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Session 3. Resourcing and Timetabling for Improvement
Objective. Count the real time a plan asks of staff, find time by repurposing before adding, compare timetable options with a trade-off matrix, build a small budget with a reserve and write a short decision brief.
Plans fail more often for lack of time than for lack of ideas. A leader who wants a weekly team meeting must know where the hours come from, who loses what, and what it costs in money. This lesson shows how to read a timetable as a resource, how to treat a small budget as a statement of priorities, and how to put the trade-off on paper so staff see that the decision was made fairly and not by accident.
Key ideas
Time is the first resource
- A plan has three budgets: teacher hours, money and attention. Most plans in schools fail on the first. Count teacher-hours, not just meetings: a one-hour meeting of 20 teachers costs 20 teacher-hours.
- Do a time audit before you plan: list every fixed meeting, duty and report with its teacher-hours per month. Staff are usually surprised by the total and by how much is reporting nobody reads.
- The EEF guidance on professional development notes that learning for teachers comes with costs and that teachers face competing commitments and time pressure. Treat a teacher's hour as money you are spending.
Finding time: repurpose before you add
- Three routes, in this order: (1) repurpose time that already exists, such as part of the subject methodical association or a staff meeting; (2) change the timetable so a team shares one free period; (3) only then add time after school, and only briefly.
- Every option has a cost. Write the trade-off in a matrix: cost to pupils' lessons, extra teacher hours, fairness between colleagues, and whether it survives next year. Do not take lesson time from pupils routinely.
- Respect working-time rules and teaching-load norms in force in your region; the Scottish improvement guidance explicitly asks plans to respect staff working-time agreements and avoid unnecessary paperwork. Ask your department if unsure.
Money and materials
- Improvement money is usually small. Spend it on preparation and use: printing forms and guides, materials for pupils, travel for school visits or a coach, not on equipment that has no routine behind it.
- Build a simple budget: each line has a quantity, a unit cost and an owner, plus a 10% reserve. Mark each line 'must have', 'would help' or 'later', so cuts are made on purpose and not by accident.
- Be open about every source and spending. If parents or the community contribute, follow the regulations on voluntary contributions, never make it a condition for any pupil, and report back on how it was used.
People and the decision brief
- Resourcing also means people: protect the owners' time by lifting something off them, pair an experienced methodist with a colleague who needs support, and do not give every new job to the same three willing teachers.
- Use a decision protocol: state the decision needed, list options, apply the matrix, name who is affected, decide, tell people why, and set a review date six to eight weeks later.
- Write a half-page decision brief for the head or the department: the decision, options, recommendation, cost in teacher-hours and som, who is affected, the risk and the review date. It protects you and makes the trade-off visible.
Where to find time, in order
Reading the timetable as a resource
A timetable is a set of constraints: teachers who share between classes, rooms, the shift in schools that run two shifts, the school bus, subjects that need a laboratory. List the constraints before you look for time. Then mark on a paper grid, in one colour, where the team teachers have a free period. Often two or three already coincide and only one or two need moving.
A timetable change has a one-off cost in the deputy's hours and a standing cost in whoever's slot moves. Tell those people first, in person, and explain what they gain back. Treat a shared free period as a standing arrangement with a review date, not as a gift that cannot be changed.
The budget as a statement of priorities
Where the small improvement money goes tells staff what you value. Put every spending line next to the priority it serves, with quantity, unit cost and an owner. Add a reserve of about ten percent so that a surprise does not force a cut in the middle of the year. Mark each line must have, would help or later, and write down what was left out and why.
Spend first on preparation and use: printing forms and guides, materials for pupils, the cost of visiting a neighbouring school. Equipment bought before a routine exists is usually unused. Remember that a teacher's time is also spending: the EEF guidance on professional development notes that learning for teachers has costs and competes with other pressures. Report on how money was used, and follow the rules on voluntary contributions from parents.
Examples from the classroom
Penciling a shared period in Fergana
Scene. A deputy in Fergana draws the timetable on a big sheet and marks the free periods of eight Grade 9 to 11 teachers. Five already coincide on Wednesday period 4. Moving two lessons by one slot clears the rest, which takes her about three hours. She talks first to the two teachers whose classes move, offers them an earlier finish on Fridays, and fixes the review for the middle of December.
Insight. Start from the free periods that already coincide; the change is smaller than it looks.
A meeting audit in Bukhara
Scene. A Bukhara head lists all regular meetings and reports and multiplies hours by people. The total is 166 teacher-hours a month, and a monthly data return that is read by nobody takes 8. He replaces the return with a one-page version and uses two association hours for the new priority. Teachers are told what stopped and what started. The new priority needed 28 teacher-hours a month, found without adding any.
Insight. Counting teacher-hours shows that the time often exists inside current routines.
A reserve saves a plan in Khiva
Scene. A Khiva school sets aside ten percent of its small improvement money and tells staff. In January the price of printing rises and the number of forms needed doubles, because a neighbouring school asks to use them. The reserve covers the extra cost, and the school does not have to cancel the visit to another school. The head reports the use of the reserve at the staff meeting.
Insight. A small reserve, openly reported, turns a surprise into a manageable event.
Common pitfalls
- Counting meetings but not teacher-hours, so the real cost of a plan stays invisible.
- Adding after-school time first because it costs no money, and then wondering why attendance falls.
- Buying equipment before any routine or training exists to use it.
- Changing a timetable without talking first to the people whose slots move.
Count the Hours, Compare Options, Write the Brief
- Trios (5 min): open the Kit. The sample school's plan has two priorities (follow-up of absence in Grades 9 to 11; pupils' questions and feedback in lessons). The plan will ask staff for time (Table B). You are the leadership team and must find the time, the money and a timetable.
- Trios (15 min): time audit. Total the existing teacher-hours per month (Table A) and the teacher-hours the plan adds (Table B), separating one-off from monthly. Say how much recurring time must be found and which existing items could be repurposed.
- Trios (15 min): score the three timetable options in Table C against the four criteria (1 poor to 3 good). Name who is affected by each option, discuss the biggest risk and choose one, with a fallback for the first term.
- Trios (10 min): build the budget (Table D). Allocate the sample amount, keep a 10% reserve, mark each line must have, would help or later, and decide what to do with the website request. State what is left unspent and why.
- Part B (15 min): write the half-page decision brief (Table E) to the head about the timetable choice: decision, options, recommendation, cost in teacher-hours and som, who is affected, risk, review date. Plain words, no names of pupils.
- Challenge round (10 min): swap briefs. The reader plays a teacher who loses a free period and asks: 'Why me? What do I get back? What stops this becoming permanent?' The writer answers honestly and improves one sentence.
- Alone (15 min): write your leadership task from the Kit: whose time your plan will ask for, the audit you will carry out in your own school, one repurposing option and the date you will bring back your decision brief.
Your facilitator will guide you through this activity in the session.
Questions to discuss
- Which existing item did you choose to repurpose, and who will feel the loss of it?
- What was the strongest objection in the challenge round, and was it about the timetable or about trust?
- What would your staff say is the one report or meeting your school could stop tomorrow?
Reflect
- How many teacher-hours per month does your school spend on meetings, and how many produce a decision?
- Who always gets the extra jobs in your school, and what does it cost them?
- What small amount of money, spent on preparation, would unblock the most?
Try it tomorrow
- List all regular meetings and reports in your school with hours and people, and total the teacher-hours per month.
- Mark on a paper timetable the free periods of one team and find where they already coincide.
- Draw up a budget for one priority with quantities, unit costs, owners and a ten percent reserve, and share it with the head.
Further reading and links
Count teacher-hours, repurpose before you add, compare timetable options in a trade-off matrix, budget small with a reserve and write the decision down with a review date.