What is it?

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

Pupil premium funding is available to both mainstream and non-mainstream schools and it is paid to schools according to the number of pupils who have been:

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• registered as eligible for free school meals at any point in the last 6 years (Ever 6)

 
Pupil Premium Plus is available to support looked-after children. Eligibility for funding has been extended to all children as a result of:

 

• adoption

• a special guardianship order

• a child arrangements order (previously known as a residence order)

• who has been in local authority care for 1 day or more

• recorded as both eligible for FSM in the last 6 years and as being looked after (or as having left local authority care).

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There is also the Service Premium, which is designed to provide additional (mainly pastoral) support for children with parents serving in the regular British armed forces.

Pupils attract the service premium if they meet the following criteria:

• One of their parents is serving in the regular armed forces,

• one of their parents served in the regular armed forces in the last 3 years,

• one of their parents died while serving in the armed forces and the pupil is in receipt of a pension under the Armed Forces Compensation Scheme (AFCS) and the War Pensions  Scheme (WPS)

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Accountability

‘The Pupil Premium for disadvantaged pupils will provide additional funding specifically linked to disadvantaged pupils with the primary objective of boosting their attainment …. We will expect schools to account to parents for how it is used’ (DfE)

 

Schools are free to spend the pupil premium as they see fit however the DfE are clear that schools will be held accountable for how the additional funding to support pupils from low income families and from service families is used

The DfE holds Headteachers and school governing bodies accountable for the impact of pupil premium funding in the following ways:

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• performance tables, which show the performance of disadvantaged pupils compared with their peers

• requiring schools to publish details online each year of how they are using the pupil premium and the impact it is having on pupil achievement

• the Ofsted inspection framework, where inspectors focus on the attainment of pupil groups, and in particular those who attract the pupil premium

 

We must include the following information on pupil premium online:

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• our pupil premium allocation for the current academic year

• details of how we intend to spend our allocation

• details of how we spent our previous academic year’s allocation

• how it made a difference to the attainment of disadvantaged pupils

 

You can find out more about the Government rational behind the funding by visiting

www.education.gov.uk/schools/pupilsupport/premium

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HOW DO WE USE PUPIL PREMIUM?

 

At Brook Green Centre for Learning working in partnership with all members of our school community we work together to raise aspirations, secure positive outcomes and personal success for all students. We aim to ensure that every young person will feel safe, cared for and supported to reach his or her full potential.

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Our aims are to:

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• Increase the number of students meeting or exceeding their progress targets in Literacy and Numeracy

 

• Improve the social and emotional wellbeing of our most vulnerable students

 

• Improve the ability of our students to communicate and interact with each other

 

• Engage hard to reach families and those facing challenges in key meetings and enable them to access parental support

 

• Focus on progression to post-16 provisions (including developing approaches to transitions which have been affected by the Covid pandemic)

 

• Support the mental health and well being of our young people

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Although our strategy is focused on the needs of disadvantaged students, it will benefit all students in our school where funding is spent on whole-school approaches, such as employing our Student Health and Wellbeing Lead. Our intention is that outcomes for non-disadvantaged students will be improved alongside progress for their disadvantaged peers.

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Our strategy is part of our wider school plans for education recovery. An example is our engagement with the National Tutoring Programme and employment of a school-based tutor for students that have been worst affected by the pandemic. This will also enable us to focus on developing speech and language skills in our young people as our tutor will work with speech and language therapists to develop support strategies.

 

Sometimes it is difficult to show immediate cause and effect after initiatives but we feel that if students are engaged, responding and happy their capacity to learn and progress will increase.

 

We would also like to reassure parents and carers that although the school is investing in a wide range of interventions and alternative provision, no student will be allowed to fall behind and not achieve their potential. All of our students are regularly monitored and if anyone is underperforming they will also get access to interventions to help them. The additional money has allowed us to build on the work that we were already doing so that we can support more students in ensuring we are ‘closing the gap’.

 

 

MONITORING AND EVALUATION

 

We will be monitoring and evaluating the achievement of our pupil premium students as a distinct cohort through the use of SIMs, attendance data and behaviour data. Achievement data will be checked frequently to ensure that interventions are working effectively and students are making good progress against local and national benchmarks.

 

It will be the responsibility of the Deputy Head to report to the Governors termly. This report will reflect our learning on the latest research evidence, such as the Sutton Trust ~ EEF Teaching and Learning Toolkit as well as our own evidence to fund strategies and activities with the most impact on improving achievement.

 

SUCCESS CRITERIA

 

The evaluation of our pupil premium statement is based on how successfully Brook Green can narrow the gap between socially disadvantaged students and their peers not only locally but also nationally.

 

If you would like any further information, advice or support of either a general or confidential nature please contact our pupil premium Lead Miss Sarah Holtsholt@bgcfl.org.uk or by phoning us on 01752 773875.

 

The following links outline our Pupil Premium Guarantee to young people and their families at Brook Green.

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