The government has revealed it will put £66 million behind the national rollout of its “Accelerator Fund” to increase access to literacy and numeracy programmes in schools over the next three years.
The fund was announced last year as part of the government’s drive to boost education catch-up after the pandemic, and initially targeted the North of England, East Midlands and the Humber, and the West Midlands.
In this year’s Schools White Paper, the Department for Education said it would provide over £55 million to the fund to “scale up” the best-evidenced literacy and numeracy interventions “across the country”, but it has now said it will put £66 million behind the rollout.
The DfE said the programme will form part of its commitment to ensure that any child who falls behind in maths or English will get the support they need to get back on track, as it set out in its White Paper.
The White Paper contains numerous measures aimed at improving attainment in maths and English, including setting an ambition for the average GCSE grade in English language and maths to rise to 5 from 4.5 by 2030, and the introduction of a “parent pledge” that any child who falls behind in English and maths will get the support they need to get back on track. The latter policy has been dismissed as “gimmicky”, by school leaders.
DfE aims to raise literacy and numeracy standards in schools
The government has also confirmed that it will back the Education Endowment Foundation (EEF) with a grant of £137 million, having promised to fund it again with ”at least £100 million” earlier this year.
Of the £66 million going to the Accelerator Fund, up to £21 million will be used to support Maths and English Hubs to roll out programmes to schools, while up to £41.5 million will go to the EEF to study evidence of which programmes are most effective, continue to scale-up its existing programmes and support schools with implementation.
Schools minister Will Quince said that the new funding would ”provide the evidence base that allows schools and teachers to give children the best start to their education”.
“This work, in addition to our ambitious education recovery plan, will help to improve the attainment of millions of pupils and level up opportunities across the country,” he added.
Sir Peter Lampl, chair of the EEF since its inception, said the new endowment would allow the foundation to continue to “evaluate and spread best practice across the country”, as well as expand its work in the early years sector.
“High-quality evidence plays an important role in supporting education practitioners’ own professional judgement, as they work to make sure that every child and young person has access to a great education,” he added.
