The government announced £1 billion of funding to support children and young people to facilitate a recovery curriculum and address any learning gaps after school closures. This is especially important for students from the most vulnerable and disadvantaged backgrounds.
Who can be supported?
Schools should use this funding for specific activities to support their students to catch up for lost learning over recent years.
While schools can use their funding in a way that suits their cohort and circumstances, they are expected to use this funding for specific activities which will help students catch up on any missed education, address misconceptions and close learning gaps.
The ‘EEF Covid-19 Support Guide for Schools’ suggested that a particular focus for interventions is likely to be on literacy and numeracy. Programmes are likely to have the greatest impact where they meet a specific need, in our case English and Mathematics. The EEF states that regular sessions maintained over a sustained period, which are carefully timetabled to enable consistent delivery, are most effective. The EEF states that small group tuition is one of the lowest cost, highest impact teaching strategies to support disadvantaged students who need additional support.
How are we using the Catch-up funding to support our students?
In the first instance, the funding will be used to deliver tuition for KS4 students in English and Maths. SEND and Pupil Premium (Disadvantaged) students are to be prioritised for support; however, additional KS4 students will be considered following consultation with teachers.
The use of the funding is regularly reviewed. Please see our Catch-up Strategy statement for further information.