Top 10 ways to spend the funding and make the most impact

1. Pupil Premium toolkit:
Top 10 ways to spend the
funding and make the most
impact
Peter Lauener
Education Funding Agency
22 January 2014

2. Areas I plan to cover today
1. The context
– The Government’s reform agenda
– Why the pupil premium is needed
2. Our policy incentives
– Funding
– Inspection
– Evidence on what works
3. Actions for school leaders and teachers to increase impact

3. • We fund schools and colleges to educate
children and young people in England. To do
this we:
• fund academies directly and ensure they meet the
terms of their funding agreements
• fund local authorities to fund maintained schools
• fund sixth forms, colleges and training providers
to educate 16 to 19-year-olds, and those with
learning difficulties or disabilities to age 24 with
LDA
• provide bursaries to disadvantaged young people
• deliver building and maintenance programmes for
schools and sixth-form colleges, including project
managing new builds for schools in greatest need
EFA’s remit
-
for which
our funding
is £54bn in
2013-14
We fund schools and colleges to educate
children and young people in England. To
do this we:

4. Improving disadvantaged pupils’ life chances
is at the heart of the Government’s education
reform agenda
‘…no country that wishes to be considered
world class can afford to allow children from
poorer families to fail as a matter of course.’
Prime Minister and Deputy Prime Minister

5. Poverty, equity and attainment
5

6. "Our data shows it doesn't matter if you go to a school in Britain,
Finland or Japan, students from a privileged background tend to do
well everywhere. What really distinguishes education systems is their
capacity to deploy resources where they can make the most
difference. Your effect as a teacher is a lot bigger for a student who
doesn't have a privileged background than for a student who has lots
of educational resources.“
Andreas Schleicher – OECD
6

7. Pupil premium: the gap
• The gap gets wider as pupils get older:
• 17.3ppt gap (63.4% achievement by PP pupils, 80.7% non-PP)
achieving level 4+ in reading, writing and maths at age 11 (2013)
• 27.2ppt gap (38.5% achievement by PP pupils, 65.7% non-PP)
achieving 5+ A*-C grades including English and maths GCSEs at age
16 (2012)
• Big variations between schools and between LAs
• KS2 reading, writing, maths gap (2013): Newham 4ppts, Rutland 35ppts
• GCSE 5 A*-C inc. English and maths gap (2012):
Kensington and Chelsea 6ppts, Wokingham 41ppts, Southend 41ppts
• Between 2008-13 the FSM gap narrowed:
• By 5.3ppts in percentage achieving level 4 or above in maths at primary
• (2008-12) By 1.6ppts in percentage achieving 5+A*-C grades inc.
English and maths GCSEs at secondary
• The highest attainment for FSM eligible pupils and smallest gaps on average
occur in schools with high rates of FSM.
• Gaps can vary widely from year to year in schools

8. Incentives
Funding
School
Interventions
Inspection
Pupil
Premium
reviews
Better
information
Evidence on
effectiveness
8
Our policy incentives

9. Funding
9
Since April 2011, additional and rising targeted
school funding for disadvantaged pupils:
 £625million in 2011-12 – £488 per pupil
 £1.25billion in 2012-13 – £623 per pupil
 £1.875bn in 2013-14 – £953 per primary
pupil, £900 per secondary pupil
 £2.5billion in 2014-15:
– £1300 primary-aged pupils
– £935 secondary-aged pupils
– £1900 for all looked-after children,
adopted children and care leavers

10. School
interventions
10
Schools have the freedom to choose the
interventions they consider to be most
effective and cost-effective, but need to
publish online:
 the school’s pupil premium allocation for the
current academic year
 details of how you intend to spend the
allocation
 details of how you spent the previous
academic year’s allocation
 how it made a difference to the attainment of
disadvantaged pupils
Identify pupils with Key to Success tool

11. Inspection
11
From Sept 2013, sharper “Section 5”
inspections, more focussed on attainment of
disadvantaged pupils:
 schools will now not normally be judged
“outstanding” if – among other things –
disadvantaged pupils are not making good
progress
 schools judged “requiring improvement”
overall and on leadership where
disadvantaged pupils are not making good
progress are likely to have a Pupil Premium
review recommended
Read the new framework document

12. Pupil
premium
reviews
12
From Sept 2013, any school can commission a
Pupil Premium review. The review:
 to identify effective action for raising the
attainment of disadvantaged pupils
 should be led by a system leader, usually
from the National College for Teaching and
Leadership (NCTL), with a track record in
this area
 can be paid for using pupil premium funding
 does not require an Ofsted recommendation
– any school can commission a review
NCTL have a directory of system leaders

13. Better
information
13
From October 2013, better information on the
achievement of disadvantaged pupils, with:
 attainment data on disadvantaged pupils for
schools in RaiseONLINE (Oct 2013, primary,
Dec 2013, secondary)
 new three-year rolling average measures in
performance tables (Dec 2013, primary, Jan
2014, secondary)
 enhanced similar schools tool with FSM
banding information
See RaiseONLINE and performance tables

14. Evidence of
effectiveness
14
Since February 2012, the Education
Endowment Foundation (EEF) has awarded
£35.9m to 68 projects, including 23 on literacy
catch-up.
 Most are rigorously evaluated using
randomised controlled trials (RCTs)
 Knowledge gained will be published on a
termly basis from January 2014
 EEF teaching and learning toolkit to
provide accessible evidence and advice on
the effectiveness of a range of approaches.

15. educationendowmentfoundation.org.uk/toolkit

16. EEF Toolkit
16

17. Feedback
Approach
Average
impact
Cost
Evidence
estimate
Summary
Feedback 8 months ££
Very high impact for
low cost
Research suggests that providing effective feedback is challenging. To be
effective, it should be:
• About challenging tasks or goals rather than easy ones.
• Given sparingly so that it is meaningful.
• About what is right more often than about what is wrong.
• Specific, accurate and clear, e.g. not just “correct” or “incorrect”.
• Provide examples of what is correct and not just tell students when they
are wrong.
• Encouraging and supportive of further effort without threatening a
learner’s self-esteem.

18. What does Ofsted say?
Ofsted’s 2013 report on the pupil premium said:
“While there are some pockets of very good practice, we find that too many
schools are still not spending the Pupil Premium on interventions that are making
any meaningful impact.”
“Many schools still lack good enough systems for tracking the spending of the
additional funding or for evaluating the effectiveness of measures they have put
in place in terms of improving outcomes. In short, they struggle to show that the
funding is making any real difference.”
“The best school leaders know what they want to achieve from each of their
interventions and they evaluate progress thoroughly to make sure these are
working. They also have well thought-through plans for building on success.”

19. How are schools doing it successfully?
Ofsted’s 2013 report also sets out the characteristics of schools
that are using their Pupil Premium successfully to maximise
achievement:
• use data to analyse progress and the causes of under-achievement;
• use research evidence;
• allocate their best teachers to intervention groups;
• give systematic feedback to pupils;
• ensure class and subject teachers knew their Pupil Premium pupils
and were responsible for accelerating progress;
• monitor and evaluate impact on pupil results; and
• involve governors in planning and evaluating.

20. When should we worry?
Independent 2013 evaluation report and Ofsted 2012 report
identified less effective practice, including:
 where school are not sufficiently clear about who their
disadvantaged pupils are
 where schools are not prioritising disadvantaged pupils as
intended
 where the choices about what interventions or training to
invest in are not evidence-based
20

21. Top 10 actions for school leaders and teachers (1)
1. Know where your attainment gaps are
2. Target funding at your disadvantaged pupils
- use Key to Success to identify who they are
3. Understand what evidence Ofsted is looking for on use of the
pupil premium and the progress and attainment of
disadvantaged pupils
- read the current Ofsted framework document

22. Top 10 actions for school leaders and teachers (2)
4. Understand what the 2013 Ofsted pupil premium report says
about the characteristics of schools that are using the funding
effectively to maximise attainment
5. Involve your board of governors – and parents/carers – in your
decisions on how to spend the pupil premium
6. Read relevant sections of your school’s RAISEonline report;
identify schools which are similar to yours; get help from
school improvement or data provider partners

23. Top 10 actions for school leaders and teachers (3)
7. Consider commissioning a pupil premium review
- you don’t need to be prompted by Ofsted to do this, and you
can pay for it using pupil premium funding
8. Engage with the evidence on “what works” in the Teaching
and Learning Toolkit – when selecting which interventions to
put in place and in planning their delivery
9. Evaluate the impact of your activities and gather evidence for
Ofsted
10. Publish your pupil premium statement online

24. Today’s
conference
Get buy-
in at
school
Use
evidence
to decide
strategy
Training
in depth
Change
practice
Make an
impact
Evaluate
effective
ness
What next?

25. To end on an optimistic note …

26. 26
Links, tweets and contacts
www.gov.uk/government/policies/raising-the-achievement-of-
disadvantaged-children
www.education.gov.uk/schools/pupilsupport/premium
@educationgovuk @johndunford
pupilpremium.champion@education.gsi.gov.uk
Questions?