Covid Catch Up Premium Spending
In June last year, in response to the pandemic, the government announced £1 billion of funding to support children and young people to catch up lost time after school closure. This is especially important for the most vulnerable and disadvantaged backgrounds. This funding includes:
- a one-off universal £650 million catch up premium for the 2020 to 2021 academic year to ensure that schools have the support they need to help all pupils make up for lost teaching time
- a £350 million National Tutoring Programme to provide additional, targeted support for those children and young people who need the most help, which includes an oral language intervention programme for reception-aged children
The catch-up premium is funded on a per pupil basis at £80 per pupil. This is based on the previous year’s census. The spending of this money will be down to schools to allocate as they see best. To support schools to make the best use of this funding, the Education Endowment Foundation has published a support guide for schools with evidence-based approaches to catch up for all students. We have used this guidance document as well as other evidence-based research findings to support our planning in order to ensure the very best outcomes for all pupils.
- Money has been invested within our Academy Inclusion and Improvement Hub in order to offer our pupils and their families the support they need during this difficult time. This will allow pupils and their families to have access to support for social, emotional and mental health difficulties. For more information on what our IIH offers please follow the link - The Link Academy Trust IIH
- There is clear evidence that emotional wellbeing is a key indicator of academic achievement, and subsequently improved outcomes in later life. In view of this, we have utilised some of our funding in order to purchase Jigsaw, a bespoke and well resourced PSHE scheme of learning.
- We have increased our ICT provision across the school meaning that every child in Year 6 (as a minimum) has access to a school based laptop in order to continue to learn and take part in a quality education. Elements of our blended learning offer will continue to be offered in order that all pupils are able to receive the interventions required in order to reduce educational gaps in knowledge.
- As a school, we are continuing to offer and develop our online learning experience through the implementation of Microsoft Teams across the school. This has led to a a rigorous training programme for all staff and in turn pupils. This has allowed us to continue to offer a high quality education remotely during any school closure. Funding has been used in order to release staff for training, update existing ICT equipment and buy new.