School trips

[suzylee73]

Hi all,

I have been a foster carer for many years but changed to a different local authority 3 years ago. I have a sibling group of 3 and now the lockdowns have ended its time for all the school trips to start up again which is great.......... but
I now have several to pay for and owe about £1500 between them all! The previous local authority always paid for or went halves on school trips but the new one will not contribute at all and the school has absorbed the pupil premium into the budget.

The school is only given £1050 but I thought they were meant to get £2345?
I can't afford all these trips but I can't tell kids they have to miss out either.
Anyone else having this issue?

You don't have to pay that out of fostering allowance- it either comes out of pupil premium or the local authority will pay for it - yes sometimes they go halves with the school

Bring it up in the school meetings with the social worker/link worker

Do not pay for this out of your fostering allowance

We recently approached our ifa and the girls LA regarding funding for shool ski trip (over £1,000) and both refused to contribute. Pupil premium funds cannot be used as the trip is "not eductional".

They are not allowed to just absorb the pupil premium into their budget. They have to show what they have used it on for each individual child they are getting it for. If they are not able to show you a breakdown you need to be telling the kids' social worker and they need to bring it up with the school, or get Virtual School involved.

My two foster teens' trips get paid out of their pupil premium but that's because they don't need specialist equipment or a 1:1 or anything, so as the money has to be used on them it's used for their musical instrument lessons and any residential trips that come up. In general it's not meant to be used on trips as long as it's being used on something specific that the child needs. But if they don't need anything then the school should use it on trips rather than put it in the general pot.