The Education and Skills Funding Agency (ESFA) and Department for Education (DfE) has published Good Estate Management for Schools (GEMS) guidance and tools (external link).
GEMS is a new online resource and brings together new and existing guidance on school estate management, and sets out:
- the fundamental policies and procedures needed to manage the school estate effectively;
- guidance on strategic estate management, organisational oversight, understanding your land and buildings, energy and water management and managing projects;
- updated guidance on health and safety, compliance and maintenance (replacing existing guidance in Essential Schools Maintenance);
- the skills organisations need access to, links to tools and resources that can help.
The guidance is for anyone with responsibility for overseeing or managing the estate. This includes: leaders and governors of schools, trustees of academy trusts, school business professionals, those with responsibility for day to day running of the school estate, local authorities, Diocesan authorities and other religious authorities and bodies.
Governors and trustees are reminded that their role in estate management should be strategic and so boards should ensure that relevant polices are up to date and they are holding their senior leaders to account.