Pupil Premium
Overview
The Pupil Premium Grant (PP) was introduced by the Coalition Government in April 2011 to provide additional support for looked after children (LAC), children from service families and those from low income families who are eligible for Free School Meals (FSM) at any point in their six years at school. Since April 2014 the Government has also allocated funding to pupils who have been adopted from care via a Pupil Premium Plus Grant (PPG+). The funding is made available to schools to help them narrow the attainment gap that still exists between pupils from disadvantaged and more affluent backgrounds.
It is for schools to decide how the PP is spent, since they are best placed to assess what additional provision should be made for the pupils within their responsibility. However, schools are to be held accountable for how they have used the additional funding and are required to report how the grant is being used to support pupil achievement and progress in their school.
Aims
The primary aim of our school is to ensure that all children are able to access all aspects of the school’s provision in order to achieve the highest standard of achievement and the greatest possible progress. We strive to ensure achievement of disadvantaged children to be in line with that of their peers who are not disadvantaged to increase their future life chances.
Principles
At Great Wakering Primary we will ensure that:
Teaching and learning opportunities will be targeted to meet the needs of all pupils;
The grant is used best to support vulnerable groups of children so that they achieve or excel their potential;
Children’s emotional, social and academic needs will be catered for in order for them to achieve their potential;
We use rigorous monitoring to pinpoint those children whose levels of attainment or progress are below expectations and put targeted interventions into place for them;
We allocate the best staff and use interventions with evidence of success to intervene;
Data throughout the intervention period is checked and used to assess whether or not the intervention needs to continue or be increased;
All staff are highly trained in the differentiation of the national curriculum and relevant interventions;
This initiative is linked to the monitoring of attendance and behaviour;
There is a clear and robust Performance Management process, linked to pupil performance and to teacher’s pay;
Governors are kept informed at all stages and that there is a named trustee for PP;
The allocation of funding is clearly tracked so that spending can be accounted for and its impact measured.
In distributing the grant, we also recognise that:
Not all children who are in receipt of PP funding are socially disadvantaged;
Not all children who are socially disadvantaged are registered for FSM so not in receipt of PP funding.
As a result, we reserve the right to allocate PP funding to support any pupil or groups of pupils we feel are vulnerable in order to raise their levels of attainment so that their life chances improve.
