The government has finally released details of the catch-up package, but what will that mean for individual schools? We take a look.
Covid catch-up: How much money is there?
The government is allocating £705 million for young people in England to catch up on lost learning due to the pandemic. The Department for Education has not commented on how much of this is “new” money.
What can schools spend it on?
The money won’t be totally free for schools to spend as they want. Instead, there are specific activities approved by the Department for Education that schools can spend their funding allocation on.
These include the National Tutoring Programme; the Tuition Fund for 16- to 19-year-old students; language support for disadvantaged children in early years; and extra help for pupils most in need of support, including funding for summer schools.
What about the Recovery Premium?
There is also a new, one-off Recovery Premium, building on the Pupil Premium, to give further support to pupils who need it most. This is intended to help schools to bolster summer provision for their students, for example by laying on additional clubs and activities, or for evidence-based approaches for supporting the most disadvantaged pupils from September.
The average primary school will receive around £6,000 extra and the average secondary will get around £22,000 extra.
What will the full package look like?
The full recovery package will include:
- A £302 million Recovery Premium for state primary and secondary schools.
- £200 million (from the £300 million announced by the prime minister in January to expand successful tutoring programmes) to fund an expansion of the National Tutoring Programme for primary and secondary schools and an extension of the 16-19 Tuition Fund for a further year to support more students in English, maths and other vocational and academic subjects.
- £200 million (including the final £100 million from the prime minister’s earlier announcement) for secondary schools to deliver face-to-face summer schools. Schools will be able to target provision based on students’ needs but the government is suggesting they may want to focus on incoming Year 7s.
- £18 million to support language development in the early years, supporting a critical stage of child development.
How will funding allocations be calculated?
Allocations will be calculated on a per-pupil basis.
Mainstream schools will get £80 for each pupil from Reception to Year 11 inclusive. Special, alternative provision and hospital schools will get £240 for each place for the 2020-21 academic year.
A typical primary school of 200 pupils will receive £16,000 while a typical secondary school of 1,000 pupils will receive £80,000.
Funding is released in three tranches, with the first and second already having been rolled out:
- Autumn 2020: This will be based on the latest available data on pupils in mainstream schools and high needs place numbers in special, AP, hospital schools and special schools not maintained by a local authority.
- Early 2021: Based on updated pupil and place data. This payment will also take account of the initial part payment made in Autumn 2020 so that schools will receive a total of £46.67 per pupil or £140 per place across the first two payment rounds.
- Summer 2021: a further £33.33 per pupil or £100 per place.
