The Education Employment team has established a national reputation as advisers to many hundreds of schools, colleges and nurseries, academies, universities and other education institutions and charities in the UK, across the whole range of employment-related concerns that arise in an education setting. We pride ourselves on providing practical and commercial solutions for our education clients.

This has been achieved by:

Commitment: Our team is dedicated to providing specialist, tailored advice to suit the particular challenges and demands faced by education institutions in employment and HR related matters. Our determination to provide you with advice of the highest calibre is evidenced by our unique provision of an eight-strong specialist employment team within our Education Department.

Sector knowledge: We have gained a full understanding of all the features of an education institute that make it different from a work place in commerce or industry. Education employment law is a specialist discipline with schools being regulated in the areas of recruitment, management and dismissal of all levels of staff. We are nationally recognised experts in advising on these issues. Find out more.

Our service: Our service is based on sector specific precedents [links to our precedent employment documentation], is proactive in ensuring education institutions are up to date and is focused on high levels of service delivery. We want to be considered part of a client's team.

Specialist lawyers: Over the years we have built a team of highly qualified employment lawyers who have unrivalled experience of working with schools, colleges, nurseries, universities, academies and charities. Our senior lawyers are frequent speakers at national conferences and widely published in the sector press.

Practical advice: We are well-known for finding pragmatic solutions backed by intellectual rigour and a high level of technical competence.

Additional support: Our lawyers travel all over the country to meet heads, bursars, governors and human resources managers. We provide speakers at training seminars and governors' briefings. We also produce regular, free-of-charge legal updates by email. These email updates have proved very popular.

Our precedent employment documentation

Our precedent employment documents have been developed with our education clients over a number of years. They have had the benefit of the practical input of numerous Heads, Governors and Bursars. They have also been through the consultation process with all of the main teaching unions. We constantly review the documents to ensure that they comply with the latest legislation and best practice.

As well as producing commercial employment documents that may be considered commonplace such as contracts, manuals and policies, we have developed a full suite of education-specific documentation. For instance we have recently developed a code of conduct for staff, offering guidance and boundaries on relationships with colleagues, students, suppliers and visitors.

Employment contracts update service

If your organisation implements our precedent employment contracts and manual you will receive our contract updates free of charge. This service is aimed specifically at education institutions using Veale Wasbrough Vizards contracts and keeps them up to date by providing a free newsletter update. Rather than merely informing you of changes to the law, the update contains the draft wording to insert in to your contracts and policies in most cases. This approach seeks to avoid the need for replacing contracts every three to five years.

Safer recruitment

Safer recruitment of staff and volunteers is an essential part of safeguarding responsibilities for all schools. We provide a specialist training programme covering all aspects of the DCSF guidance 'Safeguarding Children and Safer Recruitment in Education'. We also provide a Safer Recruitment Pack which means that schools can put the guidance into practice straightaway.  Find out more.

Training

We regularly hold training sessions for clients on a broad range of aspects of employment law and practice.

Training sessions vary in length from an hour to a day, depending on the needs of the client. They can be arranged as a presentation or seminar organised for a large group of clients, or may equally be in relation to a discrete area of employment law at the request of a single client. We prefer to visit clients whenever possible.

The format that a training session would follow can be tailored to your preference. We are conscious that employment law can at times be a technical area and therefore make our training as accessible and interactive for our audience as possible.

Immigration

We advise all types of businesses and charities, ranging from independent schools to multi-national companies and have particular specialist expertise in acting for Education Institutions, especially Independent Schools, and the relevance of Tier 2, 4 and 5 in all types of Education settings.

We can assist with all your immigration needs, including advice and assistance with:

• Sponsor Licence applications and amendments
• Visa Applications, renewals and extensions - advice regarding your prospective and current employees/students
• Sponsoring and issuing Certificates of Sponsorship (COS) and Certificates of Acceptance for Studies (CAS)
• Sponsorship duties including record keeping and reporting duties (all relevant Tiers)
• Preparing for a UKBA compliance visit
• Employers' liability
• Advice on preventing illegal working and template documents
• What to do if you suspect you may have an illegal worker

Also specific Tier advice including:

• highly skilled migrants
• the Resident Labour Market Test
• the Shortage Occupation List
• skilled workers
• sportspersons
• ministers of religion
• intra company transfers
• child students
• general students
• tier 4 specific reporting and record keeping duties
• discrimination
• admission issues
• parent contract and immigration issues
• gap year students and Youth Mobility Scheme
• temporary workers
• charity workers

Sector-specific advice

Governors and trustees, as part of their risk management duty, are required to be satisfied that their legal advisers are competent. But the regulatory burden of the employment and anti-discrimination laws is now so great that we believe competence can only be achieved in this field by specialist lawyers who are immersed in the sector.

The following are some examples of concerns that arise in an education setting but may be outside the experience of employment lawyers working in different sectors:

• The full range of child protection procedures including amendments to the rules for making checks in the Criminal Records Bureau.
• The specialist terminology in academic contracts, the important differences between the calendar year and the academic year, and particular provisions that apply to teaching and house staff.
• Proper handling of allegations of abuse and historical complaints; including liaising with the police, local authority children's services and the DCSF.
• Drafting statements for the press and related letters to parents and others.
• The discrete legal and taxation rules that apply to peripatetic staff.
• The interaction between the employment contract and the House contract.
• Correct handling of disputes with an employee who is also the parent of a child at the school.
• The interaction between Teachers' Pensions, equal pay and claims of unequal treatment.
• Those parts of executive remuneration that are "pensionable" and those that are not.
• The application of the Working Time Regulations to boarding staff, matrons and caretakers.
• Tax implications and particular rules as to tenure and other matters relating to staff accommodation and resident staff.
• Intellectual property rights in original work created by teachers.
• Fee discounts and scholarships for the children of teachers and whether governors have power to make these allowances in the case of a child who is a close relation of a governor. Phased changes to the teacher-discount scheme.
• Equal pay issues arising from historical differences in pay calculation.
• Contractual issues arising from contracting-out services involving long-serving staff .
• Work experience/case studies:
• Advising Malvern College in defending a nationally publicised national minimum wage claim based around 'on call' working
• Amending employees' contracts terms and conditions of two schools with one governing body to harmonise pay and conditions and ensuring compliance with equal pay legislation.
• We regularly advise on all stages of the redundancy process including advice on consultation and selection and consultation with trade unions. For example, we recently advised on redundancies following the merger and TUPE transfer of two schools.
• Advice on formal recognition of teaching unions and implementing a collective bargaining agreement.
• Advising on TUPE consultation with employees in several school mergers/sales.
• Successful defence for an independent school, against a claimant who alleged unequal treatment over pay, trade union membership, sexual orientation and exclusion from Teachers' Pensions (2005).
• Sensitive investigation and handling of accusations against teachers including advice on dealing with the police, local authorities, children's services and DCSF.