The Pupil Premium

 

Schools are required to provide information regarding the use of pupil premium funding. Here is some information about the pupil premium at Danegrove. Questions taken from the Department for Education Schools website.

 

What is Pupil Premium?

 

The Pupil Premium is additional funding paid to schools in respect of pupils who have been registered for free schools meals (FSM) at any point in the last six years or are looked after continuously by the local authority for more than six months. Schools receive this funding to support their eligible pupils and narrow the attainment gap between them and their peers.

 

Can the pupil premium really narrow attainment gaps?

 

It is not the funding itself that will improve attainment gaps, but how schools use it. Some children require additional support to meet their potential, and the Pupil Premium will provide schools with the resources they need to provide that support.

 

How are schools accountable for how they use the Pupil Premium?

 

Head teachers are free to decide how best to use the Premium to support their FSM and Looked After pupils and close the attainment gap between them and their peers. The Department does not want to micro-manage schools, but it does expect them to use the Pupil Premium appropriately and to be accountable for the decisions they make.

 

‘The pupil premium gives schools extra funding to raise the attainment of pupils from reception to year 11’ (DfE, Dec 2013).

 

Is your child eligible for Pupil Premium funding? 

 

In the 2020-2021 financial year there will be three types of Pupil Premium allocation:

 

• Pupil Premium

• Pupil Premium Plus

• Service Child Premium

 

In order to receive this additional funding, as a school we are required to provide information to the Department for Education confirming which children meet the government criteria.

 

• Pupil Premium: £1330 per eligible pupil

 

If your child is eligible for free school meals or has been in the last six years this will generate pupil premium funding. To be eligible for free school meals you must be in receipt of the appropriate benefits and have submitted an application for free school meals to the Local Authority Benefits Team.

 

If you qualify for the appropriate benefits, but have chosen not to apply for free school meals, please consider applying. You do not have to take up the free school meal to attract the funding. Free school meals cannot be backdated, so you should only apply if you currently qualify.

 

• Pupil Premium Plus: £1900 per eligible pupil - (held by the Virtual School for LAC)

 

In the 2015 to 2016 financial year, the pupil premium plus for looked after children doubled: to £1900 per pupil. The government is also extending eligibility to include those who have been looked after for one day or more, as compared with the six months in care currently required. From April 2014, schools in England receive the Pupil Premium Plus for children adopted from care, or who left care under a Special Guardianship Order on or after 30th December 2005.

 

School can also claim for children who left care under a Residence Order on or after 14th October 1991. It is up to those with parental responsibility to decide if they wish the school to know whether their child is adopted, or is under a special guardianship order or residence order. If you would like to enable us to claim this premium, you will need to inform us about your child and provide supporting evidence, for example, provide the original Adoption (Court) Order.

 

• Service Child Premium: £300 per eligible pupil

 

The Service Child Premium gives schools extra funding to support children and young people with parents in the armed forces. Pupils attract the 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 three 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).

 

It is for schools to decide how the pupil premium is spent as schools are best placed to assess what additional provision should be made for individual pupils and groups. Schools are however, held accountable for how this additional funding is used to support children on Free School Meals.

 

This information must be published on the school website. The table below explains how the pupil premium is currently being spent. We work very hard to ensure the best outcomes in mathematics and literacy for all our children. The support from the Pupil Premium is intended to help all pupils to achieve regardless of background or circumstance.

 

Danegrove School Pupil Premium Grant Expenditure 2019/20

 

Context of our school

 

Danegrove School is a three-forms of entry school in East Barnet.  We provide wraparound care for our 630 children, aged from 5-11 years from 7.30a.m.until 6pm, for 51 weeks per annum.

 

We have high aspirations and ambitions for our children and we believe that no child should underachieve. We strongly believe that passion and a thirst for knowledge, dedication and commitment to learning make the difference between success and failure. We are determined to ensure that all our children are given every chance to realize their full potential. We are determined to create and maintain a climate of great expectations.

 

Our success with ensuring that all children do well was recognised in a letter from David Laws, Education Minister, with regard to raising the attainment of disadvantaged pupils.

 

We have achieved our current standards by identifying individual barriers to learning in order to provide personalised targeted support so that our children can flourish.

 

Pupil Premium grant represents a significant portion of our budget and we are committed to ensuring it is spent to maximum effect.

 

We believe that one of the biggest barriers for children can be a lack of expectation and so are determined to create a climate that does not limit a child’s potential in any way.

 

Key facts

• Our school motto ‘Secure, Successful, Self Confident” reflects our high expectations for the whole school community

• The school was congratulated for raising attainment of disadvantaged pupils.

• We are engaged in and committed to partnership working with a wide range of organisations which strongly enhances our provision and supports our local community: For example, East Barnet Partnership of 6 local schools, Voluntary Reading Help (6), Home School Support,  Level 6 Maths and English projects. Sports Partnership and Gifted and Talented Project with East Barnet Secondary School.

• Accreditations reflecting our best practice include: Financial Management in School; Healthy School Mark; Science Mark (Silver); Sing Up ; Active Mark; Basic Skills Quality Mark; Schools Financial Value Standard.

 

Recent Initiatives / Improvements:

• Increased performance at KS2 and KS1

• Increased percentages of children working at or above age related levels

• Gap between key groups has been significantly narrowed

• Improved phonics scores

• Team Leaders (two additional assistant headteachers) established to continue to improve quality of teaching, ensure greater consistency in practice and expectations thus reducing any within school variance

• Earlier intervention in place in years 1/2, 3/4 and EYFS

•  Pupil Targets in place so that children are clear where they are and what they need to do next to improve thinking

• Outstanding behaviour continues to be achieved through revision of whole school approach - restorative justice

• New ICT infrastructure, including the use of ipads allows ICT to be delivered in classes

• New building (“The Learning Hubs”) to facilitate improved teaching of individuals and small groups especially in reading with increased numbers of voluntary readers and parents working in the school

• New library and teaching space to support teaching of reading and 1:1 / small group interventions and extensive new reading resources

• Learning Mentors based at school, providing support for children with social, emotional and behavioural issues

• Children acting as “leaders” across the school in a variety of roles – new coordinator post and child leaders’ accreditation

• Excellent safeguarding

• Parenting classes aid excellent partnership working with parents

• Increased uptake of extended school provision

• Increased sports provision in school time – basketball, squash, football, tennis, netball, volleyball and a new school sports coordinator

• Introduction of Numicon to support children’s understanding in maths, especially in relation to number and calculation

 

Objectives of Pupil Premium Funding

When making decisions about using pupil premium funding it is important to consider the context of the school and the subsequent challenges faced. Common barriers for pupil premium children can be accessing support at home, issues around language and communication skills, confidence issues, compliance with attendance and punctuality regulations. Family situations can prevent children from flourishing. The challenges are varied and there is no “one size fits all”.

Our key objective in using the Pupil Premium Grant is to narrow the gap between pupil groups. As a school we have an excellent track record of ensuring that pupils make good progress, but historically levels of attainment have been lower for pupil premium children– this is also a national trend. Through targeted interventions we are working to eliminate barriers to learning and progress. For children who start school with low attainment on entry, our aim is to ensure that they make accelerated progress in order to reach age related expectations + as they move through the school.

We have analysed our data thoroughly and have made use of a range of research, such as parental engagement, children as writers, good practice in using pupil premium funding to inform our decision making.

In addition to this we have identified some key principles (outlined below), which we believe will maximise the impact of our pupil premium spending.

 

Key Principles

 

Building Belief

We will provide a culture where:

• staff believe in ALL children

• there are “no excuses” made for underperformance

• staff adopt a “solution-focused” approach to overcoming barriers

• staff support children to develop “growth” mindsets towards learning

 

Analysing Data

 

We will ensure that:

• All staff are involved in the analysis of data so that they are fully aware of strengths and weaknesses across the school

 

Identification of Pupils

 

We will ensure that:

• ALL teaching staff and support staff are involved in analysis of data and identification of pupils

• ALL staff are aware of who pupil premium and vulnerable children are

• ALL pupil premium children benefit from the funding, not just those who are underperforming

• Underachievement at all levels is targeted (not just lower attaining pupils)

• Children’s individual needs are considered carefully so that we provide support for those children who could be doing “even better if.....”

 

Improving Day to Day Teaching

 

We will continue to ensure that all children across the school receive good teaching, with increasing percentages of outstanding teaching achieved by using our team leaders to:

 

• Set high expectations

• Address any within-school variance

• Ensure consistent implementation of the non-negotiables, e.g. marking and guided reading

• Share good practice within the school and draw on external expertise

• Provide high quality CPD

• Improve assessment through joint levelling and moderation

 

Increasing learning time

 

We will maximise the time children have to “catch up” through:

• Improving attendance and punctuality

• Providing earlier intervention (KS1 and EYFS)

• Extended learning out of school hours (early mornings and lunchtimes)

 

Individualising support

Children self elect to attend our Booster Groups and are keen to be invited to attend an early morning club.

 

We will ensure that the additional support we provide is effective by:

• Looking at the individual needs of each child and identifying their barriers to learning

• Ensuring additional support staff and class teachers communicate regularly

• Using team leaders to provide high quality interventions across their phases

• Matching the skills of the support staff to the interventions they provide

• Working with other agencies to bring in additional expertise Beanstalk – volunteer readers, School Home Support

• Providing extensive support for parents to develop their own skills (ESOL, Literacy, ICT, Back to Work/Volunteering) to support their children’s learning within the curriculum andto manage in times of crisis

• Tailoring interventions to the needs of the child (e.g. Targeted maths revision sessions in the afternoons for children who struggle in the main lesson)

• Recognising and building on children’s strengths to further boost confidence (e.g Robotics Club and Gifted and Talented Science and Sports)

 

Going the Extra Mile

In our determination to ensure that ALL children succeed we recognise the need for and are committed to providing completely individualised interventions for set periods of time to support children in times of crisis.

 

Funding Priorities

This year our aim is to further increase the percentage of outstanding teaching across the school through our “Team Leader Model” which has placed two Deputy Headteachers in a position to lead lessons and coach teachers. We also want to raise standards in reading, by enthusing children to become avid readers and will develop a new school library, extend reading resources and focus on improving home reading via our Bug Club (ICT programme).

 

In addition we are adopting a new whole school approach to supporting children in developing their skills as writers and will be focusing on developing children’s speaking skills to support this through the use of ICT – film making, web conferencing and podcasting. We want all children to be able to talk confidently about their learning, where they are and what they need to do to improve, so each child has their own learning targets, which are constantly reviewed.

We are determined to ensure that the percentage of children working at age related expectations and above increases, especially at KS1 and in the EYFS.

 

To increase parental engagement in learning, we are extending the support on offer for parents through skills sessions, training in the curriculum and through providing targeted parents’ meetings to support them in helping children at home. A range of areas are covered for example reading, visits and trips to take, ICT, Science, Homework, ESOL and developing maths skills using Numicon. We will also extend our crèche provision to increase attendance at events.

Our Gifted & Talented coordinator and School Council Leader ensure that there are a range of opportunities for children to develop their leadership skills and introduce a system or accreditation for children