Pupil Premium

Pupil premium is funding to improve education outcomes for disadvantaged pupils in schools in England. Evidence shows that disadvantaged children generally face additional challenges in reaching their potential at school and often do not perform as well as other pupils.

Funding is based on the number of pupils who:

  • are eligible for free school meals, or have been eligible in the past six years (including eligible children of families with no recourse to public funds)
  • have been adopted from care or have left care
  • are looked after by the local authority.

If you feel that your child is eligible for Free School Meals but do not currently claim, please click here for the application process​.

Use of pupil premium funding

School leaders are best placed to assess their pupils’ needs and use the funding to improve attainment, drawing on evidence of effective practice. Pupil premium is not a personal budget for individual pupils and schools are not required to spend all of the allocated grant on eligible pupils.

It is for school leaders to decide how to spend the pupil premium, within the requirements of the conditions of grant.

Evidence suggests that pupil premium spending is most effective when used across three areas.

  1. High-quality teaching, such as staff professional development.
  2. Targeted academic support, such as tutoring.
  3. Wider strategies to address non-academic barriers to success in schools, such as attendance, behaviour and social and emotional support.

The Education Endowment Foundation (EEF) recommend that schools particularly focus their pupil premium on supporting high-quality teaching.

Our Pupil Premium strategy statement contains the details of how we spend the pupil premium and the impact it has on the attainment of disadvantaged pupils. The impact of our strategy is regularly checked by a senior leader who has responsibility for our pupil premium and a named school governor.