What is extra school money per child of military parents actually for

[DorsetLass]

My DD has just started school - mid DH deployment. She has gone from happy , polite girl who loved pre school to angry, non compliant and very upset. I have spoken to school about various ways to manage - but just wondering what they actually use the extra money the government gives the school per child for? Can I ask for a little extra support for her?

Different schools use it differently depending on children's needs, the amount received etc. When we were in a mainly military school the amount of money received was high due to the number of 'military' students and it was used collectively for trips and activities that all the students benefited from. When he moved to a secondary school where he was the only military child we were able to have a say and it was used towards the cost of an additional course that he wanted to do. Different schools do lots of different things though so I would discuss it with the school. It might be worth getting a copy of the official guidelines first as some schools are not particularly knowledgeable if there is not a large military community there. Look at the relevant community support website for the service DH is in for more information.

My mother's school use it partly for catch-up programmes like Every Child Reads and Numbers Count as often forces kids have had disrupted education so they screen then all on entry and prioritise them for those programmes. It's near a large RAF base so they have a fair few of them.

What kind of support do you think would help?

our primary school is 46% forces children, we used the money to buy tablets for the kids to use to do e-blueys or send emails to their parent that's away, this means that all the kids can be in the one classroom together and they get more support from the teacher (the forces children's champion). Also spent the money on supporting the children as they enter and leave the school, kind of like a passport where the child will look at the school and the local area on the internet so it's not so daunting for them when they arrive.
It's very important to make sure the school knows that your child is a service child, the count is done of all service children in the school in Sep/Oct and then the money is paid out to the school the following Jun/Jul.

my 3 are the only military children in their school, this yr school are paying for ds1's residential trip which has saved me £230 (ive already paid a £50 dep) hopefully they will use the twins funding for their trip in Jan. Its at the schools descretion on what the service pupil premium is used for and for the past few yrs my children havent benefited from it at all as it wasnt used correctly (just went into schools money pot) but we now have a new Head who used to be a military wife herself so she has a better understanding of it ( and has been harrased asked by myself on numerous occasions what the money has been used for ) and as my 3 luckily dont need extra help academically theres nothing else they can use the money for as it is supposed to benefit the child and not the school as a whole but if you feel she needs extra acedemic help then its worth mentioning to the Head. After reading up on it all it says really is its for "pastoral care" & its at the descretion of the school on how its to be used.

Hi DorsetLass,
We have some info on our website www.aff.org.uk/army_family_life/education_childcare/primary_secondary.htm#spp about the premium with a link to case studies on the Dept for Education website on how it has been spent - hope that's useful :)