Schools receiving school-led funding as part of the National Tutoring Programme (NTP) have been warned that they must submit an end of year statement by 16 September, or risk having the money clawed back.
School-led tutoring (SLT) is one part of the NTP and sees tuition sorted directly by schools. They can use the grant funding to employ their own staff or source external tutors.
And schools using this funding have to complete a form that explains the amount of money they have spent on SLT, the number of hours they have delivered and more.
In new guidance published by the Department for Education today, it has been recommended that schools complete the statement by the end of July, unless they’re running school-led tuition over the summer holidays.
But tuition can be offered until 31 August, and school leaders will then have just over two weeks to complete the form.
In a warning published within the guidance, the DfE has said: “If your school does not submit the Year-End Statement, we will understand that as admission that you have not carried out any SLT and we will recover your full allocation as an overpayment.”
The guidance also adds that it is not possible to submit any data after the deadline, and that cash will be clawed back if the statement is not completed “either deliberately or by missing the deadline”.
If schools have not spent their full allocation, this will also be treated as an overpayment, and the DfE said it will offset this against future payments.
In April, union leaders warned that schools face being forced to return cash after being handed the bulk of the money late in the academic year.
Earlier this year, the deadline for using the school-led cash was extended to the end of the summer holidays.
But Julie McCulloch, director of policy at the Association of School and College Leaders, said at the time that while schools would “appreciate” being told they could use catch-up cash to fund extra sessions over the summer break, the “reality” was that holiday commitments and a lack of desire among pupils to commit to summer classes “may present difficulties arranging extra sessions for those happy to go ahead”.
From the next academic year, all £349 million for the NTP will go directly to schools as part of a shake-up to the programme, unveiled in March.
