The inquiry will focus specifically on:
*The inquiry is not looking at educational
improvement more generally as such an inquiry would be too wide in
scope for an individual Committee inquiry. The inquiry is therefore
not about the general £100 million pledged within this
Assembly for improving school standards across the board but is
focused on funding which the Welsh Government targets at improving
the performance and standards of specific groups of pupils and
schools.
** There are various funding streams, which are over and above
general education funding. However, this inquiry is primarily
concerned with the pupils and schools targeted by funding from the
PDG and Schools Challenge Cymru. These include the aspects of the
Education Improvement Grant (EIG) intended to support Gypsy, Roma
and Traveller, and Minority Ethnic learners, and funding for
meeting learners’ Additional Learning Needs (ALN). The
Committee has already undertaken an inquiry into the EIG as well as
scrutiny of the ALN Bill.
Estyn Response re: Pupils Deprivation Grant/ Pupil Development Grant (PDG)
Estyn reports on a school’s use of PDG funding in all inspections (except when there are no or very few pupils at the school who are eligible for free school meals). Estyn inspectors consider how well schools use PDG funding as a part of their overall evaluation of a school’s resource management. In particular, inspectors consider the impact of provision funded by the grant on improving the progress, attainment and wellbeing of those pupils eligible for free school meals. Comprehensive guidance in relation to the activities that inspectors undertake to inspect approaches taken by schools and local government education services to reduce the impact of poverty on educational attainment and wellbeing is available here. Estyn has published thematic reports and training materials in relation to schools’ approaches:
Tackling poverty and disadvantage in schools: working with the community and other services, 2011
Effective practice in tackling poverty and disadvantage in schools - November 2012
Working together to tackle the impact of poverty on educational achievement - December 2013
Working together to tackle the impact of poverty on educational achievement - Training Material, 2014
Summary report – pupil deprivation, 2014
Schools are complex and it is not always possible to identify cause and effect in relation to the use of the PDG.
Main findings
· Performance of disadvantaged pupils, at all key stages has improved since the introduction of PDG. However, the performance gap between those eligible for free school meals and other pupils has not closed significantly at any stage of learning.
· In recent years, the attendance of disadvantaged pupils has improved at a faster rate than that of other pupils. However, overall there are considerable differences in the attendance rates of too many pupils who are eligible for free school meals in comparison with other pupils. For example, pupils eligible for free school meals are far less likely to have an overall attendance of over 95% than their peers.
· The gap in attendance between eFSM pupils and others increases at every key stage and is a particular cause for concern in key stage 4. Evidence suggests a strong correlation between poor attendance and low attainment especially for disadvantaged pupils. This is particularly notable by the end of key stage 4. The overall national picture does not suggest that schools have used grant funding well enough to address the poor attendance issue.
· Too few schools use the PDG well to ensure that the most able pupils from disadvantaged backgrounds achieve as well as they might. This is rarely a central aspect of school PDG plans.
· Over time, the strategic use of the PDG for looked after children (LAC) has not been effective enough. Schools have not been clear enough about how they can access training or support provided through their grant to support LAC pupils. However, recent developments with Welsh Government and the regional consortia have the potential to bring about a more effective and sustainable use of funding.
· Local authorities and regional consortia were slow to establish effective professional dialogue with schools to ensure that they use grant funding well, but this situation is beginning to improve through a better understanding within regional consortia of what works and more appropriate challenge to schools, including more partnering between schools to share good practice.
· School that are the most effective in mitigating the impact of poverty have highly effective leadership, strong arrangements to ensure that pupils attend school regularly and stay in school (not excluded), provide high quality learning experiences that interest and engage pupils delivered by effective teachers who support pupils to make the progress they are capable of making.
· In the best schools, leaders build strong relationships with parents, the local community and with specialist services to meet the needs of pupils and their families. This work has a very positive impact on pupils’ standards and wellbeing. Generally, these arrangements for working with families and local communities are stronger in primary than in secondary schools.
Overall, schools across Wales now have a stronger focus on reducing the impact of poverty than at the beginning of the inspection cycle 2010-2017. The availability of PDG funding contributes to this stronger focus considerably. Schools know that they are accountable for using this funding appropriately. Inspection activities that evaluate the progress and attainment of disadvantaged pupils and how well schools make use of the PDG provide valuable accountability safeguards.
Across Wales, schools’ work is steadily improving outcomes for pupils eligible for free school meals at each phase of education. For example, the proportion of key stage 4 pupils eligible for free school meals who achieved five A*-C grades including English or Welsh and mathematics increased year-on-year from 22% in 2011 to almost 36% in 2016.
The figure below shows that the outcomes for pupils eligible for free school meals have improved steadily since 2010 in key indicators at each phase of learning. This is true for both teacher assessment from the Foundation Phase through to key stage 3 and for the nationally gathered and externally verified data at key stage 4. Whilst the performance gap between disadvantaged pupils and others has reduced slightly at most phases of learning, the gap is only slightly smaller now in key stage 4 than it was in 2011. There continues to be a strong link between achievement and the level of entitlement to free school meals in secondary schools. As the proportion of pupils eligible for free school meals increases, the level of achievement decreases.
The EFSM/not EFSM totals are based on pupils from maintained primary, secondary, all age and special schools matched between the Pupil Level Annual School Census (PLASC) and attainment databases. Please note that the all pupils totals here are the national figures and therefore on a different basis.
Year |
2011 |
2012 |
2013 |
2014 |
2015 |
2016 |
2017 (provisional) |
% L2+ eFSM
|
22.0 |
23.4 |
25.8 |
27.8 |
31.6 |
35.6 |
28.5 |
% L2+ eFSM |
55.7 |
56.6 |
58.5 |
61.6 |
64.1 |
66.8 |
60.8 |
% point gap |
33.8 |
33.2 |
32.7 |
33.8 |
32.4 |
31.3 |
32.3 |
The way that schools use the PDG has improved since the funding was first introduced. This is partly due to the sharper focus on the progress and attainment of disadvantaged pupils within the education system as a whole. Nearly all schools now target the pupil development grant to support those eligible for free school meals. Generally, the types of activities that schools use the funding for include:
· Developing systems to track the progress of different groups of pupils including those eligible for free school meals and looked after pupils
· Improving attendance
· Family engagement work, for example through work of a wellbeing/ pastoral support officer or by involving parents in literacy, numeracy, language and play courses
· Effective work with pre-school groups, for example such as Flying Start and work with parents before pupils join nursery or reception classes
· Withdrawal programmes such as catch-up
· Improving aspects of wellbeing e.g. self-esteem (SAP, PASS)
· Paying for educational visits and residential trips including musical tuition
· Literacy and numeracy projects
· Staff development, for example to use assessment for learning strategies and develop pupils learning to learn skills
These strategies have not changed significantly since Estyn’s last submission for the CYPE Committee’s Inquiry into Educational Outcomes for Children from Low Income Households 2015 here.
However, although most schools use grant funding to provide a similar range of strategies, the impact is too variable overall. The proportion of schools that make effective use of the PDG has remained at around two-thirds of primary and secondary schools.
Schools that tend to use the funding well usually have effective leadership. These schools use the pupil development grant strategically to improve their provision. For example, they employ staff to lead and co‑ordinate all aspects of provision for disadvantaged pupils and evaluate the impact of their actions, so that they know what works well. They do not simply accept that a particular approach will work in their context because it has worked elsewhere. Leaders continually evaluate the impact that strategies have. In this way, they know what works well in their school’s unique context. They do not use poverty as an excuse for under-attainment, but have high expectations of pupils and staff in all aspects of their work. In schools that mitigate the impact of poverty successfully, the quality of teaching is always good or better. In a few instances, the development of teaching approaches such as the effective use of assessment for learning strategies is a part of a school’s PDG plan. They have effective arrangements to secure high rates of attendance amongst pupils from disadvantaged backgrounds. A few schools tailor the curriculum and support to meet the individual needs of disadvantaged learners particularly well and helps learners to make strong progress. However, inspection evidence cannot confirm categorically that this practice is because of the school’s use of the PDG.
Less successful schools often adopt many of the strategies used by their more successful counterparts, such as programmes to improve pupils’ literacy skills. However, they do not adapt or tailor the delivery of these strategies well enough to meet the needs of their pupils or evaluate the difference that initiatives make to pupils’ outcomes. In particular, too many secondary schools use the funding for ‘catch-up’ programmes at key stage 4 rather than to develop pupils’ skills sustainably throughout their secondary education. Estyn does not yet have enough evidence to identify whether schools have changed policy in response to the Cabinet Secretary’s new guidance to schools which states that 60% of PDG allocation should now go to improving outcomes in key stage 3.
Throughout the time that the PDG has been available to schools, there has been a strong culture of using the funding to support pupils at risk of under attainment, for example those who without intervention might not achieve the level expected for their age. A very few schools have used the funding to support disadvantaged pupils who are more able to achieve the highest standards.
It is difficult to quantify the proportion of schools that use research to identify evidence-based approaches, for example the work of the Education Endowment Foundation (EEF) and more difficult still to identify the proportion of schools that use this work effectively. However, it is fair to say that schools who are successful in mitigating the impact of poverty on educational outcomes use evidence-based strategies, such as assessment for learning strategies well. However, a few schools that are highly effective in raising standards of learning and wellbeing for disadvantaged learners challenge research findings based on the evidence arising from their own context. For example, a few primary schools with very high proportions of EFSM pupils demonstrate that their learning support assistants represent very good value for money through the impact they have on outcomes for pupils.
In recent years, the attendance of pupils eligible for free school meals has improved more quickly than the attendance of other pupils in both primary and secondary schools. However,