Position (eg Secretary,**
**Chair, etc)**|Chair|Treasurer|
|**Date**|
29-Oct-2025|29-Oct-2025|