What is Pupil Premium?

The Pupil Premium Grant (PPG) is funding allocated to schools for the specific purpose of raising the attainment of disadvantaged pupils.

Funding is based on children who have been recorded as eligible for free school meals at any point in the last 6 years (including eligible children of families who have no recourse to public funds) and children who are (or have previously been) in care. A portion of the PPG is also provided for supporting children whose parents are currently serving in the regular armed forces. 

Why is the Pupil Premium Grant in place?

The Government believes that the Pupil Premium Grant, which is additional to main school funding, is the best way to address underlying inequalities between disadvantaged children and their peers by ensuring that funding to tackle disadvantage reaches the pupils who need it most. Whilst schools are free to spend the Pupil Premium as they see fit, they are required to publish their strategy online.

To check to see if your child is eligible for Pupil Premium funding (Free School Meals), click on the following link here to apply.

Accountability

The Government believes that Headteachers and school leaders should decide how to use the Pupil Premium funding.

They are held accountable for the decisions they make through:

• the performance tables which show the performance of disadvantaged pupils compared with their peers
• the Ofsted inspection framework, under which inspectors focus on the attainment of pupil groups, in particular those who attract the Pupil Premium
• the reports for parents that schools now have to publish online

Further information about how schools are held accountable can be found here: https://www.gov.uk/guidance/pupil-premium-effective-use-and-accountability

Funding

In most cases, the Pupil Premium is paid direct to schools, allocated to them for every pupil who is eligible. Schools decide how to use the funding, as they are best placed to assess what additional provision their pupils need.

For pupils from low-income families in non-mainstream settings, the local authority decides how to allocate the Pupil Premium. The authority must consult non-mainstream settings about how the premium for these pupils should be used.

Further information about the Pupil Premium funding can be found on the Department for Education website here:  https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/pupil-premium/pupil-premium

What do we spend our Pupil Premium on?

• Provision of school-led tuition.
• Provision of targeted nurture groups.
• Free Breakfast Club for eligible pupils.
• Free after-school tuition and after school club places for eligible pupils.
• Employment of HLTAs and TAs to support quality first teaching in classrooms as well as delivering targeted support and intervention.
• Evidence based support including Maths Whizz. 

Main Barriers To Closing The Gap

• Many of our disadvantaged pupils have gaps in their vocabulary and are not as confident to take on new challenges. Therefore, our strategy will focus on improving disadvantaged children's independence, resilience, confidence and vocabulary.
• Many of our disadvantaged children arrive to school behind their peers, academically and socially. Our strategy will focus on ensuring all disadvantaged children receive consistently high quality teaching and learning that ensures they make good progress.
• Many of our disadvantage students have a lower attendance rate than their peers, meaning they will miss out on learning and social experiences. Our strategy focuses on offering a free Breakfast Club, where children are provided with a free breakfast as well as a story read to them each day; the children then have access to games, to develop social interaction and maths activities to help facilitate fluency and rapid recall skills.

How do we support our children?

We carefully review the strengths and areas for support for our children and provide this, making sure all children benefit from daily schooling with effective teachers and staff. This is because research shows:

"The pupil premium is additional funding for publicly funded schools in England to raise the attainment of disadvantaged pupils and close the gap between them and their peers."

Allocation of additional resources is reviewed termly. The impact of spending and our strategy is reviewed continually as part of action planning.