Mp’s asking for £700 for FSM children

[Struggling2020]

Thoughts on this?

news.sky.com/story/amp/coronavirus-school-closures-will-worsen-north-south-education-divide-say-mps-11980290

Maybe I’m bitter (actually I AM bitter) but it’s not just the poorest kids who are struggling. In fact my friends on full benefits are the most secure right now out of all of us, they can focus 100% of their time and attention on their kids as no work to do from home and they’re still getting FSM with no worries about losing their jobs or reduction in income, intact according to them, benefits have gone up this month. (Fully appreciate this may not be the case all round)

In my experience, It’s those of us in the squeezed middle struggling! Trying to work and homeschool, struggling financially as everyone at home for lunches as opposed to usual nursery/ks1 free lunch. Worried about our jobs and what the future holds. Many of us forced onto reduced hours.

I understand statistically that those on FSM are more likely to fall behind. But is this another way of trying to disguise the issues? Trying to fit people into boxes of how we can help. The rich will be fine, the poor will be helped, the middle will be forgotten?

I think I need perspective.... my AIBU

AIBU to think it is not just FSM children who are disadvantaged by the current situation and actually, the problem is much bigger than that?

@Struggling2020, I think the crux of my argument as the parent of a FSM child is that £700 is absolute chicken feed compared to the EXTRA £10,000 each MP has been allocated in expenses to help them cope with working from home during the lockdown period.

I work and my children get fsm. See this is why I was shaming using my vouchers in the supermarket. My older kids I always paid for their school meals. I was with their dad then. He was awful, maybe the people think I should have stayed.

@grindergirl

Yes 1974 was literally a lifetime ago I was 2 that year!

You’re 15 years older than me and as I thought you’ve done the same as my dad does and based your thoughts and opinions on how things were THEN.

The world and the country has changed beyond belief since then!

I too left home at 17 and worked a low paid job and lived in lodgings in London. Even in London my rent was only about a third of my income, now many find their rent is half or more of their income and other costs have increased in terms of percentage of income too. Food may be cheaper but many other things aren’t.

When did you last job hunt? When were you last truly aware of the job opportunities or rather lack of for school and uni leavers now? For mothers?

My mum worked, one big difference is that Licencing hours changing mean pub work is not the family friendly option they once were. Heard of rolling shifts? How is a family supposed to organise and pay for childcare when they don’t know what shifts they’re doing each week until as short notice as a day before that work week starts? And childcare providers now aren’t as flexible either - again partly due to increased regulation. My mum used childminders in the 70’s and 80’s too but back then it was pretty much an informal arrangement and many of the minders weren’t considering or in need of the money as a main income so were happy to be flexible on hours and pay. Now if you work changing shifts you have to “book in” and pay for your child to be full time in order to ensure cover.

There are precious few “school hours” jobs and in most cases they come down to more who you know than what you know. And are often temp contracts too, and don’t pay at all well.

I was job hunting with dd a couple years back (weirdly she was also 17) the major difference now is you can see the situation job wise as most are advertised on websites/apps and there’s often a counter showing how many people have applied for that ONE vacancy. Remember also that ONE vacancy will be advertised on several sites. Care to guess the numbers of applicants PER VACANCY? It was in the HUNDREDS!

Where I live the town has been decimated by austerity policies, only maybe a third, possibly less of the shops are occupied and that reflects the situation generally. We had a chain open a shop here about 18 months ago - practically unheard of for “new” places to open - they never even needed to advertise jobs, as soon as the news hit Facebook they were inundated with THOUSANDS of on spec applications (I heard 6,500) for maybe 10 jobs.

People here WANT to work, WANT to earn but it’s mostly part time, temp, zero hours shit which is pretty crap if you have dependents and need a steady income.

In 1974 this place was THRIVING. Had several major employers and a busy town centre full of chain stores and a few independent shops.

But we all draw from our own experiences partly yes, but we also if we have compassion, understanding and empathy at least pause a moment to consider that others circumstances and opportunities are not the same as ours. Most of us have the sense to understand that the passage of time and various govt policies mean society now is not the same as nearly 50 years ago!

Something odd strikes me about your language... are you American?

I feel sorry for your granddaughter, instead of helping and supporting her you’re judging her without considering or understanding the obstacles to working she may have to contend with.

I’ve yet to meet ANYONE who LIKES being on benefits despite many who claim this as a reality.

And I’ve met a lot of people on benefits partly from my own circumstances but also in the past various jobs and voluntary roles meant I was helping people in dire straits.

Some benefits increase by less than a £1 a week every year due to the standard of living increasing. It's literally pennies.

Many benefits have been frozen for the last five years.

www.google.com/amp/s/www.mirror.co.uk/news/politics/dwp-benefits-universal-credit-rise-21820112.amp

www.google.com/amp/s/www.bbc.co.uk/news/amp/uk-politics-50278634

Even now as a pandemic tries to humble society, there are people who think they know how financially secure or not, people who are supposedly worse off than them are. FSM is based on income plenty of working parents quality for FSM due to a low income. Its not true that children on FSM don't do as well, as they are taught by the same teachers as those who pay for meals. How well a child continues to learn during home learning, depends on how pro active their parents are.

When was the abbreviation FSM a thing ? Took me a while to work it out,
How absolutely shitty to tag some poor kid like that ffs. It’s incredibly patronising and wanky.

Its not true that children on FSM don't do as well, as they are taught by the same teachers as those who pay for meals.

It is true. It is simple fact that children who qualify for FSM are less likely to attain the 5 GSCE’s than children who do not.

That is because educational attainment is about far more than class teachers. They can only do so much, but they cannot level all of the issues. If they could then things like Pupil Premium wouldn’t be needed.

There are too many variables to make a conclusive connection to fsm and failing education.

For starters something like 22% of eligible families aren’t claiming. Many won’t be claiming simply because they don’t see the point. The money is still available for some years after the family are no longer eligible.
.
There are too many variables to make a conclusive link to income and education.

Any family that meet the requirements can claim. Not all gifted children come from with money.

I mean come on, if it was so simplistic, there wouldn’t be children on fsm in super selective grammar schools. There are many, especially in secondary that didn’t have the privilege of a tutor. Instead they wanted to learn when in school.

Oh and incidentally, less than 10% of children were claiming fsm.

It’s also skewed because the mindset starts with the assumption that those claiming fsm are thick, lazy layabouts. Most fail to look at individual circumstances. Exam years, job loss, boom fsm, the kid fails. Not because of income but because something else going on elsewhere.

Linking fsm in such a way is like saying all privileged teens are well educated individuals.

Would love to see proper research that also follows those pupils who were tutored into schools.
Follow them until later in life. Then look at the statistics.

One thing about years ago that was good, working your way up the ladder didn’t have to include formal education. It was based on doing the job.

So many children at 18 are clueless about the world around. That’s crap parenting, nothing to do with income.

What puzzles me is people are more upset at the poorest children getting help but have nothing to say about Victoria Beckham getting £250000 to furlough her workers when she can pay for it herself especially given her company is a vanity project that has never registered a profit and is constantly being bailed out by her husband, or Richard Branson trying to do the same while living in a tax haven and doing his creative accounting so he can benefit from a scheme he refuses to pay into or that Amazon received more in tax cuts and subsidies than it paid in tax.

We are so busy fighting for crimes but don't see or complain about those who can actually make a difference in society if they paid their fair share. Corporations are the higgest welfare recipients in this country but we are more concerned with Susan down the road receiving £331 a week in Universal Credit than we are with the actual spongers.

Literally fighting for crumbs while someone walks away with the whole cake in hand

@grindergirl
As Graphista said, your experience was a lifetime away. You could never do what you did then as a single mum now. It isn’t allowed legally. Legislation for childminding has changed everything. Then there’s the income. Wages in relation to rent are far lower. Part of this again is due to legislation to protect the tenant and ensure housing is safe creating on costs and rent rises. Incomes have also not kept up with inflation and flexible working / 24 hour working means oftentimes you couldn’t have kept your job.

Perhaps instead of looking down your nose at your grand daughter, you could offer to help with her real life challenges. If you were in her shoes today, perhaps you would be reacting the same as her. She knows there is no way out for her and is dealing with it in the same way as her peers.

You’re early 60’s, right? Have you thought that perhaps you could look after her dc in order for her to work or study? Or help her with the skills to cook nutritious meals? Part of the break down and fragmentation of society is the older generation not helping the younger one.

How absolutely shitty to tag some poor kid like that ffs. It’s incredibly patronising and wanky

The qualifying factor for the grant is is you are in receipt of free school meals, not sure how I could have written it differently?

The thread was not about free school meals, the thread was about the grant. At no point did I say they shouldn’t get anything, I said other kids are disadvantaged too and your parents earning under the threshold for FSM’s is not the only factor that could disadvantage a child at this time and extra help should be available to others also.

Some of the responses on here appear to be answering something complete different to what I’ve said though, it’s bizarre

Perhaps by not categorising a chunk of kids in a derogatory fashion, OP? I had a FSM friend in the 1980's - you had to pay with a big bright plastic token, instead of money. Just great for bullying. Maybe sew a special patch to their school jumpers too to really 'other' them?

'Those who qualify for Pupil Premium', might be better? (the same PP that is given to the Whole School to divide up as it wishes, not spent on that qualifying pupil individually)

The £700 will not be 'given to families'.
The Laptop will be on loan, and, no Xenia, will not be instantly exchanged for drugs in many PP households.

Perhaps we could discuss the 'Free 10K MP Scroungers' too?

Maybe the Free10KMPScroungers is a different thread, but by Jove, this one is depressing, resenting £700 going to schools to help the poorest children escape their educational poverty traps :(

So many were ready to defend MPs for their 10K working from home allowance when they are more than likely to have laptops, phones and WiFi set up in their home, by by Jove should a poor child need help getting equipment, access to the internet and help catching up as they have missed the last 6 weeks of school-then they are really the problem and of course it will be immediately exchanged for drugs. We are all a few bad decisions away from being in that position. My uncle was a multimillionaire and his business went under due to an embezzling employee, he took out his savings and moved somewhere else to start again and nothing took off as the economy worsened in the country he was in, he worked night and day to keep food on the table and struggled so much. My cousins grew up in abject poverty but were born with a silver spoon in the mouth. Only now 20 years later is he finally getting back on track but that's to a normal middle class existence after retraining and working simultaneously as well as having moved 6 times. There but for the grace of God go I.

resenting £700 going to schools to help the poorest children escape their educational poverty traps

Who has done this?

Such drivel shite written on here sometimes.

Do you think the only way to give help to other kids is to take it from the poorest?

How about taxing the billionaire business owners some more to give extra support to all kids who need it? Or is that a crazy idea?

was the 'drivel shite' mine, OP?

extra support to all kids that need it - YES, great!!!

But what is wrong with starting with those already identified as needing it?? and ANYWAY that money goes to the schools who use it generally, NOT specifically attached to the child in question (hard enough to get any dedicated TA hours if you have an EHCp yet alone merely Pupil Premium - they are available for the whole class, ime)

‘Drivel shite’ was written to the people who haven’t bothered to read what I have written and instead have gone on the attack. If they had bothered to read, they’d see that I’ve at no point whatsoever, said that the PP kids shouldn’t get the support, I have merely said that I believe funds intended towards additional tuition should be available to all kids who need it when schools reopen as those qualifying for FSM Will not be the only children who will have struggled throughout this.

@Pixieblu hear hear!

@Mummyoflittledragon glad you understand what I was saying totally agree the older generations are dreadful at supporting the younger ones and far too quick to criticise without understanding how things have changed.

Who has done this? YOU op it's the entire premise of your thread pointless back-pedalling now

@Graphista
I know, I kind of repeated your post back. It seems to me society has broken down somewhat. I suppose it keeps people in their place to the satisfaction of JRM and his ilk. 🙄

. If they had bothered to read, they’d see that I’ve at no point whatsoever, said that the PP kids shouldn’t get the support, I have merely said that I believe funds intended towards additional tuition should be available to all kids who need it when schools reopen as those qualifying for FSM Will not be the only children who will have struggled throughout this

And if you'd bothered to read everything, you'd note that your child would also be eligible as part of the Pupil Premium Group (been in receipt of FSM within the last six years), so you're feeling left out for absolutely no reason.

Its not true that children on FSM don't do as well*

Bloody hell. Tell the Government. Tell them to stop monitoring children who qualify for Pupil Premium outcomes as a separate measurement of pupil and school success. Because you obviously know better than all those studies, and teachers in school who see the result of how poverty impacts on learning every single day, eh?

MitziK firstly, my child has never received FSM. So as I stated, you haven’t bothered to read and have made something up in your head. Secondly, it is not just about my child. It is about all of the children that are struggling.

FSM for KS1 is different to FSM for pupil premium.