School catch up fund

[Splinkyplonk]

Try and focus on the bigger picture here, I'm not being goady.

So the plan so far seems to be that of the 6.7 million school children, 2 million of the most disadvantaged (ie those with hopeless parents or low achievement anyway) will get extra one on one tutoring partly paid for by an extra pot of gov money.

What about the majority of kids who all have missed vital stages of learning. Is the truth its just up to schools and parents to make the effort and muddle along?

Clearly those who can pay for tutoring privately and have the capacity to supervise their children will just sort that out themselves in the absence of anything from government.

The result will just be a deeper divide in education standards between the haves and have nots.

So is the £350m for PP pupils? Will they just increase PP for a year?

The bigger issue to me is how this would work.

• after school - kids are tired anyway
• in school - means pulling kids out of other lessons
• and where are the tutors/teachers going to appear from

partly paid for?
Who the fuck pays the rest? We're talking about children on FSMs here, families accessing food banks. How the hell can they make a contribution to tutoring costs?

@7ofNine I think the schools have to pay part of it. Unfortunately most schools won’t have the budget to do this.

The schools will have to pay for the gap in funding, which means they taking away even more resource and opportunity from all the children who don't count as disadvantaged.

Schools? Schools that were already in the position of choosing between copier paper and loo paper?

This government are utter cunts.

And I say that as someone with their children in fee-paying schools.

This is such a betrayal of an entire generation of children.

You are also asking abut highvukberabke and isolated DC going forward - not just as a catch u, but for as long as it is nit safe for shielded people to be in a classroom.

Usually it would be the LA tutoring service that would provide for children unable to attend school for a protracted time because of health issues.

The trouble is that we're about to enter a recession that will make austerity look like a walk in the park. The Tories are doing exactly what you can rely on them to do, which is to prioritise getting the economy moving above shielded and other vulnerable DC. And there is merit to that. Because we're about to be so broke that we won't be able to afford it all, no matter is much you try to fiddle with squeezing local budgets or assigning new duties without adequate new funds.

OP has your child been in school all this time or at home with their other parent? If at school presumably hesbeen learning there? That said, private may be different in that the key workers children have been in DS and DDs school at least been receiving exactly the same lessons as children at home complete with videos, work etc. If KW children in state sector havent been taught at least ri same time table as children at home that is IMHO a massive blunder.

I was talking to a HT the other day, they think we are not far off all schools having to ask for regular voluntary contributions from parents just to fund the basics like books. It is awful schools are in this state

Well I think any opportunities should be available to all children. I suspect most children have been disadvantaged under the pandemic, either through not having a good working environment at home (living space/overcrowding, lack of resources), inability or unwillingness of parents to help either through work commitments, health reasons, lack of academic capability or in some cases laziness. Other children will have suffered mentally, although managing to keep up academically.

I think every child should have an allocated fund that can be spent by the headteacher in the manner they think would assist that child best. School offers children many things and I think the fund should be available to be used to help them catch up in all respects rather than just academically.

But I suspect some will just want it allocated to some kids off council estates as this will be the biggest headline grabber.

So you are a hopeless parent so your dc will get the advantage.

I think they are calling them tutors as it sounds like they wont have to have any particular qualifications. Which makes no difference to academy schools as they can do this anyway, employ who they like regardless of qualifications.

Perhaps the government could get rid of OFSTED for a year, that would free up some teacher time or write to every parent asking them not to ask where jumpers left in the playground are. There’s three hours a week of time right there!

It will be up to the schools how they work it out. There will be options.

Like all the government announcements they have made it without having thought through the detail. So who knows how it will work. I agree the most concerning thing is that is says schools will have to pay 25% of costs. This means many schools wont be able to do it anyway or it will only go to pupil premium children who get the extra funding already.

This apparently works out at about £14000 per school, enough for one extra TA for the year!

Over the past 3 months if you think of kids who have crept behind, you are talking about kids with SEND, anxiety and panic (which is prominent among the higher achieving kids), kids who may not have access to a laptop 24/7, kids whose parents are key workers, kids who come from bigger families and the parents struggled to homeschool them all, kids whose parents worked hom from and may not have engaged with their homeschooling, kids with behaviour issues, and kids with mild learning difficulties who get no help in school as it is. That covers the majority of kids in a class. As a teacher, I would estimate from the work I am being given and the engagement with online lessons now, that about 60-70% of my students are doing no work, and havent been for weeks. They are 'behind' especially year 10, and I dont have the time next year to cover the 50% of the gcse course that the kids havent engaged with.

I think this money to will go to PP. That's it. I dont think there is enough to go to anyone else and Ofsted and the government only care about the attainment levels of PP students in comparison to those that arent PP. Teachers will always try their best, but I cant see tutoring or extra help being paid for by the government to help the 60% (my estimate) of kids who have struggled. This isn't going to be what parents want.

There's always (some, not enough) money allocated based on the number who are more disadvantaged and schools choose how to spend it.

You're deluded to think that everyone should get what only some people need.

But there will be more people needing it this year. Also not all PP will actually need this additional tutoring, some will have engaged over lockdown. Other children who do not fall in the disadvantaged description and who are normally engaged may have really struggled for a variety of reasons and would benefit from additional tutoring.

The details will become clearer later today but as I read the report on the BBC website, schools will be expected to pay 25% of the costs of the tutoring out of their share of the £650m.

As to where the tutors will come from, I hope my daughter will be able to be one of them. She is just finished her 2nd year at university and has been voluntarily tutoring 4 students throughout lockdown, two year 10 and two year 12s so it would be nice if she could be paid for this.

I feel my children have been pretty disadvantaged through this with two parents both working 50+ hour weeks and literally an hour or two a week homeSchool. But they won't be classed as disadvantaged and I'm worried sick about them.

However no doubt the scheme will just be another shambles.

@Splinkyplonk no - you are correct those pupils who are technically classed as disadvantaged do fall under those categories you mentioned, however realistically I do believe those pupils WILL be those who have fallen behind and will therefore benefit from the extra tuition.

We will, however, plan to support ALL pupils who have fallen behind with this extra funding as some who are not technically disadvantaged will have gaps in their learning and those pupils also need support to catch up.

I don't expect any school to ask their pupils or send out surveys to ascertain who has worked during the lockdown - we will do what we have always done and assess the children when they come back to school and go from there.

I've just been looking on the EEF website and there is quite a lot of detail there and some useful FAQs. Hope this link works, but if not, just google National Tutoring Programme.

Frequently Asked Questions
An FAQs in relation to the National Tutoring Programme is available online here.

Interesting that it is heavily subsidised in the first year (although schools will still struggle to afford it) but not so much in the 2nd year, but I bet it will be sold as a 2 year programme to the media

Normally what happens with PP/PP+ funding is that it is targeted at those who qualify, but other children can 'piggyback' onto it.

For example, if there are 2 PP children needing maths intervention in a class, the school can use the PP funding but throw in a couple of non-PP kids too to make up the numbers in the group.

That’s why I am wondering whether it will be added to PP funding or whether the subsidised cost will only be available to named PP pupils and will have to pay full cost if you throw in some non PP pupils.

Due to the post-pandemic economic recession about to hit us like a train, the numbers and demographic of PP and FSM students is going to vastly increase.