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Schools group among 32 Covid catch-up tutor providers

Schools group among 32 Covid catch-up tutor providers

Schools will be able to book subsidised catch-up tutoring from the approved providers from today

2nd November 2020, 12:01am

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A group of schools is among the 32 organisations selected to provide external subsidised Covid catch-up tutoring to pupils in a £76 million Department for Education-funded scheme.

Schools Partnership Tutors has been established in collaboration with organisations in the education sector.

These include Unity Schools Partnership, a group of schools in Suffolk, Essex, Cambridgeshire and East London offering face-to-face and online tutoring to schools across the country, teaching school alliances, regional hubs and schools.

It is one of 32 providers selected for the National Tutoring Programme, funded by the DfE and developed by a collaboration of five charities - the Education Endowment Foundation, the Sutton Trust, Impetus, Nesta and Teach First.

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Schools will be able to access subsidised tutoring from the approved tuition partners (see below) from 10am today.

The National Tutoring Programme estimates that 15,000 tutors will made be available to work with schools via the scheme.

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The firms and organisations on the list will offer schools a range of different types of tutoring, including face-to-face and online, using tutors drawn from different pools, including supply teachers, university students and trained volunteers.

One of the approved tutoring providers has boardroom links to organisations running the National Tutoring Programme, with James Turner, CEO of the Sutton Trust, and Dominic Herrington, national schools commissioner, part of the board of The Brilliant Club.

A spokesperson for the NTP said: “Tuition partners were selected by the Education Endowment Foundation, an independent charity that has awarded funding to hundreds of organisations since it was established in 2011.

“Every tuition partner had to go through an identical, rigorous approval process. All applicants were judged by the same criteria and were appointed based on their safeguarding records, experience and quality of provision. Any conflicts of interest related to participants in the selection process were declared in full.”

Geoff Barton, general secretary of the Association of School and College Leaders, made the point that it may have been simpler to give the budget to schools.

He said: “The government needs to explain what processes have been put in place to ensure there is no conflict of interest in selecting providers for the National Tutoring Programme. We are sure this will have been carefully considered, but full transparency is essential to avoid any accusations of bias and to provide reassurance.

“It was predictable that the decision to set up a very complicated system involving lots of external providers would lead to the risk of a perceived conflict at some point. It would have been a lot simpler just to give schools the money directly so they could spend it on supporting their pupils without these distractions.”

And while it has emerged that l ess than a fifth of disadvantaged pupils will benefit from subsidised Covid catch-up tutoring, one of the approved providers has been calling for an extension of the programme.

The co-founders of The Tutor Trust, Nick Bent and Abigail Shapiro, told Tes: “As an active member of the Fair Education Alliance, we campaigned for the National Tutoring Programme and we welcomed the prime minister’s announcement in June.

“Now we urge Mr Johnson to follow the logic of the evidence and of his own commitment to ‘levelling up’, and to fund the NTP for a further two years.”

Tes Supply is also one of the Tuition Partners.

The 32 providers selected are: