Nursery World - Coronavirus: Call to double early years and school funding in 'catch up plan'

Doubling funding for disadvantaged three- and four-year-olds for a year could prevent children from falling further behind during the pandemic, the Education Policy Institute (EPI) says.

With plans to partially reopen schools from as early as 1 June, EPI is calling on the Government to implement a school ‘Catch Up Plan’ to provide critical support to those children whose learning has stalled during the lockdown period. The policy recommendations include:

A one-year doubling of the Pupil Premium for poorer pupils entering Year 1, Year 7 and Year 11. Costing around £500m, this would provide schools with more resources for catch up classes and small group tuition for disadvantaged pupils making crucial transitions into primary and secondary education, and those taking GCSEs.
The Early Years Pupil Premium for disadvantaged three- and four-year-olds also being doubled, at a cost of £31m.
New guidance on inclusion in schools to prevent a rise in exclusions when children return.
Extra support for pupils being delivered through a new national ‘Teacher Volunteer Scheme’ aimed at retired and returning teachers who may want to give their time to help schools to ‘make good’ the learning losses experienced by disadvantaged and vulnerable children.
Ofsted freezing new inspections until at least January 2021 to allow schools to focus on the challenges of re-starting education while maintaining social distancing.
The expansion of support for vital out of school services such early intervention, mental health, children’s social services and youth services.

The recommendations include allowing schools to make their own, evidence-based judgements about how best to use the proposed extra funding for disadvantaged children, including drawing on advice from the Education Endowment Foundation. It is suggested that schools would be able to increase teaching resources, including by using supply teachers and tuition available from both private and charitable providers.

Without actions such as these, researchers warn that poorer and vulnerable children could fall further behind following the period of school and nursery closures. Before the Covid-19 outbreak, EPI research found that disadvantaged children were already on average 18 months of learning behind other pupils by the time they took their GCSEs.

Commenting on the proposals, EPI executive chairman David Laws, said that a sharp rise in educational inequality is highly likely without swift and focused government action to support education providers.

‘Before the pandemic, we were already seeing progress in closing the education attainment gap grind to a halt,’ he added. ‘But the consequences of both school closure and social and economic disruption could cause disadvantaged children to fall seriously behind – scuppering the Government’s plans to level up opportunity.’