What is Pupil Premium?
The pupil premium is a grant given by the government to schools in England to decrease the attainment gap for the most disadvantaged children, whether by income or by family upheaval. For each pupil who is eligible for free school meals, their school receives £935 (if a secondary school).
In the 2021 to 2022 financial year, schools will receive the following funding for each pupil registered as eligible for free school meals (FSM) at any point in the last 6 years:
- £935 for pupils in year 7 to year 11
- Schools will receive £2,300 for any pupil identified in the January 2020 school census or the alternative provision census as having left local authority care 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)
Priorities For The Improvement of Disadvantaged Pupils
Our intent at PPCS is to enrich the lives of all our students, no matter their background or prior attainment. To that end, we aim to both raise achievement of all our learners, as well as ensuring that we close the gap between our student groups. At PPCS, we have a much higher than national average number of students with Pupil Premium funding. It is therefore right to ensure most of their needs are increasingly met through high quality universal provision. Our model to achieve success with these students is therefore as follows:
Improve the progress of disadvantaged students through high quality teaching and learning.
a) Ensuring the targets that have been set for disadvantaged students at PPCS are aspirational based on FFT50 and baseline assessments.
b) Ensure that PP students are represented in all sets but in particular the higher sets across all subjects.
c) Ensure all staff are using data when planning for disadvantaged students and that this is evident on seating plans.
d) Ensure that all staff have a strong teaching and learning focus on disadvantaged pupils especially boys.
e) Develop whole school teaching and learning strategies to promote the progress of disadvantaged pupils.
f) Support the pupil premium champions in effectively delivering school wide teaching and learning strategies developed for disadvantaged pupils ensuing that they are used all year.
g) Ensure there is a constant cycle of assessment, feedback and improvement for disadvantaged pupils and that this is planned for in lessons.
h) Focus on the teaching and learning disadvantaged boys are receiving at PPCS and put strategies in place to promote progress and engagement
j) Support the teaching and learning department to ensure the quality of teaching within the school is consistently good.
Effectively use data tracking points based on high quality assessment to identify PP students that a not making the required progress and target these students for interventions.
a) Ensure all subjects have in place quality assessments that result in accurate data tracking and provide information regarding gaps in knowledge.
b) Create an effective accountability cycle in which the progress of all disadvantaged students especially boys is discussed with classroom teachers resulting in effective in and out of class interventions.
c) Use accurate data to target disadvantaged students for high quality small group interventions that rotate to ensure disadvantaged students receive support in all their subjects.
d) Monitor the effectiveness and quality of the interventions that disadvantaged pupils receive through QA and data tracking.
e) Monitor the pupil premium champions use of data to target interventions within their faculty especially towards boys.
f) Monitoring the progress of all PP students in terms of achievement, progress, behaviour and attendance after each tracking point.
g) Share all findings with all relevant parties including governors and parents.
Improve engagement with disadvantaged parents in the community.
a) Focus on getting difficult to reach disadvantaged parents into school through phone calls and meeting after parents’ evenings.
b) Continue to monitor the work of the attendance officer regarding disadvantaged pupils.
c) Host family support evenings.
d) Use academic mentoring to promote parental engagement.
e) Create a parental toolkit to promote the learning of disadvantaged pupils at home.
Ensure all PP students have a wide range of extra-curricular activities available to them to support progress and enrich their education and raise aspirations.
a) Develop an enriching curriculum.
b) Provide a wide range of extracurricular activities for disadvantaged students to engage with.
c) Ensure all disadvantaged students are supported and prioritised in the decision making of their extracurricular activities.
d) Provide disadvantaged students with the opportunities to visit higher education establishments as well as work experience.
e) Provide disadvantaged students with opportunities to experience enriching activities such as the theatre and art galleries.
g) Ensure that disadvantaged students especially boys are represented on the student council, peer mentors and in any decision making within the school.
h) All disadvantaged students to meet with the career adviser at some point during KS4.