School Census - Thursday

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Had e mails from the school - they want everyone to have a school dinner as it is the school census and apparently this is based on how many have a school dinner (not how many have free school dinners). Is this true? Thank you

Though I did find this further down...

5.3.8 School lunches taken [ALL schools - with appropriate age
range] [used for funding]
This data item records whether an infant pupil has taken a ‘school lunch’ on census
day; where ‘school lunch’ is defined as: ‘food made available by the school for
consumption by the pupil as his / her midday meal on a school day’. This may include
‘packed lunches’ provided to children on school trips.
This data item, collected each term from all schools with an appropriate age range and
for the following pupils regardless of whether they are FSM eligible or not:
• all pupils on roll on census day in reception (that is: NCYearActual = ‘R’)
• all pupils on roll on census day in year 1 (that is: NCYearActual = ‘1’)
• all pupils on roll on census day in year 2 (that is: NCYearActual = ‘2’)
• all pupils on roll on census day aged 4 to 6 not following the national curriculum
(that is: NCYearActual = ‘X’ AND pupil born between 1 September 2009 and 31
August 2012 inclusive )
This data is used to inform the allocation of universal infant meal funding based on an
average of figures from previous census returns. It is recognised that schools will
experience some fluctuations in pupil take-up due to pupil migration, absence or other
characteristic, but it is expected that a pattern of meal take-up will be established fairly
quickly. Schools are expected to monitor any changing take-up and manage this
appropriately within their existing budget.
This field may be defaulted to TRUE within school systems, to minimise the burden of
data entry by schools.
Additional information on universal infant free school meals is available on the
department’s website.

I'm glad I'm only a postgrad research student and not in charge of any school data!

Correct potentialcharms! The more ks1 children recorded taking a meal on census day, the more money is allocated to the school budget to pay for universal free meals catering!

So, I just looked it up in the DfE guidance for census and "FSM taken" is in spring census i.e. January for FSM counts. The eligibility info is collected each census.

No FSM taken means pupil premium school meals. UIFSM is now taken at every school census. They've spotted our little scam!

haven't read entire thread but - apparently school census data is not just about FSM.. it's about nationality.... Per a tweet from the organisation Liberty: '...since 2015 the DfE has had an agreement to share up to 1500 children's names and addresses with the Home Office for immigration enforcement... ' .. of course, I could be all wrong...

It is ALL infant school meals taken not just pupil premium children meals taken. potentialqualms is right. They base the take up of census day to be what infants generally take by way of school lunches every day, and funding is given accordingly. If fewer children take a school meal on census day than on an average day the school can end up having to use funding for other departments to cover the shortfall, which is absolutely not what any school wants. there is no sneaky ulterior motive, schools are under funded.

Census gathers loads of info. Number of kids, number of SEN with additional funding, number of Pupil Premium, number in part time hours, number of exclusions, number of non-English speaking, number post-adopted etc etc. Number of UIFSM is recorded in both censuses, while some other things are only recorded in one. Yes, nationality data is now collected, but parents can decline to provide this info if they want.

http://news.sky.com/story/school-census-boycott-over-child-deportation-fear-11067557