Bursar’s report: S T E V E N
LITTLE
latter to be spent when construction work starts
on the new Sports Centre in spring 2019.
Take these away, and the school just about
broke even. The school itself recorded a small
but not insignificant loss of £1,000, but that
was before £2,850,000 of depreciation. The
deficit after depreciation was offset by income
from Trading, Investments and the balance of
available Fundraising, leaving Net Income of just
£62,000. Rather different from the headlines.
The school also receives capital proceeds
and seeks to manage its investments actively to
that end. In May we received £15million from
the second tranche of proceeds from Barton Farm
and these have been re-invested. Shortly after the
year-end we sold with vacant possession the school’s
last remaining farm in Dorset. We continue to look
for and promote other opportunities.
The school is in good shape but is not immune
to events outside its walls. As I write, Brexit remains
unresolved: that it will have an impact on the
school is certain; exactly how is less clear. Like
other schools in the independent sector, we face
other challenges and uncertainties. Ever increasing
compliance requirements take up time and money;
while the aims are laudable, the impact on the
bottom line is not. The media is full of stories of the
iniquities of private education and cries for removal
of tax privileges, from charitable relief on business
rates to VAT on school fees. More immediately,
and with less fanfare, the Government recently
announced a 43% increase in employer contributions
to the Teachers’ Pension Scheme, to which most
teachers belong. Another £400,000+ off the
bottom line.
As a charity the sole reason the school exists
is to serve the interest of its beneficiaries, primarily
its pupils – current and future. Today’s pupils benefit
from the generosity of their forebears, not least in
the beauty of the school grounds and buildings,
more than a hundred of which are listed and which
the College maintains entirely at its own expense.
In the summer, War Cloister was promoted to a
Grade 1 listing and later in the year was the centre
of the school’s commemoration of the end of WWI.
In 2025 we will celebrate its centenary and work
has already started on preparing for its restoration.
8
The Wykeham Journal 2018