Pupil Premium Statement

Background

Research has shown that there are identifiable inequalities between children eligible for free school meals (FSM) and looked after children (LAC) in relation to their peers within their academic and personal development. Nationally, as a group, children who have been eligible for FSM at any point in time have consistently lower educational attainment than those who have never been eligible for FSM.

In order to help address these inequalities the Government provide Pupil Premium funding, which is additional funding, to schools so that it can be used to support those disadvantaged and most vulnerable pupils who need it most.

The Pupil Premium is grant funding for pupils from Reception to Year 11 who are:-

· Looked After’ by a Local Authority for at least one day as recorded in the Children Looked After Data Return and aged 4-15 on 31st August.

· Adopted from care under the Adoption and Children Act 2002 and children who have left care under a special Guardianship or Residence Order

· Eligible for Free School Meals at any point in the previous six years (known as the Ever 6 FSM measure).

· Children of armed services personnel. The Service Children premium also includes children whose parents have left the service up to four years ago; this is known as Ever 4.

The level of funding for pupil premium in 20-21 was as follows:-

· Pupils in Year Groups R to 6 recorded as Ever 6 FSM £1,345

· Pupils in Year Groups 7 to 11 recorded as Ever 6 FSM £955

· Looked After Children (LAC) £2,345 (we do not always receive the full funding and are beholden to individual Local Authority decision making)

· Service children – Pupils in Year Groups R to 11 recorded as Ever 4 Service Child or in receipt of a child pension from the Ministry of Defence £310

It is the school’s responsibility to decide how the majority of Pupil Premium is spent and to ensure it is linked to targets based on the child’s educational attainment. We are required to report on how much pupil premium funding we received for this academic year, details of how we intend to spend the funding, including our reasons and evidence, details of how we spent the funding for the previous academic year and how it made a difference to the attainment of the pupils.

Practice at Heart of the Forest School

To ensure that pupil premium has the desired impact upon pupil’s attainment and personal development we review, on a regular basis, best practice and guidance in order to help us identify the best and the most effective strategies available for our pupils.

Due to the complex nature of the pupils at Heart of the Forest School we recognise that outcomes may not always be as directly related to attainment in English and Mathematics areas of the curriculum as within main stream school setting and they may not also be measurable via attainment.

For some of our pupils we identify that outcomes and therefore progress can be related to, for example, emotional literacy, behaviour support or physical development and may be far more relevant to the child at specific points in their education.