One of the most popular discussions in our social media groups is the SERVICE PUPIL PREMIUM, what is it for? how should it be spent? Is it only available in England, etc.
The Service Pupil Premium will be paid to schools (in England only) in September/ October if parents registered their child by the 17thJanuary 2019. Schools who have Service children attending are given £300 a year to provide any additional support a military child may need. The question is what do schools do with this money?
To help with this and other areas of the education of our children we created the Little Troopers at School project. The project includes:
- A series of information sheets especially for you as parents; they cover all of the hot topics including the Service Pupil Premium.
- You may also want to join this Facebook group
- Schools can sign up to use the Little Troopers Service Pupil Premium Audit tool. It helps them to look at how they spend its Service Pupil Premium, improve or confirm strategy and recommend how it can have the most beneficial impact.
In summary; The SPP is a government fund (In England) for military children in education, it is paid to schools. The funding is to collectively support all the military children in a setting with their pastoral needs due to the unique challenges often faced as part of a military family. It is not for uniform, breakfast club, music lessons, maths tuition. It could be for a forces children only club or a forces children only residential trip.
Ultimately it is for the school to decide how to best spend the fund to benefit the military children within, it shouldn’t just go ‘into the pot’ and it is very different to the Pupil Premium fund. It should be annotated on a school’s website how they spend the Service Pupil Premium they receive.
If you or your school wish to find out more please email us or visit our website
