Changes to free school meal (FSM) eligibility will make it almost impossible to track the attainment of disadvantaged pupils over the next decade, a new report from the National Foundation for Educational Research (NFER)  warns.

In the report, entitled Investigating the changing landscape of pupil disadvantage, the organisation says that because almost 300,000 new pupils are now eligible for FSM, it is distorting the data that is often used to measure attainment gaps between FSM and non-FSM pupils.

The single biggest cause of this distortion is how the government has rolled out changes to Universal Credit, the report says.

Specifically, any child who is eligible for FSM at any point between April 2018 and the end of the Universal Credit roll-out will retain their eligibility for this whole period and until their phase - primary or secondary - of education ends, even if their family circumstances improve.

Because of this, there is now a far broader make-up of FSM pupils - and, crucially, many of these pupils have only just become entitled to FSM and so have slightly higher attainment compared with those who are entitled already.

“Generally speaking, the longer a pupil has been disadvantaged, the lower their average attainment,” the report authors note.

Because of this, NFER senior economist and report co-author Jenna Julius said it will be “very hard to tell” whether changes in attainment gaps between FSM and non-FSM pupils are meaningful, or simply caused by the influx of new FSM pupils who have higher attainment.

“It will be very hard to tell whether apparent changes to the attainment gap are being driven by changes in the composition of the disadvantage group or genuine changes in attainment,” added Julius.

This will, in turn, make it “even more difficult” for teachers, governing bodies, researchers and policymakers to “disentangle what is actually happening to the average attainment of disadvantaged pupils”.

Free school meals and the distortion of attainment data

To overcome this issue, the NFER recommends that the government looks at several measures to better understand and interpret attainment among disadvantaged pupils and their peers.

It says these could include new ways of measuring “how the attainment of disadvantaged pupils is varying according to the persistence of their disadvantage”, increasing pupil premium (PP) in line with school-level inflation over the next five years and producing an annual statement setting out how funding is being targeted towards disadvantaged pupils, through the PP grant.

Julius said these changes are needed in order to ensure that there is ”a more meaningful set of measures to unpick how the attainment of disadvantage pupils is evolving over time” - and that although it is not an easy situation to fix, it is vital it is addressed.

“This issue will not be resolved overnight, which is why we are highlighting this issue now so that the government can act to develop new measures to better understand how the attainment of disadvantaged young people is evolving in future,” she told Tes.

In response to the report, Geoff Barton, general secretary of the Association of School and College Leaders, said that while on the surface it may seem to be about “arcane data processes”, the issue that it reveals goes to the heart of schools’ and teachers’ efforts to boost educational outcomes.

“Through the law of unintended consequences, the changes in free school meal eligibility will skew the figures so that we won’t be able to tell if the attainment gap between these pupils and other children is improving or not,” he said.

As such, he urged the government to recognise “the flaws that the NFER has identified” and undertake an urgent review of free school meals eligibility and the pupil premium grant so there is accurate data to identify those most in need of educational support.

“Being able to track the progress of disadvantaged youngsters is a key element in boosting social justice, and the government’s oft-repeated phrase ‘levelling up’,” Mr Barton said.

A spokesperson for the Department for Education said the government was already committed to an “ambitious recovery plan” that included boosting school funding to help tackle attainment issues.

“We are supporting the most disadvantaged and vulnerable pupils through Pupil Premium funding, which is increasing to more than £2.6 billion in 2022- 23 and is the highest cash-terms rate since this funding began,” they said.

“Backed by £5 billion, we are rolling out high-quality tutoring, world-class training for teachers and early years practitioners, additional funding for schools, and extending time in colleges by 40 hours a year.”