What is the Pupil Premium?

Evidence shows that disadvantaged children generally face additional challenges in reaching their potential at school and often do not perform as well as other pupils.

The Pupil Premium is funding allocated to schools to improve education outcomes for disadvantaged pupils.

The school’s funding allocation is based on the number of pupils in the following categories:

• Pupils who are eligible for free school meals, or have been eligible in the past 6 years.
• Pupils who have been adopted from care or have left care.
• Children who are looked after by the local authority.

Pupil Premium is not a personal budget for individual pupils.

Schools receive funding based on all of the pupils who are eligible; it is not allocated based on academic ability

Evidence shows that academically able pupils from disadvantaged backgrounds are most at risk of under-performing. These pupils should receive just as much focus as less academically able pupils.

Within the DfE framework / guidance on using the Pupil Premium, school leaders decide which ways of spending this money would have the greatest impact on removing barriers to learning and improving the attainment of disadvantaged pupils in Reading, Writing and Maths.

How we use the Pupil Premium

Research evidence suggests that Pupil Premium spending is most effective when used across 3 areas:

1. high-quality teaching, such as staff professional development
2. targeted academic support, such as tutoring
3. wider strategies to address non-academic barriers to success in schools, such as attendance, behaviour, and social and emotional support

The Education Endowment Foundation (EEF) recommends that schools particularly focus their Pupil Premium on supporting high-quality teaching, which is considered the most effective way to improve outcomes for disadvantaged pupils. By doing so, schools will inevitably benefit non-eligible pupils as well.

All schools must publish a Pupil Premium Strategy Statement on their website, which details its plan to support and raise the attainment of disadvantaged pupils.

The school Governors challenge the school to ensure that funding is used appropriately in support of disadvantaged pupils. An allocated Governor monitors the work being undertaken and its impact.

How much Pupil Premium funding does the school receive?

Schools are allocated Pupil Premium funding based on the number of pupils they have in January each year from the following groups.   

Benefits related free school meals

Schools receive £1,345 for every primary age pupil who claims free school meals, or who has claimed free school meals in the last 6 years.

Your child/ren is/are eligible if you receive any of the following benefits:

• Universal credit (provided you have a net income of £7400 or less)
• Income support
• Income-based jobseekers’ allowance
• Income-related employment and support allowance
• Support under Part IV of the Immigration and Asylum Act 1999
• The guaranteed element of state pension credit
• Child tax credit, provided that you are not also entitled to working tax credit and have an annual gross income of £16,190 or less

If you are not sure or wish to check whether you are eligible, please contact the school office.

Looked-after and previously looked-after pupils

Schools receive £2,410 for every pupil who has left Local Authority care through adoption, a special guardianship order or child arrangements order.

Local Authorities receive the same amount for each pupil they are looking after; they must work with the school to decide how the money is used to support the pupil’s Personal Education Plan.

Service Pupil Premium 

This is additional funding for schools, but it is not based on disadvantage.

Schools receive £320 for every pupil, if they meet one or more of the following criteria:

• one of their parents is serving in the regular armed forces
•  they have previously been registered as a ‘service child’ in any school census in the last 6 years
• one of their parents died while serving in the armed forces, and the pupil receives a pension under the Armed Forces Compensation Scheme or the War Pensions Scheme

This funding is primarily to help with pastoral support. It can also be used to help improve the academic progress of eligible pupils if the school deems this to be a priority.