Fairness of catch up package from government

[mids2019]

Will the government's tutoring support package announced today be directed fairly

All children have suffered some form of disadvantage from COVID19 school closures so I presume will have appropriate tutoring?

I fear a blanket approach to allocating these funds on Sat parental income will possibly miss the fact that the !even if disadvantage will be dependent on other factors e.g. commitment of parents to work at home....

All children have suffered some form of disadvantage from COVID19 school closures so I presume will have appropriate tutoring?

By definition ALL children cannot suffer disadvantage Its a relative term.

I fear a blanket approach to allocating these funds on Sat parental income will possibly miss the fact that the !even if disadvantage will be dependent on other factors e.g. commitment of parents to work at home*

Sorry? Could you restate your point?

I’d be interested to know how they view the advantage/disadvantage of key workers.

Key worker parents who worked were unable to educate their children at home. They sent them into school, where teachers were told not to educate them, either.

Now some of their classes are returning, but they are being kept apart from them and remain in ‘keyworker bubbles’ which I think is horrendous for them.

We are both in the key worker category. I didn’t send my children in, but I know several people who did, and this issue really interests them at the moment.

Money into education is good my questions would be:

What quality will the tuition be at £12 per hr? I haven’t read the details fully but wouldn’t it be better for schools to be able to pay existing TAs to provide small group or one to one work rather than have to buy in tutors from Gov approved suppliers?

I’m worried about how the gaps to high-middle achieving children education will be bridged who haven’t as obviously dropped behind.

What about the summer holidays? Working parents need to know what childcare we can use??

What is the plan for September and what’s the contingency plan? The Government can be proactive not reactive now.

Well looks like the money is being directed to disadvantaged pupils (unclear how this definition is made) but I make the point all pupils have suffered a disadvantage because all pupils haven't been in school.

I thought the catch up resources would be directed to all children as catch up support is required to all children not in school.

It looks likes those that are not 'disadvantaged' will have to seek their own tutoring resources to replicate those given to the 'disadavantaged' to catch up work missed during a period of up to 6 months.

As has been said above key workers have sent their children into school instead of home schooling in order to do essential work and so will these pupils come under the disadvantage label?

I can see the political debate about narrowing attainment gaps generally within schooling however this money should be used to address a crisis that has affected all pupils.

I can see some acrimony in how this money is distributed.

By definition ALL children cannot suffer disadvantage hmm Its a relative term
I'm sure op means they'll be disadvantaged compared to previous/future years who haven't missed 4 months of school.

The plan to provide 6 months free internet access to some families will help and throws some responsibility back on parents.
Even with extensive on line provision some of our students are not accessing learning even though we have checked they have access.
Using space like community halls etc has been ruled out but if there is space in secondary schools this might be an option for primaries.

I can see some acrimony in how this money is distributed.
Yes indeed.
When parents struggling with full time jobs and home educating with minimal work from schools see the children of unemployed Wayne and Waynetta Slob (who drank themselves stupid while the kids were on fortnite the whole time ) getting tutoring of course they feel cheated. Another badly thought through scheme.

@UmbrellaHat your deeply unpleasant post and your level of ignorance are astounding. It appears the children aren’t the only ones lacking an education.

Utterly disgusting comments from some people here. These are children that you are taking about. Children who have been at home with parents who possibly cannot read and therefore couldn’t help with work even if they wanted to. Children with no table to work at. Children who share a room with multiple siblings and don’t get any space or peace to work. Children who don’t have a book to read or a pencil to write with. Children who may not know where their next meal will come from. Children who have no outside space to play in and no car/money for public transport to get anywhere. Hang your heads in shame.
Disadvantaged from missing a few months of school and having working parents who can’t sit with them for hours on end and disadvantaged from actually being a disadvantaged child are completely different.

For reference - I work full-time in a severely deprived area and am also trying to home-school my 3DC in the few hours I have spare. No it’s not easy, but my children have in no way been as disadvantaged as the children and families I work with.

@InspectorAlleyn - put so much more eloquently and politely than some posters here deserve, I salute you.

I think this has the potential to be really good.

It could do long term good to Disadvantaged pupils.

And selfishly it will also benefit my DC.

We have worked hard and kept them up to date with all their schoolwork (whilst working ourselves) and much of this has been new learning that the school have provided.

When they go back they will potentially be streets ahead of some of their classmates. The school has a higher than average amount of pupils with PP.

Any extra tuition these pupils get will hopefully help the whole class as less time will have to ve spent in repeating learning.

Yes its crap that all kids have missed so much school but I am in a position to support the school with the learning. And if needed I could employ a tutor.

We need to ensure that those children who have missed out the most are given the opportunity to catch up.

We need to ensure that they get the opportunity to get the same education as their peers.

This country is shocking for the disparity in learning and it needs to stop.

There are very few things in life that are completely fair. I do think, if this is done well, it has real potential to help some children. Will it help everyone who needs help? Probably not. But, it seems the schools will have the power to decide how to use the funds and that is a good thing, as they are best placed to allocate it fairly at a local level.

I want to point out that the reason teachers were 'told not to educate key workers children' was so that those children weren't getting light years ahead of the kids stuck at home. It would have been hugely unfair on kids at home to deny them schooling, while just permitting a few handfuls to have dedicated teaching at school in small groups for a term and a half. They have been supervised by teachers, and given support to do the same work as the kids at home. I do not think this has put those children at a disadvantage so I fail to see why they should now get special treatment. Yes, it is a shame that in some cases they remain in a separate social bubble but remember the kids returning to school are still not following normal curriculum, because again it wouldn't be fair to let them get too far ahead of children still at home shielding, or too scared to come to school. The keyworker children are by definition not the most disadvantaged if their working parents have been able to send them to school.

It's easy to get pointy elbows at a time like this, and assume that your child is more deserving than a lot of others.

None of us is objective enough to determine who is most in need, this is why we should leave it to the schools and authorities to figure out.

The ones at home with very capable parents who have taught them imaginatively every day will be ahead. The key worker children deserved to be taught. Those lessons should hsve been accessed by all in the class. Keeping children from being taught snd deliberately kept down is unfair.

Deprived DC are usually PP children. Not all PP children have poor parents. Forces children get pp and some parents are pilots! Not only are they well paid, they are bright too! Some pp children have very well educated parents but they do little paid work for various reasons. To maximise benefits is one reason in my family.

In general, these DC need the tuition but goodness knows where the quality tutors are coming from? Teachers who decide to earn a bit extra and give up holidays?

I think it is a mistake to look at this as a scheme to catch up 6 months of education. It is a scheme to help those who have fallen further behind their peers. So if an average child has fallen 5 months behind expectations then this will be aimed at those falling 9 months behind.

Overall, all children will be behind where they would have been if normal schooling had continued and the government are being disingenuous to suggest that a year's worth of funding £150 per head will catch everyone up in a year's time.

Sadly, as the parent of relatively able children, I think there will be even less focus on high achievers, but that's an understandable feature of poorly funded education. My DD2 only started school this year, so there's limited assessment data for her. It seems likely to me that her school will be pleased enough if she hits expectations for the rest of her school career and will see that as good progress for her. I won't be happy with that, but expect to have to fix it outside school, probably with private tutoring.

It is truly upsetting to hear many children have been at home for almost 4 months and have studied less than 1 hour a day. We foster a Year 9 child with SN and as I am early retired teacher he had made good progress at home working 3-4 hours each day on English, Maths, Science, and History daily, RE, PHSE, Geography once a week each and for PE a 2 mile run 3 or 4 times a week and last 2 weeks 1-1 cricket net training. He has done no Art at all as he hates drawing. Even though he has a SW and attends a special school I don't think he has been disadvantaged during lockdown. He had his own laptop and s tablet. We have secondary textbooks in house. He has read 'Of Mice and Men' written a synopsis of each chapter, written a character analysis including key quotes of Lennie, George, Slim and Cutly's wife as well as completing questions on text. He has worked equally hard on Maths, Science and Hidtory. During term time he has a tutor for 3 hours a week paid for by his PEE money and we pay some for him too. Even though he will be classified as a vulnerable child and probably will be entitled to a tutor after school I would happily carry on tutoring him myself and allow his share of tutor money go to a child who has no laptop or tablet to access work, several siblings of differing ages with a patent who has to work whilst at home and cannot afford a private tutor for their children and does not enjoy teaching them. Schools need to be careful when they decide who should receive extra catch up tuition and not jump to assumptions that all children with a SW will have been disadvantaged over lockdown. I know 2 children who get FSM and they have both been working really hard with their Mum over lockdown studying for 3-4 hours each day + running daily too.

I have read headteachers cannot employ teachers at their schools and teachers cannot get paid overtime to tutor the children. Not sure about class room teaching assistants. It would make sense to let each tutor teach 2 or 3 children of similar ability together. That way more children could access additional help. The tutor we use charges £20 per hour. I cannot see a tutor charging less.

mids2019
Here are some of the disadvantaged children in my school who we will want to put forward for tutoring:

*children in foster care who have experienced serious abuse
*children of families living in hostels
*children with social care involvement or or early help intervention with our parent support worker
*children of parents on zero hour contracts who still do not earn enough to feed them properly
*children sofa surfing with no stable home
*children of parents who do not have basic literacy skills so have had no chance of helping them during lockdown.

These children were all disadvantaged long before covid and thanks to our society will be disadvantaged long after it. I teach in an area where the number of children entitled to free school meals is high and so is social work involvement. Lots of us thankfully have no idea of the things children are going through all across our country.

My own DC will not qualify for tutoring and nor should they as they have the absolute privilege of a stable upbringing in a financially secure home with parents who love them. Many many children are lacking in these basics.

I can see that there is a continuing issue of educational inequality in this country but this was happening before COVID19 (and will continue) but think the measures the government puts in now have to address the fact al! pupils have invariably suffered in their schooling.

Although 1 billion might not actually fund a great deal in reality there are still questions about how schools will distribute the funding .

If schools are given responsibility for this budget will the funding be given on strict family income/benefits criteria or will teachers be making subjective assessments on children's ability to access the internet /IT facilities and the time parents could dedicate to home schooling?

I also think the fact tutoring seems to be a large part of the government"s solution to this so parents who aren't in receipt of government funded tutoring will feel pressured to pay for tutoring themsleves. Many of these parents will be on modest incomes but the fear that their children could be disadvantaged when it comes to critical exams will make them go down this route.

How many parents are now considering tutoring when they may. not have done pre COVID19?

The whole cohort will be disadvantaged compared to previous years but some will have been far more disadvantaged than others.

DH and I have both worked full time at home but DD is in Y12 and able to 'self teach' . She has worked on her own desktop with my laptop alongside her with friends on Zoom. Her brother has been home from Uni and able to help.

She definitely doesn't need any of that tutor money. She will have been at an advantage compared to her peers.

I trust that schools will know which pupils will have had very different circumstances and spend the money on them not 'fairly' on everyone.

Disadvantaged in this case refers to children that have been identified as behind in age-specific targets. Being poor means you are more likely to be behind on curriculum targets even when you are at school. There are obviously a few poor children who out-perform their backgrounds but it is rare. There is normally a free school meal pupil premium and an inner city school premium given to schools for this but it isn't really much money. Many schools already use that money to pay for extra tuition for their falling behind children either by bringing in extra help or they pay for online tuition packages. It already happens. Some schools use it to pay for things like music lessons. Sometimes, a child who gets the free school meal pupil premium is identified as gifted and talented in an area and a school might bring in help with that money to develop the child. Schools also get money to spend on help for children with special needs.
What has happened during Covid is that the government is now, for the first time, admitting openly that poverty causes children to be behind on set targets and that the numbers of children needing extra help is likely to be much larger than just the free school meal children. I read somewhere that around 700,000 children either had no school work set or hadn't done any set school work for 3 months. If the government doesn't handle that correctly, it will affect the economy down the line. The innovators, doctors, business starters etc were all once members of the school population who gained some of those required skills at school.
That your child hasn't been at school for half a year doesn't make them disadvantaged especially if that child is likely to catch up as soon as schools are back. If they struggle to catch up with their age appropriate targets when they return they'll have some of that £1bn spent on them. Fairness doesn't mean all children should have money spent on them. Fairness means money should be spent on those children that need it so that they have what it takes to compete fairly with my children who are very fortunate.

When parents struggling with full time jobs and home educating with minimal work from schools see the children of unemployed Wayne and Waynetta Slob (who drank themselves stupid while the kids were on fortnite the whole time ) getting tutoring of course they feel cheated. Another badly thought through scheme

What a horribly judgemental and nieve comment.

MyCruiseControl

That was a fair and balanced argument for addressing educational inequality in general and I think there is a wider debate about educational disparity to be had and the correlation between poverty and school attainment. I actually agree that the government should agree to additional funding in the long term .

However.....

This was an immediate and severe educational crisis that effected all pupils and they all have been put at some form of disadvantage compared to previous year groups who have had uninterrupted teaching.

The point is that all have suffered to some degree and therefore all should be entitled to some additional form of support due to lost schooling irrespective of social-economic background.

It has been mentioned that some older children are well motivated self-learners and a lot of pupils may continue at an educational level appropriate to the their age group.

However.....this will not apply to all children and I think the ability to target funding at any child that does fall back relative to their level if schooling had been continuous normally is important.

There may be children that will be able to achieve an A* at GCSE for example that may get an A or B if there isn't sufficient intervention and these children are important to and I think the ones that may suffer in these circumstances especially against privately schooled peers.

There are many children in failing schools who already under achieve.

I notice in The Times today a letter from a tutor who has been trying to help children in the last few months is finding the vast majority have not wanted to participate. They prefer their electronic devices and screen time. These DC that need the most help will be difficult to reach. If there is no compulsion, there might be no progress.

I agree op and disagree with gov wasting monet in this way.
I think many kids will be where they should be.
Where parents and kids have had the
-internet
-work provided
-a parent to supervise

Then doing no work is the family's choice.
Where these havent been possible then yes intervention for the child.

The children without internet and devices are why some schools werent teaching or doing so online. It makes no sense to have effectively held all state school pupils back but only support some to catch up. Would have been sensible for all who could to carry on with expectations of work submitted and then deal with specifically catching up those who had no facilities.